The Kachers

18.1.10

Last few days in the Middle East

On one of our last days in Abu Dhabi Ben and I went for our first official date since Paije was born. We went for a bike ride along the water front, watched the sun go down, and had dinner at a local restaurant. Ben flew back to Brussels without us and we spent another week with his parents.

We played at the local beach and Paije had her first dip in the water. She liked it at first.

But quickly changed her mind about the whole thing.

She was happy again the moment I took her out.

She loved sunbathing with her aunt Nelli.

Cool view from the beach.

Here is a picture of the Kachers home.

6.1.10

Burj Dubai....tallest building in the world

If you haven't already noticed from my other posts, the UAE is really into setting world records. In fact there is even a building in Abu Dhabi that claims to be the largest curved building in the world. It is no suprise then that the UAE would also be home to the tallest building in the world....823 meters to be exact. Its called the Burj Dubi and it is definitely really tall.

Atleast for the next 5 years (according to the news) Paije can say she has seen the tallest building in the world.

We actually happened to visit the night before its grand opening. Even though it would have been cool to see the fireworks, we were grateful not to have to deal with the hundreds of thousands of people they expected to show up to watch the event.

Cool building next to the Burj Dubai

Right next door to the Burj Dubai is the largest mall in the world. Are you surprised? We walked around it for a while. It had some fun shops including this candy store.

It also had an indoor equarium.

Here we are enjoying some of UAE's famous juices. This particular drink has strawberry on top, mango in the middle, and avocado on the bottom.

I opted for the strawberry mango drink instead. Which do you think looks better? Mine had pistachio and strawberry ice cream on top...ok I guess they are more like milkshakes then juices.

4.1.10

Happy New Year

We spent New Years Eve out in the desert around a camp fire. The sunset was amazing.

Doesn't Paije look just perfectly posed for this photo.

Baby blessing dress

Pauline made Paije the most beautiful blessing dress. We were able to have Paije blessed here in Abu Dhabi on Christmas day. It seemed like such a perfect day for a baby blessing. Here are my favorite pictures from the day.

Camel Races

1.1.10

Fjords of Oman

This week Larry planned the most amazing trip to a city in Oman called Musandam. We drove about four hours north of Abu Dhabi up the Pennisula right to the very tip of the country. Evidently the city sits just 25 km from the coast of Iran.

Once we got there we drove up into the mountains to see what we could discover. We ended up finding lots of cliff homes. They reminded me of the cliff dwellings you can see in the Southern Utah area. The only difference is that here the people still live in them.

Larry arranged for us to camp on a dhow (traditional Omani boat) that night.

We boarded the boat around 5pm.

I was curious to see how Paije would do on her first camping trip. We carried her on with all the other camping gear.

When we set sail she just chilled with everybody.

The sunset on the water was beautiful.

For dinner that night the guide made us a traditional meal of curry something with rice.

Under the open sky Paije slept the longest she has slept in her entire life! 7 hours!!!! I think the lull of the water kept her as happy as a clam.

When she woke up (see below) she was just as peaceful as could be.

We got up and watched the sun rise together over the mountains.

The cliffs were spectacular.

During the next day Paije just laid around and dozed. In case you are wondering where she slept you can see her bed in this photo. Its just above her head.