Just a 90-minute drive east from the steel-and-glass skylines of Abu Dhabi, the desert begins to shift. The land rises gently, palms thicken, and the Jebel Hafeet mountains rise like ancient sentinels along the Omani border. Here lies Al Ain: sun-washed, storied, and stunning. This is not the Middle East of glitz and glass towers, of air-conditioned malls and supercar showrooms. It is a place where the past survives; not behind museum glass, but woven into the fabric of daily life.
Designated the only UNESCO World Heritage Site in the United Arab Emirates, Al Ain offers a window into 5,000 years of continuous human habitation. “Al Ain means ‘The Spring,’” says local guide Rabia Siddiqui as we walk beneath a lattice of date palms. “The ready availability of water here encouraged nomadic hunters to settle and build a life.”
The city, long a resting point on the caravan route to Oman is now a constellation of more than a dozen heritage sites: restored forts and homes, peaceful parks, living oases, and museums. Perhaps most striking are the hundreds of date farms that still nourish the land using the irrigation technique qanat, which draws water from hand-dug wells at higher elevations, channeling it through underground tunnels to fields below. “These closed systems lose less to evaporation than open-air canals. Perfect for the desert,” Rabia says.
Part archaeological wonder and part landscaped public space, the Al Hili Archaeological Park showcases remnants of a Bronze Age settlement from 4,500 years ago. At its heart is the Hili Grand Tomb, a circular stone structure dating to around 2000 BC. Among the park’s crown jewels is the Hili Grand Tomb, a ring-shaped burial site built circa 2000 BCE. Its dual entrances are carved with elegant reliefs—stylised humans and animals that peer across millennia, their stone eyes still watchful.
Nearby, Al Jahili Fort commands the city like a mythical sand-hewn fortress. Built in the 1890s under Sheikh Zayed bin Khalifa Al Nahyan, it once housed members of the Al Nahyan ruling family. The materials: sun-dried mud brick and palm wood are humble, yet the effect is monumental. It is one of UAE's largest and most photogenic forts.
Step into the camel souk, and you’re hurled into a swirl of noise, colour, and commerce. This is one of the last remaining traditional camel markets in the region—a place where trade is tethered to ancient customs. Emirati men in crisp white dishdashas appraise animals with practiced hands. Their sellers, mostly South Asian handlers in salwar kameez hunker low in the sand, hawking beasts with pride. “This is a milk camel,” shouts Jamal Farooqui, a fifth-generation Bedouin, slapping the shoulder of his beast affectionately. “Only $5,000 for you, lady!”
Al Ain lives, not as a monument, but as a moving, breathing tapestry of past and present. Beneath the shade of the mountains, in the rustle of palm groves, along ancient channels of water and through sand-colored streets, the story of Arabia endures—in camel calls and acqueducts, in crumbling tombs and fortified walls. History here whisperes to the curious traveller who’s willing to listen.