Al Qudra Lakes

We'd organised to meet up with Diane today. She travels an hour out of the city to a cycle track to get her Wednesday morning exercise. In recent years, a conservation area has been created out there and that includes some lakes.

We met up at the cyclists' pit stop (Last Exit Al Qudra), had a cup of coffee, and then did the relatively short(er) drive on a dirt road to get to the flamingo lakes. We already have flamingos where the Creek peters out into salt flats, but nothing prepared me for seeing black swans. SWANS! In the UAE!! Amazing!

Despite the time of day (it was getting close to midday) and the heat caused by a very foggy morning, we enjoyed the time out and took in all we could. Another unique feature that has been created out there is Heart lakes. Best seen from the air, but I don't own a drone, so we just walked around a bit of them. Really, this was a reccy for a longer visit, preferably started earlier in the morning. What we definitely got right was doing it on a weekday. We were the only people there apart from the workmen doing maintenance or adding features.

We had lunch on the beach before getting home which is where we've been the rest of the day. It's been interesting listening to some of the proceedings of DT's second impeachment. So much evidence and yet not enough to make anything stick.

AND, one of my nephews turns 24 today. We still remember the excitement we felt when we heard he had been born! :))

PS. The extra shows more; we saw white swans too as well as other birds. We took a longer way back to Diane's car and saw gazelles in the wild.