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A Luxury Travel Blog at World Travel Market and Arabian Travel Market

Hot on the heels of last month’s Luxperience event, A Luxury Travel Blog will be in attendance at next month’s World Travel Market as well as at Arabian Travel Market next April. If you would like to meet at either of these events to discuss how we can help your travel business, please get in touch via our contact page or through the comments below. World Travel Market Staged annually, WTM is a leading global travel trade show held at ExCel London, attended by more than 50,000 travel professionals. This year it will be held from Monday 5th November to Wednesday 7th November 2018. I will be there for all three days of the event, but my diary is already about 50% full so please get in touch soon if you would like to meet up! Arabian Travel Market Arabian Travel Market will take place at Dubai International Convention & Exhibition Centre from Sunday 28th April to Wednesday 1st May 2019. It has been the leading global travel event for the Middle East inbound and outbound travel industry for the last 25 years. Again, I will be there for all four days of that one. If you would like to meet, please just get in touch.

Paul Johnson

Paul Johnson is Editor of A Luxury Travel Blog and has worked in the travel industry for more than 30 years. He is Winner of the Innovations in Travel ‘Best Travel Influencer’ Award from WIRED magazine. In addition to other awards, the blog has also been voted “one of the world’s best travel blogs” and “best for luxury” by The Daily Telegraph.

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15 Comments

  1. The first time I went to Dubai, in the late 1990s, I didn’t even know where Dubai was. I was told to go and represent the company at a Trade Fair at the World Trade Centre. On my second evening I was invited to drinks at the British Consulate. As I looked across the Creek to the lights of the Souks I decided that this place had potential so I hired a car to explore. The Exhibition had a long mid-day siesta. So at lunchtimes I drove to the Jumeirah Beach Hotel for a swim and lunch. Incredibly there was little building between that hotel and the Dubai Marine Beach Hotel. I guessed that things would change. They have and now UAE is at the hub of the Arab World’s thriving tourist industry.

    1. My previous two visits were both comparatively recent, Jeff, so I haven’t seen the changes evolving so much but imagine they must be pretty dramatic to anyone visiting over the last couple of decades. Visiting now, it’s hard to believe that you’re actually in a desert.

  2. One of the things that people don’t realise is that the Arabian world is becoming a real destination for Art Lovers. Even before you get to the exhibits inside Qatar’s Museum of Islamic Art is a beautiful piece of architecture. It is an enightening insight into the world of Islam. Abu Dhabi’s great plans to build museums and galleries on Saadiyat Island grab a lot more media headlines and that’s going to be a real draw once it is completed.

    1. Very true, Brian. The month before the Arabian Travel Market they have Art Dubai – an art fair which features over 100 galleries from all over the world.

  3. And what about the growth of sport? The first time I visited Dubai everyone was getting excited because Eric Cantona had dropped in for a beach football tournament. In 2022 Qatar will host the Football World Club. Abu Dhabi hosts one of the most popular F1 races. And Abu Dhabi now regularly hosts Cricket Test matches. Plus the Arab region has many beautiful but challenging golf courses. Whilst all these new events have come along the Arab World continues to breed world class racing horses and traditional camel-racing thrives too.

    1. True. Dubai even hosted one of the oldest rivalries in cricket recently (India versus Pakiston) at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium in front of around 25,000 fans.

    2. As a cricket nut I took advantage of a holiday in Abu Dhabi to watch the first day of the October 2016 Cricket First Test Match between Pakistan and West Indies. The match began on a Friday, the Holy Day. At the start of player there were just 22 people in the crowd, the same as the number of players. Four of that @crowd” were Swedes who saw the match in Abu Dhabi “Time Out” and were intrigued. I spent the morning explaining the Laws of Cricket to them. Once prayers were over the crowd swelled to over 3,000. But by then the Swedes, totally baffled, had departed.

  4. I’d like to meet up again, Paul… we have some new developments since we last spoke. Please can you email me? Thanks.

  5. If you are in Dubai it is worth calling in to the Dubai Museum which is based around what was once the Al Fahidi Fort. It is an important reminder of the traditional Bedouin way of life before oil was discovered and before the skyscrapers were built.

    Similarly in Abu Dhabi, it is a chastening experience to stand on the banks of the waterway that separates Abu Dhabi the Island from the mainland. Somewhere near where the Ritz-Carlton Hotel now stands, just seven decades ago, Thesinger, meet his guides and their camels, before he set off to explore what were uncharted lands to Europeans.

  6. I’m learning a lot about different trends in the travel industry that have an epicenter in the Middle East. There was even something on CNN recently about Westerners spending a good chunk of their time in that region each year forging business contacts, networking and reaching deals. Merging cultures is one of the best things about travel from my perspective.

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