Is Dubai a Good Place to Buy???

[Out-Station]

G'day all, does anyone have any knowledge of how cheap fishing gear is in Dubai. My old man is passing through there for a few days in the next month or so on the way home from Affrica. If its a cheap place to shop for gear i might get him to pic me up another saltist and a tld50. If anyone has had first hand expereience with how expensive things are there compared to aus it would be great thanks.

Cheer's Scott

[ShaneC]

check out barracudafishingdubai.com or do a google search on them, they have an website with all their prices on it. I used to buy some gear from a sports shop in one of the shopping centres (the name escapes me right now but it'll come to me) and what I found was some things were very cheap and others were just a bit cheaper than Aus.

One thing that was very cheap from memory were Rapala lures, if prices haven't gone up in the last 12 months the big ones set you back about $12 which is good going.

I'll think of the name of the joint today and send you a PM.

Shane

[Out-Station]

Thanks Shane, i'll check it out.

[ShaneC]

Deira City Centre I think from memory is the shopping centre. A cabbie will get you there and there is only one big sports shop there.

I am sure with a bit of research you will get much better prices than Aussie, I used to only transit through there for a day or two at a time so buying fishing gear sometimes took a back seat to drinkin, dancin, and misbehavin....

The big ticket items are the ones you would really win on, from memory the big Penn Internationals were about half price of here. Give me a couple of days and I will make a couple of calls and find out for ya, I am after some gear anyway and might get a mate to pick it up over there instead

[PNG1M]

I've been to a few sports shops in Dubai but nothing really struck me as overly cheap, except for the Rapala lures as Shane mentioned.

Sometimes the outlets have sales on with up to 75% off so if you're lucky enough to land on one of those you'd be laughin'.

I can't remember the exact price of rods & reels as I wasn't particularly after any. But I did see that their Penn Slammers were similarly priced to Mo tackle, so no noticeable savings.

The sports shop I go to when in Dubai is in a centre called "Festival City" (or the "Festival Centre") and the shop is in the same part of the mall as Toys R Us.

Dunno the name of the shop but there are two sports places above/below each other and only one stocks fishing equipment. I think its the 'below' one. And its got loads of hiking gear & camping clothes like the Columbia brand; and backpacks, boots & all that. Plus loads of golf & gym stuff.

The range of fishing gear isn't all that large though. They do have some spinning reels as well as chunky overheads, stand up sticks & lures.

Worth a squizz at least...

[PNG1M]

A bloke I know over here (an Aussie) who has returned to his home in the Solomon Islands. He is setting up a bit of a game fishing business and he was shopping for some big reels.

He found a place on the outskirts of Dubai called DRAGON MART. Its a massive undercover market that takes half a day to walk around. I've been there and it stocks just about everything.

Anyway, this bloke bought reels from Dragon Mart and was raving on and on about how cheap they were. I think he bought at least six. They were big conventional reels, gold in colour but I can't recall the exact models.

When I popped into the fishing section of Dragon Mart there were half a dozen smallish outlets with a lot of Chinesee brands I've never really heard off. They had a wide range of gear and the prices seemed overall cheap.

As I was just browsing I didn't take much notice of all the costings. I picked up an imitation leather, 2-pce rod carry bag for my 5' 6" Miller baitcaster. The bag was padded inside with a zip and carry handles all for AU$8.00

They had quite an interesting range of lures too, at good prices.

So if you're in Dubai, Dragon Mart is also worth a look. All the taxi drivers know where it is.

Type in Dragon Mart Dubai into Google Earth and you'll find it.