Emirates Heritage Village

This guide to Emirates Heritage Village in Abu Dhabi starts with a paradox: an oasis built mud-brick by mud-brick on reclaimed land jutting into the Arabian Gulf. It traces the 1990s construction of wind towers copied from real desert settlements, and asks how the site's flowing falaj irrigation channel gets its water on a peninsula with no wells. Along the way you'll pass camels, Arabian horses and a hooded falcon on your way toward the mosque and old souk stalls.