Dubai: A Staycation at Fairmont The Palm

When Dubai started opening up after the lockdown, we started looking for staycations and ended up booking a night at Fairmont at The Palm. It was nice l to get away from the monotone mass that has been everyday life for the last couple of months, and our timing was just right as the hotel beach clubs were allowed to open again that weekend.

I had booked a room with sea view, because I wanted that soothing calm you get from resting your gaze at the water. Though because of some mistake, the room type had not been registered properly in the reservation system. I am a Hotels.com gold member, so I called them immediately and asked them to fix it, but it turned out that all the sea view rooms were booked by then, so we were offered to move to a hotel of similar standard with sea view rooms available, or we could get a discount voucher for our next stay. Since it was mid-afternoon and the beach was calling, I chose the voucher.

The beach at that part of the Palm is not the nicest, and the sand is rather coarse compared to the beach at JBR. Though when you have not been near the water for months, you don’t really care about aesthetics. It was just wonderful to be on the beach, and we spent the rest of the day, swimming and eating fresh fruit under the parasol.

We did not go back to our room until after sunset, so it did not matter so much that our room was facing the street and the neighboring buildings. After a quick shower, we went for dinner at Seagrill Bistro, which is the international restaurant at the hotel. International is usually a bad thing when it comes to restaurants, but the food at Seagrill Bistro was surprisingly good. I had a starter with egg, asparagus and Hollandaise sauce, and a nice pasta dish with mushrooms as a main. Though I did not manage to finish my food, because I had eaten too much of the delicious bread, we were served, before the food arrived.

We got up early the next day, so we could spend the morning on the beach before checking out. The breakfast buffet had been replaced by set menus with different themes and the food was served at the table.

We chose the American Breakfast, which looked good on paper but disappointed IRL. To be honest, I’ve had better food on planes, and better coffee from airport vending machines. I am aware that the ongoing restrictions might be posing some challenges, but this breakfast was far below what you would expect at a 5-star resort, restrictions or not. In a later post I will tell you about my stay at Atlantis, and the excellent way I think they managed the breakfast buffet.

After a couple of hours on the beach, it was time to check out and check back in to reality. I am not very good at exploring the cities I live in. Maybe it is because I am traveling so much, so when I am finally home, I just want to be, well, home. Though this staycation was a nice reminder that I should appreciate what is right at my doorstep. Times may be different now, but it is not an excuse to just let the days pass by, and I will try to get the best out of the rest of this very unusual summer.