3000cc Dune Buggy & Sandboarding - Private Experience

We’ve been to Dubai many times, but somehow this super cool experience somehow escaped us, until now! We were originally reluctant to do it in the middle of the hot season thinking that 40+ C temperatures are going to be too hot to enjoy it. It was not an issue at all! We booked the experience for 5.30pm and the temperatures in the desert cooled down to mid 30C and with the breeze while driving, it was a very pleasant experience. You get goggles included in your hire & can purchase a scarf to protect your nose and face from the send at the host’s HQ. If you don’t wish to purchase the scarf there, I’d say be prepared and bring your own. It is probably not essential but I would not recommend the experience without it. Our guide was Sultan and he was excellent. Not only he was a great driver of the lead buggy picking up on your driving abilities and going fast where he can see you are confident to follow or slowing down where it was more tricky, he was also a great photographer and an awesome host. We could not recommend this experience high enough, if you are looking for something unique and fun to do an hour’s drive from Dubai.

Sultan was a perfect guide for this risk taking experience! He lead us nicely through the dunes and took some great pictures for us half way through. Very hot weather but they provided us heaps of cold bottled water!

We enjoyed our experience with Arabian Expedition. Our package included transportation to and from our resort. The transportation was exceptional. We were picked up in a very new clean GMC Denali with a friendly and knowledgeable driver (Jay) who made the hour drive from our resort to the desert a fun experience on it's own. Upon arrival we were quickly and politely greeted by all the staff who offered plenty of drinks and snacks including plenty of nice cold water. They also have clean restrooms at the office to use before heading into the dunes. We brought our own balaclavas which double as cooling towels that I have used for riding in the US. However they do offer face scarves for purchase if you don't have your own. If your going on the edge of the season I definitely recommend cooling towels or cooling balaclavas like we used because they made the experience very comfortable (we went in May, it was 38 degrees Celsius. They provided tinted goggles which were excellent for the sunny desert. I Highly recommend good quality full shoes. The desert sand is extremely hot, hot enough that it literally melted the soles off my brothers Adidas sneakers and my Fathers loafers! My Merrill Nova's did great as well as my fiancé's sketchers had no issues. My mother wore sandals and the sand was too hot to handle on her feet at one point. You won't be doing any walking however if someone gets stuck you may need to get out, also there's the photo ops and sandboarding. The vehicles themselves are definitely rentals and you can tell they get used often and have some miles on them. This was not a surprise since they are the only business offering true sandrails as an option for the dunes here. I felt like it took a little while for the suspension to get warmed up and start really soaking up the bumps as the beginning of the ride felt more rough than the end but it might have just also been me getting used to working through the ruts and lines of this sand which is heavier than Glamis sand. That being said, they rails ran excellent, had decent safety harnesses, good seats, and we felt very safe in them. The tires were in good shape and the sandrails felt overall mechanically sound. They have a ton of power, more than you will use in the dunes here. Our guide was great however I cannot recall his name. He was an excellent driver and had great lines cutting through the dunes. I ride dunes often in the US (Glamis) so I could easily tell he, and the rest of the crew, were very experienced in "Dune Bashing" as they call it here. The pace through the dunes was great. I could tell our guide was able to quickly determine the abilities of the groups drivers and adjust accordingly. As a passenger you will just need to hold on and scream if needed lol. It was great fun, as fast as we could handle, and as exciting as we wanted, with great photo ops. I would highly recommend this experience and we would definitely do it again exactly the same but my brother and father would wear better shoes.