2023 Alaska, Asia, Australia, Arabian Peninsula Trip
Day 102/105 - Cruise day #9 - Abu Dhabi - it's fun to say
Today, we are in our final port, Abu Dhabi, UAE. Abu Dhabi
is the capital of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi as well as the capital of the United
Arab Emirates.
We started the morning watching Cruise Director, Paul Baya’s
daily show where he runs down the activities of the day. We also caught this on the TV.
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| Nice to get a little recognition :-) |
As we exited the cruise terminal, we were greeted by local men twirling and a falconer.
Our tour today was the Abu Dhabi City Tour. The first stop was the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque.
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| You take an escalator down from this dome to the Sheikh Zayed Mall where you can gain entrance to the mosque |
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| The dome from the inside |
Let me get this out of the way. We have been in many mosques around the world. While not the biggest we’ve been in, it was by far the most architecturally beautiful. With a capacity to hold 41,000 worshipers, it is still imposing.
The descriptions below in italics are unedited and taken directly from the official website of the mosque. Anything else is from me.
As a testament to the vision of its founder, Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque sits majestically at the entrance to Abu Dhabi City Island, distinctly visible from the three main bridges connecting the island to the main land, the Maqta, Mussafah and the Sheikh Zayed Bridge. The strategic geographical location of the Mosque is a symbolic expression of the emotional connection the Mosque has in the hearts of all UAE citizens particularly because the burial place of the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, first President of the UAE, is located beside the mosque.
The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque is well recognized by its pure color, as it is clad with SIVEC marble from Macedonia. Every artistic design element was carefully considered and fits into the overall vision of the Mosque.
There are 82 domes of various sizes and the largest is located in the centre of the main prayer hall. The design elements include pure white marble cladding; onion shaped ‘crowns’ and crescent shaped finials decorated with gold-glass mosaic. The elongated windows allow the natural light to enter the prayer halls.
The inside of the domes feature traditional Moroccan artwork which has been made from reinforced plaster called (GRG). Encircling the inside of the domes are verses from the Holy Quran which are also molded from GRG and painted in gold colour.
Other domes are found on the grand gated entrance and other entrances. There are also fourteen green glass domes incorporated into the roof of the underground male and female ablution facilities. They are visible above ground and are an important feature of the Mosque’s Islamic garden design.
The main prayer hall houses the world’s largest hand-knotted carpet. The intricate Islamic medallion design was made by third generation carpet maker and artist, Dr. Ali Khaliqi. The predominantly wool carpet was hand-crafted by approximately 1,200 artisans.
Its creation was a two year project, the design took approximately 8 months, the knotting 12 months and the remaining time to transport, trim and weave the pieces together. The final single piece carpet is 5,700 square meters, about 70% being wool and the rest of 30% is cotton.
There are seven crystal chandeliers made by Faustig (Munich, Germany) situated inside the halls and foyers. The largest (located in the main prayer hall and considered one of the world’s largest in a mosque and is weighing approximately 12 tons.
Two smaller versions of the same design (located also in the main prayer hall) are weighing 8 tons each. Four blue coloured chandeliers of similar design and size are located in the foyer entrances surrounding the SZGM. The largest of them is weighing about 2 tons and located in the main foyer entrance.
All chandeliers are made from gilded stainless steel and gilded brass (approx. 40kg of 24 carat galvanized gold was used). Glass panels studded with Swarovski crystals were installed in all of them.
External Columns: The arcades of the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque are flanking by thousands of columns, which are made of white marble panels, inlaid with precious and semi-precious stones such as lapis lazuli, red agate, amethyst, abalone shell and nacre. Their overall design has been inspired from a valued tree throughout Arabia, the date palm. From the golden capitals (anodized aluminum colored with golden color) which are in the shape of a palm treetop.
The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque has 1096 columns around the arcade. Each piece was hand-carved and inlaid by craftsmen here on site and they used a special inlay technique called “Pietra Dura” which began firstly in Italy 16th century and reached Mughals in the early 17th century, and perhaps the most exquisite example is the columns of “Taj Mahal” in India.
