Dubai Essentials, 4 Nights

Met at Dubai International and driven to the hotel; flights from India land at all hours, and the day is built around the pool until evening. Then out to Dubai Marina for the dhow dinner cruise: a wooden boat with a buffet on board, two hours along the canal between the lit towers, past the yachts and under the bridges, and back to the hotel by ten. The first sight of the city is the one it is proudest of.

The morning is Dubai before the towers. Al Fahidi's lanes of coral-stone houses with their wind towers, the Dubai Museum quarter and the Al Shindagha waterfront, then an abra — the open wooden ferry that has crossed the creek for a century — over to Deira and the spice souk and gold souk on the other bank. Lunch in Bur Dubai, where the Indian kitchens are the best in the city. The afternoon is free. In the evening the Dubai Mall and the Burj Khalifa: the timed ticket takes you to the 124th and 125th floors, and the fountain plays on the lake below every half hour from six. Dinner on the promenade with the fountain in view.

The morning is yours: Jumeirah's public beach, the pool, or the mall. Around three in the afternoon the 4x4 collects you for the desert: an hour out of the city, tyres let down at the edge of the dunes, and half an hour of dune driving that is the reason people book it. Then the camp — a camel ride, sandboarding, henna, Arabic coffee and dates, the sunset from the ridge, a barbecue buffet with vegetarian dishes clearly marked, and the tanoura and fire shows after dark. Back at the hotel by about nine. Dune driving is not suitable for pregnant women, children under three or anyone with a back condition; a flat drive to the camp is arranged instead.

The modern city in a morning. The Dubai Frame first, the gold rectangle in Zabeel Park whose glass walkway at 150 metres looks at old Deira on one side and Downtown on the other, and then the Palm Jumeirah: the monorail runs up the trunk of the artificial island to the Atlantis end and back, which is the only way to see the shape of the thing from the ground. Lunch on the Palm. The afternoon and evening are free; from October to May the Global Village opens at four, with its country pavilions, street food and fireworks, and is the best last evening a family or a group can have. Otherwise the Marina walk or the JBR beach road.

Breakfast, checkout and the transfer to Dubai International for the flight home, which is three to four hours to most Indian cities. If your flight is late in the day the hotel can usually hold your bags, and a final morning at the Dubai Mall or the Mall of the Emirates — with Ski Dubai inside it — fills the gap. On request the day can add the Ain Dubai wheel at Bluewaters before the transfer.