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Saudi's Vision 2030: The Unfiltered Truth About AlUla · Phil and H Travel - Is It Worth It? Top Travel Destinations Explored!

• 0:00
  I want you to close your eyes for a second.
• 0:01
  I want you to imagine a destination, but don't imagine a
• 0:06
  hotel lobby or a pool. Not just yet.
• 0:08
  I want you to picture silence. Like absolute, ringing silence.
• 0:13
  You're standing in a landscape that looks less like Earth and
• 0:16
  more, I don't know, like a set from The Martian or Dune.
• 0:19
  Right, I can see. It it's vast, it's red.
• 0:21
  There are these towering sandstone pillars just rising
• 0:25
  out of the sand, all jagged and carved by the wind over millions
• 0:29
  of years. And the sky is that piercing
• 0:31
  high altitude blue. It feels ancient.
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  It feels completely. Untouched, like you're the first
• 0:37
  person there. Exactly like you're the first
• 0:39
  person to ever set foot there. That is the dream, right?
• 0:42
  That is the the Instagram version.
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  That's the breathless architectural rendering come to
• 0:46
  life. That's it.
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  That is the screensaver, that's the hook.
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  But now, OK, I want you to keep your eyes closed, but just pan
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  the camera in your mind. Maybe 10° to the left.
• 0:54
  OK, just add that perfect frame. There is a waiter in a pristine
• 0:58
  uniform holding a tray, and on it is a cold towel scented with,
• 1:04
  I don't know, lavender and bergamot.
• 1:06
  Huh. Of course there is.
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  And there's a private plunge pool reflecting those ancient
• 1:10
  rocks. And then you look down at the
• 1:13
  bill in your hand and you realize that the silence, this
• 1:16
  feeling of being the only person on Mars, is costing you about
• 1:19
  3000 U.S. dollars. A night.
• 1:22
  A night. And that right there is the
• 1:25
  tension we are going to be living in for the next hour.
• 1:27
  It really is we're. Exploring a place that is, I
• 1:30
  think, arguably the most ambitious and maybe the most
• 1:34
  confusing tourism project on the planet right now.
• 1:37
  We are talking about a ula in Saudi Arabia.
• 1:39
  But we aren't just, you know, reviewing a travel destination.
• 1:42
  We're not just here to say, go here, eat this.
• 1:44
  No, no. We're looking at this bigger
• 1:46
  emerging concept of Red Sea ancient resorts.
• 1:49
  It's this fascinating, kind of wild mix of deep, deep history,
• 1:53
  extreme luxury, and, well, what happens when a country decides
• 1:57
  to pivot its entire global identity in the span of like,
• 2:01
  five years? It raises such a fundamental
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  question, one that just hovered over every single page of the
• 2:06
  research we did for this. Is this destination a real
• 2:10
  place? I mean a place that you can
• 2:11
  actually visit, navigate and sort of understand.
• 2:15
  Is it something else? Or is it, as our source material
• 2:18
  hints, a mirage? Is it just this beautiful
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  shimmering image that's been constructed for the ultra
• 2:24
  wealthy that just dissolves if you try to get too close or try
• 2:28
  to touch it? And to help us answer that, we
• 2:30
  have a really, really interesting set of source
• 2:32
  materials for this deep dive. We're analyzing a travel guide
• 2:36
  that features 2 very distinct, very loud voices.
• 2:39
  Voices. First up, we have Phil.
• 2:42
  Phil. Phil is the cynic.
• 2:44
  He's the guy who checks the plumbing.
• 2:46
  He is obsessed with logistics, with budgets, with the gritty
• 2:49
  reality of getting from point A to point B.
• 2:52
  We all need to fill in our lives, you know he's the voice
• 2:55
  of reason. Or at least the voice of the
• 2:57
  bank account. Definitely the voice of the
• 2:58
  wallet. If Phil sees a beautiful sunset,
• 3:01
  he's the one asking how much the parking cost to see it.
• 3:04
  And then we have HH is the optimist.
• 3:06
  She's there for the culture, the vibe, the the spiritual
• 3:11
  connection to the history. She's the one who's willing to
• 3:14
  overlook a $20 latte because the light hitting the rocks is just
• 3:17
  so soul stirring. And what's so useful about
• 3:20
  having these two perspectives is that they help us triage the
• 3:23
  truth. Because when you look at a
• 3:25
  project this massive and this state funded, I mean, yeah, the
• 3:30
  marketing hype is deafening. It's everywhere.
• 3:33
  It's slick, it's everywhere. You need someone like H to tell
• 3:36
  you if the beauty's actually real, but you desperately need
• 3:39
  someone like Phil to tell you if you're going to, you know, go
• 3:42
  bankrupt or freeze to death trying to experience it.
• 3:44
  So our mission today really is to answer that ultimate
• 3:47
  question, is Anula the next Petra?
