On Thursday morning I headed to Dubai in my car for the weekend and just got back last night. I had a few things I needed to do on this trip, first thing was to stop at Abu Dhabi since I have a car being restored there and I needed to check on it and take it out for a test drive. Then I needed to head to Dubai because I had some things I needed to install on my car at Arctic Trucks (Mountain Top roll cover and sports bar, and Rival4X4 skid plates). Finally, on my way back I also needed to stop over in Khobar for work.
Kuwait to Dubai is a very doable trip. Its long, and it’s not something I’d do often, but it would be something I’d be willing to do if I needed to get something from Dubai which we don’t have in Kuwait. Like a couch or something, I don’t know, I just like the idea that if I found something in Dubai that I can’t ship to Kuwait or bring back on a plane with me, then I can just drive there pick it up and come back.
So here is everything you need to know in case you want to do the same trip. This also applies to driving to Qatar since you drive by the Qatari border on the way to the UAE one.
Trip Duration
I left my place in Salmiya at around 6AM, and got to my hotel in Abu Dhabi by 6PM Dubai time (5PM Kuwait time). The trip took exactly 11 hours including stopping for breakfast, a few photoshoot stops, and all the border crossings. If you’re heading to Dubai directly just add another hour on to the trip.
Google Maps
Trusting Google Maps will take you on the best route is not the best idea in the world but it’s something we do. At one part of the trip it made me exit the main highway and go through a tiny road where I swear I read a sign that said for use by ARAMCO contractors only. I wasn’t sure if 30 minutes later I’d end up at a security gate and have to turn back, I just hoped I’d end up back on the main road eventually. It did take me back to the main road but this brings up an important thing which is my trip could be different from yours. Yesterday coming back from Khobar Google sent me on a different and nicer road than my last trip back so just be aware of that.
Kuwait to the UAE Borders
I’ve already covered driving through Saudi in my previous post and the same rules apply here again. The Saudi leg of the journey although long actually passed by really quickly. The thing about driving in Saudi is the roads and scenery change very frequently. There isn’t just one straight highway from here to UAE and so the journey feels a lot more interesting since you drive through a variety of terrain and road types. You could be on a highway for 30 minutes, then a back road for 30 minutes, then driving through a coastal town for an hour, then through sand dunes for another hour, etc. The only issue I faced on this trip was the lack of fuel stations.
I think I counted 8 fuel stations that were open from Kuwait to the UAE borders, and that’s including both sides of the highway. This was the only thing that made me anxious on the way because I didn’t know if I’d find a gas station on the road ahead or not. Google Maps isn’t helpful and at one point when I needed fuel I used Google Maps to find one in a village I was driving by and Google Maps took me to a gas station under construction, and then another gas station that turned out to be a garage. So in case you need them, here are some fuel stations where I filled up at:
First stop after the Saudi borders. There is a McDonalds there so you can also have breakfast: https://goo.gl/maps/LFhKgeHkmmekjxUi8
Second station I filled at. This was in a village when I wasn’t sure if I’d find another station on the highway ahead (turns out there was): https://goo.gl/maps/CUh3oL2nteFyhfNx7
This is to where you should fill up instead of the village station I mentioned above: https://goo.gl/maps/k6zDv9PrLGMvf3FL9
For my third stop I used this station. It’s located on the other side of the road but it’s easy to U-turn to and get to. It’s located in a beach town called Salwa and it’s near the Qatar border: https://goo.gl/maps/dbY3HRz4dr7bv9Hq9
Last station before UAE border. You should fill up here before crossing into the UAE. https://goo.gl/maps/U7sdkoJRGd868hMD6
So basically there were around 4 fuel stations on the way to the UAE with the rest all closed down, abandoned or located in villages and towns out of your way.
Qatar
As I mentioned at the start of this post, you need to drive by the Qatar border to get to UAE. At one point you’ll get to a roundabout where if you go straight you get to the Qatar border, or if you turn right you head towards UAE. Because I didn’t cross into Qatar and experience the trip to Doha, I didn’t make this a Qatar guide as well.
