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- Jan 24, 2018
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Just going to do a TR on the Mysk Al Badayer as we had such a great time.
Mysk are in the GHA hotel program and thanks to a cheap mattress run in Asia I was elevated to GHA’s highest tier which is Titanium.
To anyone not familiar with GHA they have 4 tiers being Silver, Gold, Platinum and Titanium and to reach Titanium you require either 30 nights, US$15k spend OR stay at 3 of their brands.
On our travels through Vietnam and Thailand I booked at 3 properties for 1 night each and simply checked in, left and then went back the following day to checkout.
My 3 properties were
- Pan Pacific Hanoi $141
- Parkroyal Saigon $106
- Avani Atrium Bangkok $61
So as you can see for the princely outlay of $308 I had fulfilled my Titanium obligations. All stays credited within 24hrs of check out and my tier status changed at the same time pretty much. Now to put my freshly minted Titanium card to use.
We were doing a driving holiday in the UAE and were traversing every Emirate and were looking for some cool places to chill out and relax and thought that Mysk Al Badayer looked perfect. We had booked the one bedroom tent for 4 nights as I didn’t want to risk missing out on it if upgrades aren’t guaranteed. Room cost just under $700 per night was well and truly worth it IMO. We had a hire car and although it was only about a 2hr direct route from Abu Dhabi we decided to see the sights and put the pedal to the metal. The roads are simply fantastic throughout the UAE even if the drivers are absolute loons we still had some fun especially in the 160km/hr zones where our poor little MG rental was getting overtaken like we were standing still despite me nudging up over the speed limit. Eventually after a few rest stops and snack breaks not to mention photo stops we arrived at the resort at around 1430.
The resort lies just out of the Al Madam township and the hotel is only set back from the 6 lane highway by a few hundred meters. Arrived at the boom gates and security checked my booking credentials and buzzed us in to where we parked in the car park. The sounds of dirt bikes and dune buggies was quite loud as they were buzzing around the surrounding dunes. First thoughts were that this wouldn’t be relaxing but shouldn’t have worried. We were escorted from our car in a golf cart and whisked to reception where the relevant check in was completed and then we were given the royal tour of the property via golf cart. I fell in love with the place and when we arrived at our private “tent” well I knew we had made a great decision. The giant dunes that stretched fro miles around the property seemed to soundproof the resort and the stay only got better. Private temperature controlled pool backing on to one of the many dunes was so relaxing and at night with the stars out it was absolutely fantastic. The resort was across the border in the Emirate of Sharjah so was a dry resort which was fine by me for a few nights. Welcome gift of a personalised red velvet cake and a assortment of dates, dried figs, apricots was nice and the room was comfortable and had great views to the dunes and open sky. First night there we decided to eat at the resort and had the buffet dinner with all drinks included (non alcoholic of course) and set us back about $80 each but wasn’t a bad spread. The following night we drove into surrounding towns and sampled local cuisine and enjoyed that too. Breakfast was in the same restaurant and as dinner and offered up a pretty decent buffet as well as some cooked to order food. A couple of pools on site for those in the regular part of the hotel and numerous activities set up around camp such as table tennis tables, dart boards, soccer goals etc. As Titanium members our local gift was a free 45min camel ride which was nice and gave us a great view of the resort and surrounds.
The hotel organises numerous activities such as dune buggies, motorbikes, 4WD bashing etc and I chose to go on the 4WD tour with a very experienced local who had the Toyota on two wheels numerous times around and over the dunes.
Was a memorable 4 nights and I’m already thinking about when we can squeeze in another trip to the UAE as we enjoyed the resort that much
Mysk are in the GHA hotel program and thanks to a cheap mattress run in Asia I was elevated to GHA’s highest tier which is Titanium.
To anyone not familiar with GHA they have 4 tiers being Silver, Gold, Platinum and Titanium and to reach Titanium you require either 30 nights, US$15k spend OR stay at 3 of their brands.
On our travels through Vietnam and Thailand I booked at 3 properties for 1 night each and simply checked in, left and then went back the following day to checkout.
My 3 properties were
- Pan Pacific Hanoi $141
- Parkroyal Saigon $106
- Avani Atrium Bangkok $61
So as you can see for the princely outlay of $308 I had fulfilled my Titanium obligations. All stays credited within 24hrs of check out and my tier status changed at the same time pretty much. Now to put my freshly minted Titanium card to use.
We were doing a driving holiday in the UAE and were traversing every Emirate and were looking for some cool places to chill out and relax and thought that Mysk Al Badayer looked perfect. We had booked the one bedroom tent for 4 nights as I didn’t want to risk missing out on it if upgrades aren’t guaranteed. Room cost just under $700 per night was well and truly worth it IMO. We had a hire car and although it was only about a 2hr direct route from Abu Dhabi we decided to see the sights and put the pedal to the metal. The roads are simply fantastic throughout the UAE even if the drivers are absolute loons we still had some fun especially in the 160km/hr zones where our poor little MG rental was getting overtaken like we were standing still despite me nudging up over the speed limit. Eventually after a few rest stops and snack breaks not to mention photo stops we arrived at the resort at around 1430.
The resort lies just out of the Al Madam township and the hotel is only set back from the 6 lane highway by a few hundred meters. Arrived at the boom gates and security checked my booking credentials and buzzed us in to where we parked in the car park. The sounds of dirt bikes and dune buggies was quite loud as they were buzzing around the surrounding dunes. First thoughts were that this wouldn’t be relaxing but shouldn’t have worried. We were escorted from our car in a golf cart and whisked to reception where the relevant check in was completed and then we were given the royal tour of the property via golf cart. I fell in love with the place and when we arrived at our private “tent” well I knew we had made a great decision. The giant dunes that stretched fro miles around the property seemed to soundproof the resort and the stay only got better. Private temperature controlled pool backing on to one of the many dunes was so relaxing and at night with the stars out it was absolutely fantastic. The resort was across the border in the Emirate of Sharjah so was a dry resort which was fine by me for a few nights. Welcome gift of a personalised red velvet cake and a assortment of dates, dried figs, apricots was nice and the room was comfortable and had great views to the dunes and open sky. First night there we decided to eat at the resort and had the buffet dinner with all drinks included (non alcoholic of course) and set us back about $80 each but wasn’t a bad spread. The following night we drove into surrounding towns and sampled local cuisine and enjoyed that too. Breakfast was in the same restaurant and as dinner and offered up a pretty decent buffet as well as some cooked to order food. A couple of pools on site for those in the regular part of the hotel and numerous activities set up around camp such as table tennis tables, dart boards, soccer goals etc. As Titanium members our local gift was a free 45min camel ride which was nice and gave us a great view of the resort and surrounds.
The hotel organises numerous activities such as dune buggies, motorbikes, 4WD bashing etc and I chose to go on the 4WD tour with a very experienced local who had the Toyota on two wheels numerous times around and over the dunes.
Was a memorable 4 nights and I’m already thinking about when we can squeeze in another trip to the UAE as we enjoyed the resort that much
