St Regis Abu Dhabi has one amazing view

I recently spent a heavenly night at this hotel (on the Corniche, near the Hiltonia Beach Club) for the opening of the Sisters salon.

The amazing view aside, there is a lot to love at this hotel. Some of the highlights:

-the beach club, which has one of the only in-pool bars in the city

-the gym, which has that hard-to-find machine that lets you can do cardio using skating motions 

-the breakfast in Rhodes 44 (big bowl of berries+lots of smoked fish+freshly prepared waffles=my happy place)

-a serious Italian lunch on the lovely terrace at Villa Toscana

-expert mani-pedi-neck massage at Sisters, a relaxing, mellow hideaway with top treatments and hair stylists I can highly recommend because I've seen them in action (they cut hair and did updos to opera music at the opening - it was very dramatic)

-two items of clothing pressed and a butler included in the stay

I didn't love that there was no way to make tea or coffee in the room. They are included, and can be ordered, but it just feels like something you should be able to make yourself.

Simple sign nods to a simpler time

I noticed this a couple of weeks ago while I was having a power walk along the Corniche. I love how much of a throwback it is, the idea that in the middle of all this mayhem that is Abu Dhabi city, you really only have three ways to go: Al Bateen, Ministries Area and Hilton Hotel.

PS I feel a little sorry for the Hilton Hotel these days, if it's possible to feel sorry for a building (and I believe it is). It used to be one of the landmarks of the city and lately it's being dwarfed by the massive St Regis complex to the right and Etihad Towers to the left.  

It's hot. Summer survival guides are a joke. Except in the UAE, now, when you must have one

I have said it before and I'll say it again: August in the UAE is not that different from the depths of a harsh Canadian winter. I am as pale as a cadaver, my clothes are all too tight and all I feel like doing is laying around watching repeat episodes of all those shows that keep up with the Kardashians.

But while I never felt going outside when I lived in Canada's capital of Ottawa, where it gets seriously cold, the bottom line was that I could and if I did, I would be better for it. Much better. Once I realised that if I put on snowpants and braved it through 45 minutes, no matter how biting the wind or driving the snow, sometime in the last 30 seconds or so I would begin to feel more alive than I had ever thought possible. Once home and in my jammies I would feel so cosy, so happy and warm and lucky, that I would fall into the sleep of the dead and wake up the next morning a new, un-Seasonal Affective Disorder-ed woman.