UAE Border
Once I got to the UAE border the process was fairly easy at the Saudi side. It was just me and another car crossing at that time. The guy at the window didn’t even take my passport, I had opened my passport to the visa number page and held it out of the window to give it to him and he just looked at the number and typed it out on the computer and handed me a slip. The UAE side of the border was super nice, multiple lanes and looks like a proper border. I had to drive through an X-ray machine first before arriving to passport control. Even though I usually use the eGate when I arrive to Dubai, after giving the border guy my passport he told me I needed to drive around to the immigration building and get my passport stamped there. It wasn’t busy so the process there was also fast, I filled up a paper and had my iris scanned and then got the passport stamped. I got back into my car and then drove through the border. I had to get car insurance before leaving the border, the minimum duration was 2 weeks and it cost 210AED.
UAE Border to Abu Dhabi
As soon as you get into UAE you’re suddenly on a proper 3 lane highway with a speed limit of 160KM/h. The fuel stations on this road are also a lot nicer than Saudi, and the convenience stores and bathrooms at the stations are proper. I stopped at the first one to fill up and get a sandwich and coffee for the remaining leg of the trip. This was actually my least favorite part of the whole trip. It was around 3 hours of driving in a straight line going 160km/h with the exact same scenery. It was super boring.
Abu Dhabi and Dubai Toll Gates
So this is something I was hoping to work out but couldn’t really do it properly. So Abu Dhabi has toll gates on the road called DARB. I couldn’t figure out how to get it working with my Kuwaiti license plates and I need to check and see if I have any tolls so I can pay them before I get at fine. In Dubai they use Salik and I picked up a Salik tag with 100aed on it from a gas station on my way to Dubai. I couldn’t get it set up. Firstly I couldn’t access the Salik website using my phone data (you can’t use the App btw if foreign plates). Then when I did access the website using a shops wifi, it wouldn’t send me the OTP to my phone to verify. Luckily Google Maps has an option to avoid roads with tolls and I used that. Next day I set up Salik with my friends phone number who lives in Dubai and it worked. But it also told him that it would take up to 5 days to activate. They then called him this morning because they needed my car chassis number, he gave them my number and they spoke to me while I was typing this post up. My Salik is now active and any toll gates I passed under while I was in Dubai will now be deducted from my Salik account.
The best option to keep things simple is tell Google Maps not to use roads with tolls.
UAE to Kuwait
On the trip back to Kuwait I stopped in Khobar. I was meant to spend the night there but I ended up arriving quicker than I expected and once my meeting finished I realized I could make it to the Kuwait borders by 6PM (when there would still be some light). On the way back I left Dubai at 6:20AM (so 5:20AM Kuwait time). I headed to Khobar first, took the scenic route and stopped a few times for photos. I got to Khobar at 1:40PM (so 2:40PM Dubai Time). I was done with my meeting by 2:50 and figured if I skipped lunch and stopped for fuel only once I could make it to the Kuwait borders by 6PM. You do not want to drive on Saudi roads in the dark. I crossed the borders by 5:53PM. What sucked was that Google this time took me through a very scenic seaside road back to Kuwait and I couldn’t stop to take pictures because of my schedule.
Cost Breakdown
Here is the cost for the journey that includes my fuel stops and car insurance:
Saudi
138SAR – Saudi car Insurance
78SAR first fuel stop
95SAR second fuel stop
50SAR third fuel stop
53SAR forth fuel stop
UAE
210AED – UAE car Insurance
155AED – fuel stop
on the way back:
UAE
190AED first fuel stop
113AED second fuel stop
145AED third fuel stop
37AED forth fuel stop
Saudi
61SAR first fuel stop
111SAR second fuel stop
65SAR last fuel stop
Conclusion
I liked the trip and I didn’t find it really that exhausting. I’m not sure how many speeding tickets I got on this trip. On the UAE road where the speed limit was 160KM/h, I got flashed twice going 155KM/h. I was on cruise control and Waze was saying 155, and my car speedometer was saying 155 and I still got flashed, but only on by two cameras. I’m hoping those were just average-speed cameras that take photos of every car, I hope. Then in Saudi, the speed limit is mostly 120 so I would drive under 140. I’d pass by 20 cameras with no issues and then one would randomly flash me. No idea whats going on there. But, I did get flashed at one point for going over 140 but that was my mistake since I didn’t have it on cruise control and didn’t notice my speed.
Hopefully this guide is helpful in case you want to make this trip. I might have missed something or not covered a subject so if you have a specific question, let me know in the comments.
