Camel Races

Well as I have said in the past, there are some things we get to do that we will only get to do in Doha! Here is something that I will never get to do again, how many people can say they have been to see camels race! Well the Sartains can officially say they got to see some camels race. This was quite the experience I must say! First off you just pull up to the start in your car and then you follow these camels around the track, while trying not to get hit by the other cars driving next to you! It's unbelievable.

I guess at one point they use to put small boys on the backs of these camels to race them around, but then they thought that was getting to be a little to dangerous (smart thinking)! So they moved to the mechanical monkey jockey. The guys racing the horses have a remote control in their car and they push a button that makes the mechanical monkey whip the camel to get them going. So to do that these cars again follow the camels all around the race track as well.

Here is a pic of a racing camel with his monkey!


They line the camels up behind this gate then they raise it up and these guys run them out and get them going!


And they are off!!



Notice all the cars following these camels, at times we were 5 wide, this was worse then driving down Salwa Road in traffic! They were honking their horns and going crazy!


Another pic of the camel trainers getting them going!


How often do you see a sign that says Camel Race Track!