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  Is it this new world wonder? Or is it just a sandbox for the
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  1%? We're going to unpack the cost,
• 3:54
  the safety realities and something our sources call the
• 3:56
  Pioneer tax, which I think is a concept everyone needs to know
• 3:59
  about. Absolutely, yeah.
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  And to do that, we have to start by zooming way, way out, because
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  you just can't understand it Ulo, without understanding the
• 4:08
  massive machine that is building it.
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  Right, the big why now question. I mean, this place has been
• 4:12
  there for thousands of years. The tombs are 2000 years old.
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  Why is it suddenly on every influencer's feed in, you know,
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  2024-2025? This is the physical
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  manifestation of Vision 2030. OK, let's unpack that Vision
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  2030. It's a term we hear a lot in
• 4:28
  geopolitical news, right? Usually involves oil prices or
• 4:31
  diplomatic summits. But what does it actually mean
• 4:34
  for a traveler? Why should you, listening at
• 4:37
  home, care about a government policy document?
• 4:40
  Well, think about it like the existential anxiety of a nation.
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  For decades, Saudi Arabia's entire economy was, for all
• 4:47
  intents and purposes, dependent on oil as a petrostate.
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  But the leadership there knows. I mean, they're not naive.
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  They know the oil age won't last forever.
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  Whether it's because of climate change policies or peak oil
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  demand, the clock it's ticking. Vision 2030 is the master plan
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  to diversify the economy before that oil money runs out.
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  And a huge, massive pillar of that plan is tourism.
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  But they have a pretty big problem, don't they?
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  They're basically starting from scratch.
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  From zero. Exactly.
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  They are so late to the party. I mean, look at their neighbors.
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  Jordan has Petra. That's a global brand.
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  Everybody knows the Treasury Building from Indiana Jones.
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  Right. It's iconic.
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  It's iconic. Egypt has the pyramids.
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  I mean, these are Titans of tourism.
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  Saudi Arabia is sitting on the exact same geology, the same
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  history, the Nabataean civilization, the very same
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  people who built Petra, but it's been closed off to the world for
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  religious and cultural reasons for so long.
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  So now they're playing catch up. A very very expensive game of
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  catch up. They are pouring billions,
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  little billions with a beat of dollars into infrastructure to
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  pivot from basically 0 tourism to ultra luxury in about 5
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  years. The speed of it is what's
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  staggering, you know, you usually see destinations evolve
• 5:58
  organically over decades. Backpackers find a beach, then a
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  little hostel opens. Yeah, then a boutique hotel.
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  Then The Four Seasons shows up 20 years later.
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  This is a. It's skipping all the middle
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  steps. Precisely, they are trying to
• 6:09
  leapfrog the entire backpacker trailface.
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  They don't want the college kids on a shoestring budget.
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  They're aiming straight for the high net worth individual
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  immediately. And that brings us to this
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  concept of the Red Sea corridor. This was something in the
• 6:23
  sources that I found really interesting.
• 6:25
  It's not just about the desert, is it?
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  It's a package deal they're selling.
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  No, it's a strategy of retention, a strategy of
• 6:33
  containment almost. They know that a lot of
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  travelers, especially coming from Europe or the US, they want
• 6:38
  a beach holiday. Sure.
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  So they're building these Maldives style islands on the
• 6:42
  red seacoast. That's a Red Sea project over
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  water villas, pristine coral reefs, the whole 9 yards.
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  But here's the thing, you can get a beach in the Maldives, you
• 6:51
  can get a beach in the Caribbean, right?
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  It's not unique. It's not unique to make Saudi
• 6:56
  Arabia a world class destination.
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  You need a hook. You need something only you
• 7:00
  have. You need culture.
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  So aulah is the hook. Aulah is the anchor, the idea,
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  the grand plan, is to capture the traveler for a full
• 7:10
  itinerary. You fly in.
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  You spend 3 nights in the high desert of Aulah soaking up the
• 7:15
  ancient history in that silence we talked about, and then you
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  take a short flight or a drive over to the coast for four
• 7:21
  nights of luxury diving and spa treatments.
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  It creates this corridor of luxury.
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  The goal is to keep you and your wallet inside that Saudi
• 7:32
  ecosystem for your entire vacation.
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  It's a closed loop. They want to keep you in their
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  bubble. Exactly.
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  And that leads directly to this tension between expectation and
• 7:41
  reality. The hype, as pushed by all the
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  Vision 23 marketing, is ancient, untouched mystery.
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  They want you to feel like you're an explorer discovering a
• 7:50
  lost civilization. But the reality, according to
• 7:52
  our source Phil, is that it's an active construction site with
• 7:54
  five star service. It's a resort bubble.
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  That is the key phrase Phil uses again and again.
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  You have to understand you're not visiting a country in the
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  traditional sense, you are visiting a curated zone.
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  So let's talk about what happens when you actually arrive in that
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  zone, because the sources describe an experience that is
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  well, it's not like landing at Heathrow or JFK.
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  It's not even like landing in Dubai.
