| We took a drive into the
desert about one hour south of Abu Dhabi to The Emirates National
Auto Museum. The road there was rather impressive in the sense that it
also leads to a massive middle-of-nowhere desert waste landfill site,
which has an access road running parallel for miles on end, thus making
the route far more void of slower moving trucks. It became apparent as
we went further inland how hot the desert really is. Outside in the car
park of the museum, the heat was really unwelcoming to say the least. The museum houses the private collection of Sheikh Hamad bin Hamdan Al Nahyan with approximately 200 vehicles on show. Some of the collection has featured in the BBC television programme Top Gear. The visit was only spoilt by the fact that outside the museum, the desert heat was unbearably hot. The museum is housed in a massive pyramid building and standing outside are the world's largest motorhome, a huge globe shaped trailer, a 4:1 scale Jeep and a 4:1 scale Land Rover. Inside there is an unusual collection of predominantly 1950s to 1990s vehicles in various stages of customisation, hard to find in any other car museum; Exhibits include seven Mercedes (one in each colour of the rainbow for each day of the week), a 5-metre-high Dodge with a complete apartment under its roof, a number of 1950s American and 1970s European limousines, a large collection of 4-wheel-drive vehicles, modern classic cars, military vehicles and a Rolls-Royce Phantom used by Queen Elizabeth II, during a visit to the Emirates. All exhibits are in excellent condition and several are roadworthy. It was very easy to spend 2-3 hours there, even for the non car-fanatic. Here are a few of my photos. Alas, I got a bit carried away there with the camera; time permitting and when I can find some server space, a separate sub-site may be appearing to show my 200+ photos of each of the vehicles exhibited. |
