From desert safaris to eye-popping feasts, how Dubai makes the perfect family holiday

RIDING the very same camel Paris Hilton rode on her honeymoon wasn’t on my bucket list.

But here in Dubai, the motto is very much “anything is possible”.

And although we’ve only done a small loop on said camel behind the Bedouin camp we’re visiting, my son Raffy, three, is ecstatic and now – slightly problematically – wants a camel for Christmas.

We’ve joined a desert safari that started with a ride in an open-top vintage Land Rover through the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve, spying gazelles and white-as-snow Arabian oryx along the way.

Raffy and sister Poppy, five, make the most of a stop-off to race each other up the reddish sand dunes, before ditching the traditional headscarves we’ve been given and sausage-rolling back down as the sun sets behind us.

Next, a falcon show captivates and the kids beam as they get to pose with the bird.

Falcons, by the way, do not get a shoddy deal in the UAE, they get an Emirati passport and can fly business class with their owner!

Our guide Abdul is full of fascinating facts like this, so we’re getting our culture fix, too.

The evening feast at the camp is exactly that and includes Arabic spiced lamb ouzi, which has been cooking in an underground pot for six hours, and harees, which is a little like chicken porridge but far tastier than that sounds.

Plus, there’s lentil soup, delicious salads and the chance to taste camel milk (slightly salty) and camel stew (not dissimilar to beef).

Dessert is fresh fruit and traditional doughnuts washed down with karak chai.

But first, the kids get henna tattoos – flowers for Poppy, a spider for Raffy – and try traditional drumming, before we all lie on rugs to stargaze, spotting planets Saturn and Jupiter and learning that the North Star isn’t the brightest star, after all.