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  Not at all. You fly into a ULI International
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  Airport, showed ULH. The source describes it as
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  sleek, small, almost boutique. It feels more like a private
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  terminal. It's clearly designed to handle
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  a very specific, very select type of clientele.
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  You aren't going to see massive jumbo jets unloading thousands
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  of packaged tourists here. And the first thing that hits
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  you when you walk out isn't the noise of a taxi.
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  Rank. It's the silence.
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  And the cars. And the cars.
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  This is a great detail from Phil.
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  He mentioned that when you walk out of the terminal, you don't
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  see that chaotic line of Yellow Cab or people shouting taxi
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  taxi. You see a pristine, silent
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  parade of white Land Cruisers and black Lexus SUV's.
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  That paints a picture immediately.
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  It sounds incredibly orderly, but also really expensive.
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  It is. Phil makes the point that if you
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  haven't prearranged your transfer with your hotel, you
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  are basically in trouble. There is no Uber queue.
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  There is no bus to hop on. You're either getting into one
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  of those white SUV's or you are essentially nowhere.
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  So you get in your high end SUV and you start the drive towards
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  the Asher Valley where most of the big resorts are and looking
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  out the window the landscape just changes.
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  The source says it transforms from flat boring scrub into
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  these massive sandstone pillars. Looks like Mars is the direct
• 9:32
  quote. That visual is key.
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  But H our optimist source, she emphasizes something else about
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  that dry She talks about the haunting silence.
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  She mentioned that the silence is so deep, you forget about
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  politics, you forget about the news, you forget about the noise
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  of the world. It's an immediate decompression.
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  That sounds incredible. I think we all crave that kind
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  of disconnection. But there is a flip side to this
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  beautiful isolation, isn't there?
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  The sources describe the geography as feeling trapped.
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  This is a crucial, crucial logistical insight.
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  When you look at the photos on Instagram, you see a hotel room
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  right next to a giant, amazing rock.
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  So you assume, oh, I'll just walk out of my room and wander
• 10:09
  through the desert. Yeah, you think you can just go
• 10:11
  for a hike? Right.
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  But Phil points out that nothing is close to anything else.
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  The scale is massive. It's a 30 to 45 minute drive
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  from the airport to the Eschar Valley.
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  It's another 20 minutes between the Old Town and the main
• 10:24
  historical site, Hegra. So you aren't just strolling
• 10:28
  down the street to grab a coffee.
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  There is no St. there is just desert and perfect paved roads
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  connecting these luxury nodes. You are either in your resort,
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  or you are in a car, or you are at a specific ticketed site.
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  You are trapped in a painting, as age puts it poetically.
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  A beautiful painting, but still trapped.
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  It's beautiful, but you can't really interact with it freely.
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  Phil corrects her phrasing to something a little more direct.
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  Trapped in a resort? And once you arrive at that
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  resort, the hospitality is intense.
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  Aggressive hospitality. That was the phrase that stuck
• 10:59
  with me. Please don't cancel us vibes.
• 11:02
  I love that description. It feels so humid, so anxious.
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  It really speaks to the anxiety of a new destination trying to
• 11:10
  justify his price tag. They know they have to prove
• 11:13
  themselves. They know they're charging a
• 11:15
  fortune. So the check in rituals are
• 11:17
  elaborate. Date, juice, coal, towels, Three
• 11:20
  different people welcoming you by name.
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  And interestingly, Phil notes they don't immediately demand a
• 11:27
  credit card for incidentals. It's all about establishing a
• 11:30
  relationship of honored guest rather than customer at the very
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  beginning. Which is a nice touch, I
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  suppose, until you eventually do have to hand over that credit
• 11:38
  card. And this is where we really need
• 11:40
  to take a deep breath because wow, the numbers.
• 11:42
  This is the Ouch factor. We're calling this segment a
• 11:45
  financial deep dive, but to be honest, looking at these
• 11:47
  numbers, it feels more like a financial Cliff dive.
• 11:50
  Let's start with the expert analysis of the high band.
• 11:53
  If I want to stay in one of those places I see all over
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  Instagram, the banyan tree, the habitas, the ones with the
• 11:59
  private pools reflecting the rocks, what am I actually
• 12:01
  looking at? You are looking at for many
• 12:03
  people, a mortgage payment for the high end properties like
• 12:08
  banyan tree or habitus. The source sites rates starting
• 12:12
  at around 1500. 1500 OK. Going up to 4000 U.S. dollars.
• 12:16
  A night. Night.
• 12:17
  That is staggering. I mean, that's more than the
• 12:20
  Maldives. That's more than most luxury
• 12:22
  suites in New York or Paris. And that's just the starting
• 12:25
  point in peak season, say December, January, it goes
• 12:29
  higher. And here's the real kicker,
• 12:32
  there is no real mid range. But Phil mentioned something
• 12:36
  about Airstreams. Surely staying in a trailer is
• 12:39
  cheaper? Yes, the Habitat Caravan.
