My 2002 Persian Gulf Deployment #2: Dubai, UAE - Off roading and sandboarding

These videos are from my second deployment to the Persian Gulf, October 2001 - May 2002. A month after 9/11, Canada sent 6 warships to the Gulf and I was on one of them, the HMCS Vancouver. We were a part of a US battlegroup headed by the USS John C. Stennis aircraft carrier. They skipped over another Arabic linguist (who had never been deployed) to get to me. This is pretty much how I was treated my entire career. But I digress...

During my first deployment, we stayed in Dubai for 2 weeks and I didn't do anything. I always regretted that so this time I was determined to spend my time wisely. On this day we went offroading, rode a camel and went sandboarding in the desert.

I have no video of me on the camel because the guy I gave my camera to, pushed in the record button to point it at the ground and then pushed it again (shutting it off) when I got close to camp.

Sandboarding was not nearly as much fun as in the brochure :) It was blistering hot that day and my comment "Hey, how do we get back up" turned out to be a very important one. We had to hike back up to the top after going down two dunes. I went down twice, climbed back up and sat in the truck drinking water. I thought maybe the truck would come down and pick us up, but nooooo.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• Dubai
• UAE
• deployment
• Persian Gulf
• HMCS Regina
• sandboarding
• off roading
• desert safari
• Doug FM

[gabed13]

Adding a new perspective on the expression "pound sand"

I hope it was all worth it.