Living in Middle Eastern countries is, for me, all about getting out into open spaces. Desert, for preference. In the Egyptian desert I had three or four favoured boltholes out in the Sahara that I used to go to most weekends, with names like Dew Camp, First Drop Camp and Three Rocks Camp.

The view from First Drop Camp at sunrise, 2014

Sleeping bags drying out at Dew Camp (see why it got the name?!), 2002

All the camps have one thing in common – they are isolated and quiet. Here in the UAE the desert, which is smaller than in Egypt, is used a lot more by recreational 4x4s and also by runners. Finding a quiet patch to vanish into is not so easy. But there are a few….

This was last weekend, in Ras Al Khaimah.

Three weeks before Christmas 2018, on the beach at Kalba, overlooking the Indian Ocean at dawn

I’m not always an antisocial git though – sometimes I go with a gang of friends

With friends from the British Embassy, Egyptian desert, 2003 (That Sakkara beach umbrella is sorely missed as a souvenir!)