• 12:41
  These are beautifully appointed Airstream trailers.
• 12:44
  And you know, in most parts of the world, sleeping in a trailer
• 12:46
  is the budget option. It's camping right here.
• 12:49
  It's 400 to $600 a night 6. $100.
• 12:52
  To sleep in a trailer. A very nice luxury trailer to be
• 12:55
  fair. Has air conditioning and a
• 12:57
  lovely bed. But yes.
• 12:59
  And if you're looking for a hostel or a budget hotel, a
• 13:02
  Holiday Inn, forget it. It's non existent.
• 13:06
  Phil is very, very clear on this point.
• 13:07
  He says backpacker budget $0.00 do not come.
• 13:12
  That is a harsh reality check. I mean, it completely excludes a
• 13:16
  huge demographic of travelers. It's designed to.
• 13:19
  What about? Food.
• 13:20
  I mean usually even in expensive cities like Tokyo or Geneva you
• 13:23
  can find a cheap shawarma or a convenience store sandwich
• 13:26
  somewhere. Not inside the resort bubble,
• 13:28
  you can't. Yeah.
• 13:29
  Phil breaks down the food costs in excruciating detail.
• 13:32
  A dinner and one of the top spots like Tama at Habitus or
• 13:36
  Mariah Social, which is run by Jason Atherton, a big name
• 13:39
  celebrity chef. That's going to be a minimum of
• 13:41
  $150.00 per head, OK. That's London or New York fine
• 13:44
  dining prices. It's high, but it's sort of
• 13:47
  expected for that level of luxury.
• 13:49
  It is, but then you look at the casual food.
• 13:52
  There's some cool looking food trucks near the Old Town.
• 13:54
  Phil notes that a burger and fries from one of those trucks
• 13:57
  will cost you 25 to 30, five U.S. dollars.
• 13:59
  Wait for a food truck burger that is airport pricing on
• 14:03
  steroids. It's captive market pricing.
• 14:05
  You're in the middle of the desert.
• 14:07
  You cannot just walk to a competitor down the street.
• 14:10
  You pay what they charge. Because the alternative as well?
• 14:14
  Eating the granola bars you brought from home.
• 14:16
  Which they did. Which they did, and a latte 6 to
• 14:20
  $8. So if we try to total this all
• 14:23
  up, Phil gives us some estimates on what an actual trip cost per
• 14:26
  day he. Does and they're eye watering a
• 14:29
  mid range couple and this is them trying to do it cheaply by
• 14:32
  staying in the airstreams and strictly watching.
• 14:34
  Every single dollar they spend is still looking at about $800 a
• 14:37
  day. A day, and that's the budget
• 14:39
  option. That's the budget option, the
• 14:40
  luxury traveller. You're easily looking at $3000 a
• 14:43
  day and it can go up from there. This brings us to a concept that
• 14:47
  Phil calls the Pioneer Tax, and I think this is a really
• 14:50
  important idea for our listeners to understand, especially if
• 14:53
  you're someone who likes to be an early adopter of travel
• 14:56
  trends. It's really the economic theory
• 14:59
  of early adoption applied to tourism.
• 15:02
  You are paying a premium to be somewhere before it gets ruined.
• 15:06
  You're paying for the exclusivity.
• 15:08
  You're paying for the bragging rights of being the first one in
• 15:10
  your friend group to post that photo from Hegra.
• 15:13
  But there's a trade off, isn't there?
• 15:14
  I mean, usually early adopters get a discount because things
• 15:17
  aren't quite finished yet. Here it seems like you pay a
• 15:20
  premium and things aren't finished.
• 15:22
  That's it. That's the paradox.
• 15:23
  Phil explains it as the difference between hard product
• 15:27
  and soft product. The hard product, the villas,
• 15:29
  the pools, the architecture, the views themselves is world class.
• 15:34
  It is spectacular, 10 out of 10, no question.
• 15:36
  But the soft product, the service be, the consistency, the
• 15:39
  training of the staff is still catching up.
• 15:41
  So you're paying Ritz Carlton prices, but you might get a
• 15:44
  waiter who forgets your water three times.
• 15:47
  Exactly, You are in effect funding their on the job
• 15:50
  training program. You're paying extra to be a beta
• 15:53
  tester for their entire tourism industry.
• 15:57
  The source is clear that the staff are incredibly
• 15:59
  enthusiastic. They're kind, they're eager to
• 16:02
  please. But they don't yet have that
• 16:05
  polished, almost telepathic service instinct that you'd find
• 16:08
  in a place like The Four Seasons in Paris, where they know what
• 16:11
  you want before you even ask for.
• 16:12
  It that is a tough pill to swallow when the bill comes at
• 16:15
  the end of a $4000 a night. But OK, let's say you have the
• 16:18
  money, you've paid the tax, you're there.
• 16:21
  How do you actually survive the trip?
• 16:22
  Because Phil calls a you a logistical minefield.
