BAHRAIN -
Really nothing to write home about here. Thanks to Kim, we stayed at the Intercontinental, a necessary step up from where we had considered residing. Within minutes, we realized why everyone's response to "Where are you heading next?" ("Bahrain.") was "WHY in the world would you go THERE?!" Absolutely nothing to see, not even a good souq - trust us, we searched high and low and somehow managed to spend $$ in the one shop we found open with pashminas and jewelry! Other than that, we enjoyed the rooftop swimming pool and room service for breakfast. Night one was spent at the nasty Le Bistro Thai buffet inside the Intercon, where we were the only females in the company of a handful of American military men. Our second and final night, we ventured across the pool deck to the Lebanese place affiliated with our hotel, which was okay but not as scrumptious as what we ate in Dubai. We had planned to wander farther for Lebanese, but after scoping the possibilities with the concierge, we discovered that while we could have our pick of hotel restaurants, why not just stay within the safety of the trusty old Intercon?!
We also must admit that we fell in love with cable television. We found 2 English language channels, one of which was Star World and WONDERFUL. We enjoyed a few too many awful movies to help us fall asleep, including our new favorite, Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle and a couple of cheesy romances. Needless to say, we were ready to go when the time came to fly to Hong Kong!