United Arab Emirates » Dubai

Dubai: Camel Desert Safari & Emirati Dinner

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Free cancellationTravelers' pick

1/15

Duration7h

GroupUp to 20

LanguagesEN

PickupAt your hotel

You ride out as the desert cools, then eat under stars at a Bedouin camp

You're picked up from your hotel and driven to the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve, where you ride a camel for 45 minutes across the dunes while watching a falconry show at sunset. At the torch-lit Bedouin camp, you get henna tattoos, watch bread and coffee being made, and sit down to a 4-course Emirati dinner with live entertainment. The driver returns you to your hotel by late evening, and hotel pickup and drop-off are included in the price.

Step-by-step itinerary

Desert safari with dinner and entertainment

Pick-up from Dubai hotels
Arrive at Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve
Receive Adventure Pack and wear traditional headscarf
Ride camel through desert dunes
Watch sunset falcon show
Arrive at torch-lit Bedouin camp
Enjoy henna tattoos and live bread making
Experience Arabic coffee making and camel rides
Relax with aromatic shisha pipes
Dine on 4-course Emirati banquet
Watch cultural drumming and Yola performances
Return to hotel

The Experience

You step into an air-conditioned minivan between 2 and 4:30pm from your Dubai hotel, and within an hour you're at the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve pulling on a traditional Sheila headscarf. The staff hands you an Adventure Pack, and then you're walking toward the camels — two guests per animal, and the handlers know what they're doing. The 45-minute ride out across the dunes is slower than you'd think, which is the point; you're watching the light change, watching the sand shift under the camel's feet, and the whole thing has this rhythm that makes you stop checking your phone.

As you're riding, a falconry demonstration happens right there in the sand — a handler releases a trained falcon and it circles and dives while you're still mounted, which is the kind of detail that sticks with you. Then the camp appears, torch-lit and low-slung against the dunes, and you climb down stiff-legged and genuinely thirsty. The next few hours are a loose string of things: someone's drawing henna on your hands while someone else is making bread over an open flame, and there's Arabic coffee being poured, and if you want it there's shisha. It doesn't feel rushed or choreographed — it feels like you've walked into someone's evening in the desert, except there's also a 4-course dinner waiting.

Dinner is soup, salad, an appetizer, a main course, and dessert, all served Bedouin-style with water and juice included. While you're eating, there's live drumming and traditional Yola dancing — not a performance you watch from a distance, but something happening around you. By 9:30 or 11:30pm depending on the season, you're back in the minivan heading to your hotel, sand still in your shoes, henna still fading on your hands. The whole thing is 7 hours door-to-door, and it moves at a pace that lets you actually absorb it instead of ticking boxes.

What’s included

Hotel pickup and drop-off in an air-conditioned minivan.
a 45- to 60-minute camel desert safari with two guests per camel.
a sunset falconry demonstration.
entry to the torch-lit Bedouin camp.
traditional henna tattoos, live bread-making, Arabic coffee preparation, and shisha pipes.
a 4-course Emirati dinner with water and juice.
and live entertainment including drumming and traditional Yola dancing.

Good to know

Easy physical levelNot for pregnant travelersNot for back problems

Operated by Platinum Heritage Dubai

Is this one for you?Book this if you want the main desert experience — camel ride, sunset, Bedouin camp, and dinner — without arranging transport or timing it yourself; the fixed pickup window and 7-hour structure fit the whole arc into one evening.