I'm finally getting back to finishing up my last story from my Dubai trip in December. It's hard to believe that only thirty days ago I was enjoying the sunshine and the exotic offerings of the middle east and now I am sat in a dark office with rain pounding the windows.

I think I mentioned this in the previous posts, but one thing that really struck me about the Dubai car culture scene is the friendliness of everyone involved. Now, to be fair I've always regarded the car scene anywhere in the world to be welcoming and accomodating but the people we met in Dubai really took this to another level entirely. With the postponement of the UAE Drift event, I was left to kill time before my flight home.

Thankfully I was not alone. Joining me and instigating most of the following adventures was the voice of JDM Allstars, writer, photographer and probably one of the nicest human beings you could ever meet, Mr. Bryn Musselwhite. The night previous we had met a gentleman with a stunning white Murciealgo; black wheels, tubi exhaust just an incredible looking and sounding car. After a quick chat he invited us out for a meal the following evening followed by a visit to a local tuning shop and a spot of, erm, uh, brisk driving ?

You may of seen this image in my final photos of the year post, but of the thirty five thousand images I've taken for Speedhunters since April, it comes closest to defining what it is we do in one image. Travel, fast cars and cool people.

The shop we were visiting was that of Sub-Zero. A garage with a lot of experience in many disciplines.

Parked outside was this really cool S14 with 2JZ that I had seen at the UAE Drift event during the course build.

 A view from the side of the bronze TE37s.

Inside was one of the two Nissan GT-Rs. The guys from the shop were telling us that earlier that night one of their other GT-Rs had run a nine second pass on street tires at Yas Marina, something they were obviously quite proud of.

Beside the GT-R was this Cadillac CTS-V …

… which they were converting from supercharged to a twin turbo setup.

But it was these sand dune racing jeeps that really got our attention.

Some of these jeeps are running close to 1500BHP and it's not unheard of for them to run 3000BHP.

Looks regular enough from the rear …

… Yowza.

Coming away from the insanity for a moment was this Radical SR3 track car. They look even smaller with the aero removed.

Another GT-R in for a custom exhaust manifold.

Another crazy Nissan Patrol with a 900BHP I6.

This was something you don't see everyday, an unused R34 GT-R V-Spec II Nur rolling on TE37s.

Finishing up our visit it was time to go explore Dubai for the last time …

Jumping in our chase car (Big thanks to Carlin for taxiing us around) we hunted the Murcielago as it picked off some exotic prey.

After a hard night on the big bull, it was time to leave it simmer down and cool off for a while.

Sitting back amongst friends, having a drink and looking out over a harbour in the city after an evening of absorbing some of the local car culture was just pure bliss. It was the first time I had an opportunity to actually take everything in that we had seen over the last few days. Whatever my perceptions of Dubai had been beforehand, they were now truely rearranged. It's all too easy to stereotype people and a country but once you get to know the people and the places you can see they are exactly the same as any other petrolheads you could meet. Fair enough, some can enjoy more exotic offerings that may never be available to 99% of us, but it doesn't change the fact that they do it for the same reasons that we do. Wouldn't you rather see these cars being used for their intended purpose (and o' boy do they use them) rather than as fashion accessories ?

An incredible city with incredible people and an amazing car culture scene.

Dubai, you have stolen my heart. I will be back.

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Paddy McGrath