Al Shandagan Watch Tower

Despite its mediaeval appearance,  the Al Shandagan Watch Tower was built in 1939 as a part of the desert facing defenses for Dubai. Even as late as then the area was rent with inter tribal warfare and petty raiding. 

Deira Dhow, Dubau

Against a backdrop of Dubai high rise buildings, wooden dhows still ply their trade across the Gulf. 

The dhows were originally copies of Chinese Junks, and have been around for hundreds of years.  They are still built the traditional way, but engines have replaced the sails.

In the photograph they are tied up and are loading cargo almost in the middle of the city, in the Deira area. 

Dubai Dhow

In Dubai, wooden Dhows are still being built on the creekside, still in the traditional materials, and they still carry goods across the Gulf.

I took this photo from my hotel window at Festival Dubai, looking out over the creek towards Jumira.

Dubai Fort

Until the late 1980s,  very few people really knew Dubai. It wasn't the big tourist place that it is now. A limited number of people went there for work, other than that no one really knew it even existed.

 When I returned to Dubai after an absence of over thirty years, just about the only thing I could find that I still recognised was the old Al Fahidi Fort. 

Built in 1787 to protect the landward approach to the village, the fort is now a museum.  Remnants of the old city walls still exist.  When I fist visited Dubai it stood alone in an area of sand. Now it is surrounded by high rise buildings. 

This is how the fort looked when I first came to Dubai:

Dubai sunset

In early 2012 I found myself back in Dubai, for the first time in thirty years.

Much had changed. I could barely find my way around the city.  but the sunsets were still blood red.

This photo sums up Dubai as I know it.  The sunset, the modern high-rise and the cranes of construction, and yet on the Creek the wooden ferries still ply their trade and on the shore workmen still build traditional wooded Dhows.

I often wonder what would have become of me if I had stayed on in Dubai.