• 16:25
  It really is, and he identifies 3 great traps that inexperienced
• 16:30
  travelers fall into. These are the things that will
• 16:32
  absolutely ruin your trip if you don't know about them in
• 16:34
  advance. OK, let's walk through these
• 16:36
  trap #1 the I'll Just Walk fallacy.
• 16:38
  We touched on this with a geography, but it bears
• 16:40
  repeating because it's so counterintuitive.
• 16:43
  The scale is massive, but it's not just about the distance.
• 16:46
  Phil mentioned something I hadn't even considered.
• 16:49
  Fences. Fences in the middle of the
• 16:51
  desert. Yes, there is a huge amount of
• 16:54
  archaeological preservation work happening and a lot of future
• 16:57
  development is already cordoned off.
• 16:59
  So you can't just, you know, go for a hike point to point across
• 17:02
  the dunes. There are fences physically
• 17:05
  blocking you. So if you're looking at a map
• 17:07
  and think, oh I'll just walk from the Old Town over to that
• 17:10
  Oasis trail, you might literally hit a dead end.
• 17:13
  You will hit a fence and probably a very polite security
• 17:15
  guard. The solution, according to Phil,
• 17:18
  is mandatory. You must rent a car.
• 17:21
  And not just rely on Uber or the hotel shuttles.
• 17:24
  He calls Uber spotty at best and says the resort shuttles operate
• 17:29
  on what he charmingly calls Inshallah time, meaning God
• 17:33
  willing, it will eventually arrive.
• 17:35
  Not ideal for a dinner reservation.
• 17:36
  Not at all. If you want any control over
• 17:38
  your trip, you need a rental. And interestingly, he notes, an
• 17:42
  SUV is preferred for status. Of course it is.
• 17:45
  You don't want to pull up to the $4000 a night banyan tree and a
• 17:48
  tiny little hatchback. Exactly.
• 17:50
  Though he says a sedan works perfectly fine for the roads,
• 17:53
  The SUV is the social currency there.
• 17:55
  OK, so trap #2 the dinner reservation.
• 17:58
  This is such a classic rookie mistake.
• 18:01
  People get there and think I'm in the middle of desert, how
• 18:03
  busy can it be? Who else is even here?
• 18:05
  But because there are so few good restaurants.
• 18:08
  Scarcity. There are only about 5 cool
• 18:12
  restaurants in the entire area and they are booked out weeks,
• 18:15
  sometimes a month in advance, by VIPs, by wealthy locals who fly
• 18:21
  in from Riyadh for the weekend, and by organized tour groups.
• 18:24
  So what happens if you don't plan?
• 18:26
  You eat granola bars in your room.
• 18:28
  Phil and H literally did that one night because they couldn't
• 18:30
  get a table anywhere. Eating a granola bar in a $1000
• 18:34
  room is a special kind of travel tragedy.
• 18:36
  It's a failure of planning, but it just highlights the total
• 18:39
  lack of casual walk in options. And trap #3 the weekend
• 18:44
  confusion. This is a cultural one that can
• 18:46
  trip people up. The Saudi weekend is Friday and
• 18:48
  Saturday. This means Thursday is the big
• 18:50
  party night when things are buzzing.
• 18:52
  And Sunday is a work day. Sunday is Monday, so if you plan
• 18:55
  your big romantic dinner for Saturday night Thinking at the
• 18:58
  peak the weekend, you might find that things are already winding
• 19:01
  down. Also, prayer times.
• 19:04
  While Illula is much more relaxed than, say, Riyadh,
• 19:07
  service does still pause. You just need to be aware of the
• 19:10
  rhythm of the day. Speaking of things you need to
• 19:13
  be aware of, let's talk about the weather, because this was a
• 19:16
  genuine shock to me reading the source material.
• 19:18
  I think Saudi Arabia. I think heat, I think sun.
• 19:21
  We all do, but the source explicitly and repeatedly warns
• 19:25
  about the cold a. Park a warning.
• 19:27
  Yes, in the winter months, which is the prime tourist season from
• 19:31
  about November to March, the temperature swings are violent.
• 19:34
  It can be a beautiful 30°C. That's 86 Fahrenheit in the day.
• 19:38
  Perfect T-shirt weather, mostly. But then the sun drops behind
• 19:42
  those giant rocks and the temperature will plummets to
• 19:45
  5°C, which is about 41 Fahrenheit at night.
• 19:48
  That is near freezing. That's a huge drop.
• 19:50
  It's a massive drop, and Phil describes this tragic comic
• 19:54
  scene of tourists showing up with nothing but linen pants and
• 19:59
  bikinis, thinking they're going to a hot desert destination.
• 20:02
  And they end up freezing. They end up having to buy $500
• 20:06
  cashmere scarves at the hotel gift shop just to avoid getting
• 20:09
  hypothermia at their outdoor dinner reservation.
• 20:12
  That is a very, very expensive mistake to make.
