Saudi Arabia Road Trip Eid 2014 - Day 1

Jamie and I hadn’t seen much of Saudi Arabia.  We have always spent our vacations getting out of the country whenever we could.  Some friends of ours were planning a road trip around the country and asked if we wanted to go.  It seemed like a good time to do it, so we agreed.  So, four families loaded up in four separate vehicles and set out for a 36+ hour 3600+ km road trip.  Our journey will take us from Al Khobar to Riyadh to Taif to Jeddah to Medain Saleh to Ha’il back to Al Khobar.  We will see the capital city, the resort town of Taif in the mountains, the Red Sea city of Jeddah, the pre-Islamic archeological site of Medain Saleh, and the drive through the deserts and terrain of Saudi Arabia. 

We left the parking lot at ISG in Khobar at 4:00 for the drive to Riyadh.  The drive to Riyadh was hectic.  There are 3 lanes, but a 4^th lane is created on the far left as people pass going about 100 – 120 mph.  If you stay in the middle lane, you will be fine until you need to pass someone.  If that is the case, you’ll need to quickly pass the person on the left but get out of the way as someone will quickly be on your bumper flashing their lights. 

Nonetheless, we made it safely to Riyadh pretty easily and made it in about 5 hours.  We stayed at a pretty nice hotel called the Golden Tulip Andalusia.  I crashed in the room while Jamie went out to get something to eat with James.