So as we eluded to, we didn’t budget much time in Kuwait. Just enough time to go out and see a few things. And we started that as soon as we took the taxi downtown to our hotel. Quite the skyline! And our view from the hotel window didn’t disappoint.

We immediately left the hotel for a walk. Only around the block because it was already close to midnight and we were tired, but we just couldn’t resist.

And Kuwait did not disappoint.

They clearly have a World Cup favourite! World Cup fever is alive in Kuwait!

And with that, we went to sleep happy. We woke up well rested after all that travel and had to eat a big breakfast at the hotel to get energy for what would turn out to be another long (but enjoyably long) day! With views like this, why wouldn’t you want to get going in the morning?

Then it was off to start our adventures. Usually we tell the story chronologically, and we will show you it chronologically like always. But my partner just wanted to make it clear that he carried me around for 10 km today. All just walking around. And as we would soon learn, it doesn’t seem like Kuwait has a big walking culture..

We were then explained that today was a cool day (around 25 degrees Celsius) and that in the summer it has gotten to about 65 degrees Celsius in the not so distant past. With temperatures like that, of course you don’t want to walk kilometres and kilometres. Even if you are treated to skylines like this.

And street art like this.

But we had one main goal today, and that was to make it to see the Kuwait Towers. With that in mind we headed out to the Gulf! Along the way we saw more proof that we are getting closer and closer to the host country of the World Cup!

But then we made it to the Arabian Gulf!

And with that, our first look at the towers!

So we headed over, paid the fee (3 KWD, about 10 USD) to go up to the look out sphere, and took in the Kuwaiti skyline and the Arabian Gulf.

One thing to note for tourists, you cannot use big cameras up here. You are only permitted to use your mobile phone to take pictures/videos. We had previously read that many countries in the Middle East had stricter rules around photography/filming than we were used to back home for privacy and security reasons. We were allowed to enter with ours, just not use it. Just a heads up!

Then it was off to walk along the coastline. We were hopeful to visit at least one more monument in Kuwait before having to leave, because it was already getting close to our next flight. We saw malls, marinas, and traditional boats, and I got my partner to snap my picture with this example.

Along this walk was the first time we heard the call to prayer. It was quite interesting to hear for the first time as all of a sudden (to us, it is on an actual schedule) there was the call to prayer ringing around the city from various minarets. Very interesting, and definitely not the last time we will be hearing it.

Another thing we saw while walking around this part of the city was this on the side of a building.

There wasn’t any information to be had about this, but knowing a bit of the history of Kuwait we imagine that this was because of the Gulf War (1990-1991). We were told that this is still very much in the minds of Kuwaitis and has had lasting effects (obviously) on the society. If anyone knows that we completely misinterpreted this, please let us know! We like learning as we travel!

Continuing along the waterfront promenade, we ended up outside of the Sief Palace (in the background below). Here we found a tourist that told us it was unfortunately closed. We hadn’t even considered entering it since we hadn’t even known it was here.

What we had actually come for was this:

The Grand Mosque of Kuwait. For anyone that followed along our World Cup trip through Russia, they will know we entered a lot of Russian Orthodox churches, will this trip see us entering a lot of mosques? Not off to a great start here. We were too late for the 9 am public tours, and too early for the 4 pm public tours. Unfortunately, by 4 pm we will be out of the country. Next time! It looks absolutely HUGE!

We were able to use this vantage point to see another cool landmark though. Too bad we were already running late to check out of our hotel, or we could have tried entering here as well. We think that it is absolutely amazing that there is a central library only for poetry. Must be amazing inside, and even more so if you can read Arabic (or if they have translations, we have no idea).

Then it was time to power walk back to the hotel. On the way we randomly walked along random streets taking random pictures. Like outside of this (what we assume, could be completely off) mosque.

Another interesting sight were the shopping districts. We aren’t used to seeing the same item being sold by numerous stores side by side back home, although we have seen this type of store grouping in other countries along our travels. This place was absolutely filled with bikes! We also saw places that were only for phone repair, then SIM cards, then various electronics, then toys, and lots of different examples.

But with that it was back to where we started last night so that we could check out and head back to the airport!

The trip continues! It was a nice stay in Kuwait, although extremely short.

Here we also had a bit of time to kill before our flight, so we walked the entire terminal a few times. And we got more and more excited as we got closer and closer to the World Cup. Can you tell?

Then it was time to hop on our last flight for a little bit!

It is goodbye to Kuwait and hello to the World Cup and Qatar! Beyond excited!

It’s still early enough to go out and start exploring Doha today, but that will have to wait for the next entry for this trip! Time to get settled into Doha!