Internal Columns: 96 columns stand in groups of four contribute to the structural support for the three main domes. The columns in the main prayer hall are clad with white pure marble inlaid with mother-of-pearl vines. This work was completed mainly by hand in Dongguan (Pronounced: Tung-kwan) ,China.
The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque has four minarets, each of which is around 106 meters high. The minaret has been the most significant component of Islamic architecture across the ages. Each minaret is made-up of three different geometric shapes. The first is a square that forms the minaret's base built according to the Arabic Moroccan architectural styles, as well as the Andalusian and the Mameluke styles. The second has an octagonal shape, which is a design that goes back to the Mameluke era. The third holds a cylindrical shape, which emerged during the Ottoman era. The crowning lantern covered with gold-glass mosaic goes back to the Fatimid era.
The word “Minaret” derives from the Arabic word “Manarah”, meaning lighthouse, so it is fitting that the library, a source of knowledge and education, is uniquely located at the minaret. It is the only library to be found in a minaret.
More views...
An Islamic clock was mounted in two places. It shows the five daily prayer times in clock time, and the prayer names in English characters, and in Arabic.
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| Prayer times |
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| Prayer names in English characters |
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| Prayer names in Arabic |
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| The outside towers are lined with spotlights that illuminate the mosque at night |
We were quite impressed with this mosque. It easily was one of the most beautiful we have seen.
We boarded our bus for two more stops. First, we stopped at the breakwater for views of the city.
Next up was a stop for a photo op of the presidential palace and the Emirates Palace Hotel plus more city views.
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| Emirates Palace Hotel |
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| Presidential Palace |
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| Just a small yacht available |
We returned to the ship.
As we boarded the ship, we caught a glimpse down a crew hallway where they were still all set up for crew Christmas.
Lunch called for a birthday beer and a Blue Moon sure went down easy.
We noticed a high yacht docked nearby. It sure looked familiar. Sure enough, we saw it before in both Gibraltar and Cadiz, Spain. It is owned by one of the Shaikhs here and it is called Yas.
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| Not a bad way to travel |
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| We spotted the Sheikh Zayed Museum |
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| We also saw the dome of The Louvre Museum, Abu Dhabi |
We were able to get in both bocce and shuffleboard for more Big O points this afternoon.
We will be cashing in the points tomorrow for Oceania swag.
We played two rounds of trivia and I am too tired to put all that in here. Arlona & I took third on our own this afternoon and our team grabbed second place tonight.
We went to Toscana - the Italian specialty restaurant and the last one for us to try. Once again, everything was terrific although the service, while great, was a little slow for our taste.
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| An outstanding bread selection |
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| They have an entire olive oil bar featuring a wide variety of flavored and spiced oils |
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| Yummy calamari for me |
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| Caprese salad for Arlona |
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| Really good carbonara for me |
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| My attitude for having only a year left to figure out Medicare |
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| Osco Buco for Arlona |
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| A caramelized peach dessert for Arlona |
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| A chocolate and blood orange cake for me |
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| They also brought me a cake and sang Happy Birthday |
We popped up on deck to see what the Sheikh Zayed and Lovre museums looked like at night.
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| Sheikh Zayed Museum |
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| Louvre |
What we didn't expect was a coordinated drone show. We caught the end of it but it was cool to see this many drones flying in a coordinated show.
It was another good day and a fitting start to my 65th year. We plan to head out tomorrow again before packing. We have to be off the ship the next day at 5 a.m. to catch our transfer to the airport in Dubai for the long, long, long travel day home.
That is a beautiful mosque. Too bad we were not allowed in any of the mosques in Saudi Arabia. The architecture and the building materials used are incredible. I love that they are not cluttered inside as that only accentuates the building itself. We saw this mosque years before we saw the outside of the mosque in Medina, S. A. That mosque holds 1,000,000. It is a spectacular site even from outside the fence.
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