travel | Dom's den

Just checking in with my travel log. Well, since my last check in from Kazakhstan in August I’ve been around. From Kazakhstan went to Croatia for a few days, then went to Houston TX in September.

Great times in Houston, spent some time in training, some time working, but also relaxing in Houston parks, restaurants, museums.

Had the lucky opportunity to bring my family with me so it was really great to spend some time with them in Texas.

Anyway, at the end of September, went back to Croatia, for two days, then left of for Saudi Arabia for a month. Saudi is like a second home for me now already. Loved it from the first moment I saw it.

First time I was driving from the Dammam airport to the hotel in Dhahran I had some strange feeling as I’ve seen that road before. Maybe in some previous life or something, but the feeling was definitely there.

So although travelling in Saudi is dangerous, and there is a lot of trash and car tyres besides the road (people don’t seem to care), I simply love the wild desert landscape, the immense heat of the place in the summer, Arabic food, Indian food, water tastes great when you work in the sun :).

Also, when you experience this

it puts some things into perspective. Video is not mine, but I’ve been through a few of these. They’re fun.. 😀

So, went home from Saudi at the end of October, spent a few days home, then left for Qatar on November 10th.

First time in Qatar. That I actually got to get out of Doha airport. What to say about Doha, from what I saw in the few hours I was there. It kind of looks like they’re aspiring to be like Dubai, but they are not there yet. 15 story building across the street from my hotel, that looked relatively in sound state was being teared down, probably they will build a shopping mall or something similar. Stayed at the Grand Regal hotel. Food was very good, bar was also good… 🙂

So now, I’ve been working here for some three weeks, temperature is perfect at around 25 degrees Celsius. It was actually raining for a few days, but I don’t think the desert around me noticed. Working close to Dukhan city, so went there for McDonalds, Dominos pizza… I have to admit, I like Arabic food better… 🙂

Read that Qatar is one of the richest countries in the world. Haven’t noticed it really. Probably that’s because I haven’t been in the right places. Doha seems nice, but not like Dubai.

But there is 4G signal everywhere and the wireless internet is really flying here and it’s not that expensive.

What else…. Nothing really, I leave for home in nine days. This time I hope I’ll get a month of. One can hope… 🙂

Until next time, stay safe!

Well then. Here I am again. Almost same time as last year. In the mean time, since my last check in I’ve been around. Let’s see.

Last post was in September 2014, at the time I was in USA, after that I went to Kuwait, Congo, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, USA again, Ivory Coast, Gabon, Saudi Arabia again, UAE and now I’m in Kazakhstan, but not in Tengiz, on a different oil field close to Uralsk, in the north west, like 20 km from the Russian border.

So one can say I get around. On my way over here from Dubai, I stopped over night in Almaty, south east Kazakhstan.

There, what I later found out, I got swindled by a cab driver for a taxi ride from the airport to the hotel. I didn’t mind the money he fooled me over for, but the hour and a half ride what should have been a half hour ride.

Anyway, driving through Almaty we turn around a bend and what amazed me were these huge mountains that appeared in front of us. I regret not taking a photo, but you can probably Google it.

(UPDATE: I googled it for you :)) Very nice and impressive to see.

They are 5000 meters high and have a all year round snow caps and look really impressive. I believe they belong to the Zailiski Alatau mountain base.

Stayed in a 5 star hotel the Rahat Palace. Hotel looks fair, but those are some old five stars…

Breakfast was brilliant though… 🙂

Flight to Uralsk had no excitement as the ride that followed.

There was some roadwork so the paved road was closed and the driver concluded to avoid dust from cars in front of us, he drove on the left side service “road”, in the opposite direction. As I am writing this, everything ended good.

Staying at the work site for three weeks had it charms so I’ll describe it in a few photographs.

Some very nice clouds and over ground gas pipeline

Well it aint a quilt, it's a mattress, and that below is plywood — Well it aint a quilt, it’s a mattress, and that below is plywood

Anyway, trip to Kazakhstan was colorful and I met some new friends, I’m to leave for home in 4 days so until next time, signing out…

Dom's den

Tag Archives: travel

Check in from Qatar

Kazakhstan, again… :)

This mostly seems to be my travel diary