Good bye to Dubai today, our flight was at 1pm to Mumbai. Nothing much to do other than, breakfast and then head out to the airport.

At breakfast, Pooja did not find her favourite waffles on the buffet (it was pancake day at the buffet) – she asked the Chef who did not hesitate and made fresh waffles just for her!

Hotel review for Novotel Suite Dubai – Mall of Emirates

Service: Great service, accommodating all requests and assisting with sight seeing bookings. 5/5
Accommodation: This accommodation is suited for families,  and was great for us. The rooms are a decent size, with sleeping areas on each opposite end of the rooms, one for parents and one for kids. The middle section has a living area, and a small nook for coffees/teas etc. Two showers were in the room and one toilet. The bathrooms & toilets were however very tiny – not ideal at all. 3/5.

highly recommended and would definitely come here again.

A final check in the room, bags packed and loaded into our waiting car.

Being a Saturday, the roads were not too busy, which was great, we were at the airport in just over 30 minutes, lots of time for Nita and the girls to browse the various duty free shops – always a dangerous scenario with three girls!

Our flight Emirates EK502 was on time and departed @ 1:10pm, it was a Boeing 777 LR 200, all 4 of us seated in the middle section again.

3.5 hours later, we were in Mumbai, whilst my immigration was quick (thanks to my OCI), unfortunately the E-VISA processing for the girls took over 45 minutes, it was the slowest service and was so frustrating. E-VISA was supposed to be quick??
Not sure why, but it seems India does its best to portray its lack of speed and process from the moment you enter the country! Very disappointing, but I guess that is expected!

Collected our bags and out of the customs area, our car to Novotel Juhu was awaiting, they decided to split the luggage into two cars, then the LOOOONG ride to the hotel. The hotel is close to the airport but Mumbai traffic on a Sat night is a nightmare, what should have taken us under 30 minutes, took over an hour. Pooja was with me in one car, Nita and Neha were in the other. All along, it was interesting for Pooja to be seeing the Kaos of Mumbai traffic. Managed to spot an AUTO with her name on it.

Finally arrived at the Novotel, quick check-in & freshen up then to hit the road – meeting Jayesh, Priya & family @ JW Marriott at 8:30pm. They had arrived in Mumbai a couple of days earlier.

It was close 9pm when we finally did make it to JW. Down to the Lotus Cafe on the giant stairways, saw Jayesh, Priya and their daughters – Neha & Payal! Big greetings and welcome all around – it was good to catch-up again!
Got seated at the Lotus Cafe and were shown the buffet – was this BIG. First off, we all went for the CHAAT station, the pani-puri’s that were being served were the most amazing!

Whilst we got stuck at the CHAAT station, kids were happily going through the other varieties. It was a long night of eating, drinking and chatting.

It was around midnight when we farewelled each other and headed back to our hotels. Time to get some sleep, tomorrow was the start of some serious ladies shopping!