• 20:15
  It's physically dangerous if you aren't prepared for it.
• 20:18
  The desert at night is not a warm place.
• 20:20
  It strips the heat right out of your body.
• 20:22
  OK, let's pivot a bit to the vibe of the place, because when
• 20:25
  people think of Saudi Arabia, I think they often have questions
• 20:27
  about safety and social norms, especially for women traveling.
• 20:31
  It's a country that has been in the headlines for social
• 20:34
  restrictions for decades, right? And H our female perspective in
• 20:39
  the Source, she tackles this head on.
• 20:41
  She's very direct and honest about her experience.
• 20:44
  And she says it's statistically safer than Singapore.
• 20:47
  In terms of physical safety, things like theft, violence,
• 20:51
  yes, she says. It's basically non existent.
• 20:53
  You can leave your phone on a cafe table and walk away.
• 20:56
  It'll be there when you get back.
• 20:57
  Crime is just not something you worry about in that bubble.
• 20:59
  That is refreshing, but what about the cultural comfort
• 21:02
  level? The stare factor?
• 21:04
  Did she feel uncomfortable as a Western woman?
• 21:07
  She does mention being stared at, but she clarifies that it
• 21:10
  felt like curiosity, not aggression.
• 21:13
  It's a country that has been closed for a very long time.
• 21:16
  Seeing Western tourists, especially women, is still a
• 21:19
  novelty. In many ways it felt like the
• 21:21
  stare of who are you and why are you here?
• 21:24
  Not get out. And the big one, the dress code.
• 21:27
  This is the number one culture I hear.
• 21:29
  Do women need to cover their hair?
• 21:31
  Can you wear shorts? So this is where it's a tale of
• 21:33
  two cities inside the resort bubble at the banyan tree at
• 21:36
  Habitus, The dress code is basically Tulum or Micanos.
• 21:41
  Bikinis at the pool are completely normal and allowed.
• 21:44
  No need to cover your hair. It feels like any luxury resort
• 21:47
  in the world. But outside that bubble?
• 21:49
  In the Old Town, or at the airport or at the historical
• 21:52
  sites the code switches, you need to be respectful, shoulders
• 21:56
  and knees covered. Loose clothing is key.
• 21:58
  H recommends linen trousers and loose long sleeved shirts.
• 22:02
  She says she felt completely comfortable and safe as long as
• 22:05
  she respected that clear boundary.
• 22:07
  It's about code switching. There is another aspect of the
• 22:10
  vibe that might catch people off guard though, the dry reality.
• 22:14
  Yes, despite all the modernization, despite the
• 22:17
  bikinis at the pool, the alcohol policy remains absolutely
• 22:20
  strict. It's a completely dry country.
• 22:22
  So no glass of wine with that beautiful sunset.
• 22:25
  No mocktails only. And Phil, our budget conscious
• 22:29
  source, points out they are very, very expensive mocktails.
• 22:32
  You're paying $20.00 for some fancy juice in a nice glass.
• 22:35
  H puts a positive spin on it though, doesn't she?
• 22:37
  She calls it a detox. She does.
• 22:39
  She says you wake up feeling fresh for the sunrise instead of
• 22:42
  hungover from a bottle of overpriced Sauvignon Blanc.
• 22:45
  Which is probably a good thing considering the other
• 22:47
  environmental risks. Absolutely.
• 22:49
  That's another safety point they raise.
• 22:51
  The air is bone dry. You don't realize you're
• 22:54
  sweating because it evaporates instantly.
• 22:57
  Combined with the extreme UV index, you can get dehydrated
• 23:00
  and sick very very quickly if you aren't constantly drinking
• 23:04
  water. If you were drinking alcohol on
• 23:06
  top of that, you'd likely feel terrible.
• 23:08
  I want to touch on something Phil mentioned about the Old
• 23:10
  Town. He called it curated
• 23:12
  authenticity. This gets right back to that
• 23:15
  Mirage theme we started with. This is a fascinating
• 23:17
  sociological point. The Old Town is, by all
• 23:20
  accounts, beautifully restored. The mud brick buildings, the
• 23:24
  winding alleys. It looks perfect.
• 23:26
  It looks like a movie set, but Phil notes that it's filled with
• 23:29
  high end candle shops, artisanal coffee roasters and perfume
• 23:32
  boutiques. So not local grandma selling
• 23:35
  vegetables or spices. No, and the locals who used to
• 23:38
  live there have been moved to a new modern town nearby, so H
• 23:42
  describes it as feeling like a museum exhibit rather than a
• 23:45
  living city. It's beautiful, but it lacks the
• 23:48
  chaotic, vibrant pulse of a real Middle Eastern sook.
• 23:51
  It's quiet, it's clean, it's a bit sterile.
• 23:53
  It's the difference between the Epcot version of Morocco and
• 23:57
  actual Morocco. That's a harsh comparison, but
• 24:00
  perhaps accurate in terms of the level of curation.
