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Get a Personal Pick →United Arab Emirates
21 destinations
City Al Ain Oasis
"A 3,000-year-old falaj still waters 147,000 date palms in the middle of a desert city."
City Al Jazirat Al Hamra
"The Gulf's last intact pearling town stands empty, coral walls open to the wind."
Wilderness Al Madam
"Sand pours through the doorways of a village the desert is swallowing whole."
Wilderness Al Marmoom Desert Conservation Reserve
"Flamingos wade through a mirage-like lake in the middle of the Arabian desert."
Water Dalma Island
"An island inhabited for 7,000 years, where Mesopotamian pottery predates the pearl fleets."
Water Dibba
"One bay, two countries, three jurisdictions: fishing dhows work the borders beneath Hajar cliffs."
City Ed-Dur
"A lost Gulf port with 20,000 graves and the region's only temple to the sun."
Wilderness Fossil Rock (Jebel Maleihah)
"Shells from an 80-million-year-old sea floor stud a peak in red dunes."
Mountain Hatta
"A turquoise reservoir pooled between rust-red peaks, in the emirate everyone thinks is all sand."
Mountain Jebel Hafeet
"A road of sixty corners spirals up a bare limestone fang above 5,000-year-old tombs."
Mountain Jebel Jais
"Ice sheets the UAE's highest ridge on the coldest winter dawns, desert haze far below."
Water Kalba
"A kingfisher that exists nowhere else nests in the Emirates' oldest mangroves."
Wilderness Liwa Oasis
"South of the last date farm, Moreeb Dune lifts 300 metres of sand at 50 degrees."
Water Ras Al Khor Wildlife Sanctuary
"Flamingos feeding on salt flats while Dubai's skyscrapers shimmer behind them like a mirage."
Water Saadiyat Island
"Hawksbill turtles nest on protected dunes a boardwalk away from the Louvre's rain of light."
Water Sir Bani Yas Island
"A year after the first oryx arrived here, the species went extinct in the wild."
Water Snoopy Island
"A rock shaped like a sleeping beagle, ringed by coral where reef sharks patrol."
Wilderness The Empty Quarter (Rub' al Khali)
"The largest sand sea on Earth: no roads, no landmarks, only dunes and planetary silence."
Mountain Wadi Bih
"A gravel track climbs between thousand-metre limestone walls towards a border only rock crosses."
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Legendary Destinations
Little-known places, unlike anywhere else, that leave you awestruck and full of stories.
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