My MIL picked up the kids from home and cooked some food to bring along. Bernie picked me up from the office and the MIL and the kids met us there too as we were all going where no Viernes has gone before. Armed with a map to resort near the camp site and phone numbers of friends who were probably already there wondering where the heck we were, we set out in two separate cars.

As usual, when I sit in the car and we have more than a half hour of driving ahead of us, I take a nap. Next time I came to, were stopped at the fork on the highway because the drivers could not decide where to go next. There we were in the middle of the highway with cars whizzing faster than the speed limit allowed and the drivers were consulting a map! Geez! Anyway, we moved on for what seemed like hours only to take the wrong turn leading into the Nakheel entrance for the Palm Jebel Ali construction site. The poor guy at the gate must be so sick and tired of waving private motorists onto the side ti turn back where they came from and tell them where to get to tehir actual destination.

Another stop, another phone call and we were on our way. Eventually we found the place. There were about 5 other groups of people dotted around the beach with their own bonfire going on. Okay, photos then…

I thought the setting was perfect for night shots so I set up the tripod behind the cars to avoid all the light from the tents. There was this bare tree with some green light behind it. I must have taken more than 10 photos but there were lots of cars passing by so I had these really bright photos. This one would have been perfect if not for that headlight on the right. Thinking about it though, I thought it was kinda eerie, like a UFO hovering low in the dead of night.
At first glance, this photo is underexposed but I wanted to capture that dark patch of grass on the top of the dune and behind it the light from oncoming vehicles. What do you think?
The men fired up the barbeque in preparation for dinner. We brought along marinated chicken, beef, lamb chops and rice, stews, fruits and all sorts of food. Even though we didn’t manage to catch any crabs, we still had plenty of food to go around.
The younger kids decided to put away their slippers as they played around the beach. They slowly made their way towards the water even though all the moms kept caling them to come back because the water was getting too cold. The kids won in the end and some of them were soaked all the way through before dinner was served.

Some of the ladies cornered me into taking their photos. Who was I to say no?
I love this particular photo of Jojo, our host for the evening. The light behind him, the blurred items on the foreground and the sharpness of his image I thought all came together into a nice shot. But then again, I’m a little biased.