• 24:04
  It's a presentation of history rather than history itself,
• 24:07
  living and breathing around you. OK, but let's get into the
• 24:10
  highlights because despite the costs, the cold and the
• 24:13
  curation, both sources admitted there were moments that were
• 24:16
  genuinely special, truly unforgettable.
• 24:19
  Absolutely, we have to give credit where it's due.
• 24:21
  The hard product delivers in a huge way.
• 24:24
  H describes the sunrise at Hagra as soul stirring.
• 24:29
  Hagra is the main archaeological site right the sister city to
• 24:31
  Petra in Jordan. Exactly, and she talks about the
• 24:34
  tomb of Lithium. Son of KUSA is that iconic 4
• 24:37
  story tune carved into a single stand alone rock.
• 24:40
  H describes standing there with a very small group watching the
• 24:43
  sun hit the very top of the rock and just slide down its face
• 24:46
  like liquid gold. And because the groups are kept
• 24:48
  so small, a direct result of those high prices and controlled
• 24:52
  entry, she had a moment of actual solitude with a 2000 year
• 24:56
  old monument. That is something you absolutely
• 24:59
  cannot get at the Pyramids or Petra these days.
• 25:02
  You're fighting through crowds of thousands and dodging selfie
• 25:05
  sticks. Exactly.
• 25:06
  The exclusivity, for all its problems, does buy you silence.
• 25:11
  It buys you a moment of connection that mass tourism
• 25:14
  almost always destroys. What about elephant rock?
• 25:17
  I've seen so many pictures of that.
• 25:19
  This was a logistical triumph, according to Phil the cynic.
• 25:22
  It's a massive natural rock formation that looks uncannily
• 25:26
  like an elephant. But what impressed Phil wasn't
• 25:28
  just the rock, it was the setup. They've dug these sunken seating
• 25:33
  pits into the sand. Sunken pits?
• 25:34
  Yeah. You sit down in a hole in the
• 25:36
  ground, basically to view the sunset.
• 25:38
  And the genius of it is that it prevents all the tables and
• 25:41
  chairs from ruining the landscape view for everyone
• 25:43
  else. It's an incredibly smart design.
• 25:45
  That is smart. It is, and even though Phil
• 25:47
  noted the crowd was all linen pants and designer sunglasses,
• 25:51
  he had to admit the experience of watching that rocket turn
• 25:53
  deep purple against the twilight sky was magical.
• 25:56
  And then there's the Mariah Concert Hall, the giant mirror
• 25:59
  cube in the desert. The world's largest mirrored
• 26:01
  building. Phil, our resident cynic,
• 26:04
  usually hates what he calls stunt architecture.
• 26:07
  He thinks it's gimmicky, but even he admitted that this
• 26:09
  works. It just disappears in the
• 26:11
  landscape. It reflects the desert back at
• 26:13
  you. It's a complete mind Bender.
• 26:15
  So the visual highs are incredibly high, but the let
• 26:17
  downs, what were the real let downs?
• 26:20
  The let downs, almost without exception, were service based.
• 26:23
  Those service gaps we talked about.
• 26:26
  Phil tells this painful story of that $400.00 dinner where the
• 26:30
  waiter forgot to bring them water three times and then the
• 26:33
  expensive steak arrived cold. Ouch, that hurts.
• 26:37
  It just perfectly highlights that clash between Ritz Carlton
• 26:40
  prices and a workforce that is incredibly enthusiastic but very
• 26:43
  new to five star luxury standards.
• 26:46
  And then there was something he called the club atmosphere.
• 26:49
  What does he mean by that? The exclusivity of it all.
• 26:52
  The crowd is very homogeneous, mostly wealthy French tourists
• 26:57
  and wealthy Saudis. It can feel a little isolating.
• 26:59
  It can feel like you've walked into a private members club that
• 27:02
  you aren't quite sure you belong in, or that you've paid way too
• 27:06
  much to enter for the weekend. It creates this invisible
• 27:08
  barrier between you and the place itself.
• 27:11
  So we have this picture of a place that is visually stunning,
• 27:15
  historically profound, but logistically a nightmare and
• 27:19
  incredibly, punishingly expensive.
• 27:22
  That's a perfect summary. Which begs the question, are
• 27:25
  there alternatives? If I want red rocks and silence,
• 27:29
  but I don't have $10,000 to drop on a weekend getaway, where do I
• 27:32
  go? Phil provides a really helpful
• 27:34
  comparative analysis Here he stacks a Lula against its main
• 27:37
  rivals. OK, option one, Wadi Rum,
• 27:40
  Jordan. The most obvious competitor.
• 27:42
  It is literally the same geology, the same kind of rock
• 27:45
  formations, just a bit for the north across the border.
• 27:48
  And the price difference is the main thing.
• 27:50
  It's staggering, Phil says. It's about 110th of the price.
• 27:54
  You can stay in one of those cool Martian Dome bubble tents
• 27:56
  for $150. You can get a Jeep tour for 50
• 27:59
  bucks. But there's always a but.
