Desert Rose and Zekreet Tour

Joined the tour by 365 Adventure on 24 February 2017, since we were 9 persons, they provided 2 cars.
Though the tour company provided the itinerary as below, we didn't quite follow it.

First, on the way to see the desert rose, we stopped by to an abandoned village in Al Nasraniya.
We saw a camel farm on the way, and asked a photo stop.
Our driver, Saif, also the co-founder of the company, then got lost in finding the desert rose.
Quite a long time we drove around the desert trying to find a way to cross a very long fence.
We made a toilet stop in a camel hospital.
Finally he followed our suggestion to get out first from the gate we entered since it looked like the fences were connected to the gate.
We succeeded to get out from the fenced desert, but it took long time also, since Saif lost the GPS coordinates of the desert rose location.
I almost requested him to give up since we would only waste our time driving around a a huge are in the desert to find desert rose.
However, finally, he found the location of the desert rose.

The desert roses were very small and spread out in a small sandy area in the desert.
But they were uncovered naturally.
I thought we had to dig out to find a desert rose.
After satisfied taking photo with the desert rose, we headed to Zekreet.

The East West / West East monument by Richard Serra, I wanted to visit since long time.
Four 30 meters height steel plates, separate each other about 400 meters in the middle of the desert.

After satisfied taking photos, we found a place to do BBQ, shaded from wind.
Our Japanese friend did an elaborate BBQ for us.
We enjoyed relaxing time, eating BBQ, drinking and chatting on the big carpet brought by the company.

Finally we didn't have time to visit other places and ended the tour with the BBQ. 

Desert Roses Tour:

Inclusions:

    8 hours excursion
    Desert Rose scouting excursion - 2 hours
    Zekreet city stop-over including visit to Richard Sierra's art pieces and Film City
    Stop-over at Zekreet Beach or Rocks for BBQ camping
    Drop-off back to Doha


Price:

    200 QR per person
    Bring your own meat for BBQ

QF Art Trail at Georgetown University in Qatar

A new nice event to see the art works installed in various places in Education City.
Found about it in an article in below link and joined the session on 25 February 2017 to tour the art works inside Georgetown University in Qatar.
http://www.gulf-times.com/story/533514/QF-to-hold-guided-art-tours-in-Education-City
The tour was conducted by the QF curator, Ms. Leila.
Around 20 persons were in the tour.
I enjoyed the tour, giving a chance for public to watch the art works inside the university.

One of my favorite was the stalactites, lots of big stainless steel structure with shape like stalactites, hanging on the high ceiling of atrium (food court). 
The other one was the pot clay huge 3D plate in the Majlis (VIP Room).

Short Night Cruise

The boats are waiting for passengers at several stops along Doha Corniche at night.
Typically, it is QAR 15 per person for 30 minute ride, but it can be negotiated.

That time we got on in a stop between Sheraton Hotel and Oryx statue.

Baladna The Farm

http://www.baladna.co/en/home.aspx

Visits: 10 February 2017, 4pm
Taste: 3/5
Cost performance: 2/5
Location: Off of Shamal Road in Al Khor (Exit 40), follow Google Map

Baladna is a sheep farm, located in Al Khor, off of Shamal (North) Road, Exit 40, we followed Google Map to reach here.

It is a huge farm with 20,000 sheeps, equipped with the meat and other product factories, a restaurant, a cafe and shops selling their product.

Visited with a friend for late lunch at 4pm on Friday.
The restaurant was crowded with Arabic people. Initially we were told to come back at 6pm, but somehow we managed to get the table from a group of guest just finished their meal, showing that they were not really organized allocating the tables for waiting guests.

The restaurant was not big, but quite nice, with few unique stations.
There was a station for the popular pot, meat and vegetable stew covered with a pie, and baked in the charcoal stove.
There was also another station for fresh labna (yoghurt), desert, meat meal.
We ordered the pot, the meat meal and labna, and paid QAR 327, not cheap, but we enjoyed the meal, though it was too oily for us.

We also tasted the halawa cheese desert, a chilled desert, and was good. QAR 40 for half kilo, can be kept for 3 days in the fridge.

After the meal, we did a small excursion, provided for free, on a golf car.
The driver answered our questions about the farm.
We saw so many sheeps.
Mainly, they are breeding Syrian sheep for the meat. There were also Syrian goat for the milk.

After the excursion, we visited the cafe which was selling chawpati and drank karak tea (QAR 6).

Our bill:
- Baladna breakfast tray, QAR 149 --> the pot
- Lamb Cutlets 400g, QAR 135
- Americano, QAR 15
- Capuccino, QAR 18
- Fresh Ayran Glass, QAR 10