• 28:02
  But it is gritty, it can be dirty, and it's crowded.
• 28:05
  You'll see 500 other jeeps churning up dust.
• 28:09
  You'll see trash in the sand. In some places you completely
• 28:11
  lose that silence and exclusivity.
• 28:14
  A Lula is the polished, private five star version of Wadi Rum.
• 28:19
  OK, option 2. Aman, Yuri in Utah in the US.
• 28:22
  This is for the American listener who wants that concrete
• 28:25
  luxury in the rocks aesthetic without the long haul flight.
• 28:28
  But surprisingly, Phil says it's actually more expensive than a
• 28:31
  ula. At least the hotel is.
• 28:33
  The resort itself is yes, but the flight is much easier for
• 28:36
  Americans. And critically, you don't have
• 28:39
  to stay at a Manjiri to see the landscape.
• 28:41
  You can rent an Airbnb in the nearby town of Moab for cheap
• 28:44
  and see the same national parks in Hula.
• 28:47
  There is no Airbnb in Moab equivalent yet you are forced
• 28:50
  into that top luxury tier. And the final alternative, Siwa
• 28:53
  Oasis in Egypt. This is the authentic
• 28:56
  alternative. An ancient mud fortress,
• 28:59
  Beautiful salt lakes, a really rich living culture.
• 29:03
  Yeah, a 10 hour bus ride from Cairo.
• 29:06
  It is very difficult to reach. It is incredibly cheap.
• 29:09
  You can live on $30 a day, but it completely lacks that luxury
• 29:13
  infrastructure. It's a trip for the dedicated
• 29:15
  adventurer, not for someone looking for a relaxing vacation.
• 29:18
  So let's bring this all to a final verdict.
• 29:20
  Who is a ULA actually for? Phil and H created a kind of
• 29:24
  matrix to figure this out. Let's run through it.
• 29:26
  It's pretty clear cut. OK, backpackers.
• 29:29
  NO. Hard no.
• 29:30
  The cost, the boredom, the lack of freedom.
• 29:32
  You will hate it. Don't even think about it.
• 29:34
  Families with young kids. Also NNO, the kids will be bored
• 29:38
  by the rocks after 10 minutes. The food is too fancy, bathrooms
• 29:41
  are too far apart at the sites. It is absolutely not built for
• 29:44
  toddlers. Mid range traveler.
• 29:45
  This one's a maybe, but only as a major once in a lifetime
• 29:49
  splurge. Phil warns that what your mid
• 29:52
  range budget gets you in a oola would get you absolute top tier
• 29:56
  luxury in a place like Bali or Thailand.
• 29:58
  So you have to really really want to see this specific place.
• 30:01
  And finally, the luxury traveler.
• 30:03
  A definitive yes for this person, Alula offers unmatched
• 30:08
  privacy, a deep sense of history and a huge exotic factor.
• 30:13
  It beats the Maldives on history and it beats Utah on the I went
• 30:17
  Somewhere new and different factor.
• 30:19
  It's perfect for them. And they suggest a specific
• 30:21
  strategy if you do decide to go the combo strategy.
• 30:24
  Right, they say, don't just stay in the desert.
• 30:26
  The real value proposition starts to make sense when you
• 30:29
  combine three days in a ULA with red Seacoast, either in Yanbu or
• 30:32
  one of the resorts. Phil claims the diving there is
• 30:35
  untouched. Better coral than Egypt because
• 30:37
  literally nobody has been swimming there for decades.
• 30:40
  So let's wrap this up. After all of that, how do we
• 30:43
  define a ula? What is it?
• 30:44
  I think Phil's definition is the most practical.
• 30:46
  He calls it a logistics heavy luxury splurge.
• 30:50
  It's an expedition, not a casual holiday.
• 30:52
  You have to plan it like a military operation.
• 30:54
  And H calls it a soul stirring mirage.
• 30:57
  And I think that mirage concept is the perfect place to end.
• 31:01
  Oola is imperfect, It's confusing, it's astronomically
• 31:03
  expensive. But the hard product, the
• 31:07
  silence, the stars, the canyons themselves, that part is real,
• 31:11
  and by all accounts, it changes you.
• 31:13
  It's a place that really forces you to ask, how much is silence
• 31:17
  worth? How much is history without the
• 31:19
  crowds worth to you? And.
• 31:21
  That leads us to our final provocative thought for you to
• 31:23
  take away as places like a Oola curate these perfect, pristine
• 31:27
  experiences for the wealthy. Are we moving toward a future
• 31:30
  where authentic history is only accessible if it's behind a
• 31:33
  $3000 a night paywall? Are we in effect privatizing the
• 31:37
  past? A heavy question to Mull over
• 31:39
  while you check your bank balance.
• 31:41
  Indeed. Thanks for joining us on this
• 31:42
  deep dive into the desert. Safe travels.