Al Wathba Salt Lake: Abu Dhabi's strangest swim

Updated 5 November 2026 · Emirates Spots

Forty-five minutes from the Corniche, the desert does something it has no business doing: it turns milky turquoise. The Al Wathba salt lakes sit in a band of sabkha south of the city, the biggest of them nicknamed the Long Salt Lake, with water so dense you bob like a cork and a shoreline crusted white like the world's largest margarita glass. Instagram found it during the pandemic; the directions online are still half-wrong. These ones aren't.

Entry

Free

Open

Always; no gate or staff

Drive

~45 min from Abu Dhabi city

Car

4x4 ideal; sedans OK with care, dry days

Facilities

None

Best light

Sunrise, or 1 hour before sunset

Finding it (the part everyone gets wrong)

Search "Long Salt Lake" in your maps app, not "Al Wathba lake", which routes people to the fenced wetland reserve where flamingos live and swimming is very much a crime. The drive runs out of the city on the E22 or E30 toward Al Wathba, then onto graded desert tracks for the final stretch.

• Stay on the obvious compacted tracks; they're driven daily and firm.
• Park on hard sand short of the shoreline. The ground nearest the water looks solid, holds a person, and swallows a car. Every month someone tests this; the recovery trucks know the spot by heart.
• Go with phone fully charged and location shared. It's not remote by UAE standards, but there's no kiosk, no shade, no help desk.

The floating question

Yes, the water is salty enough to float you effortlessly, Dead Sea style, and on any winter weekend you'll see families doing exactly that. There's no official ban at the Long Salt Lake, but understand what you're signing up for: no lifeguards, an uneven crusty bottom that can be sharp underfoot, and water that finds every papercut you forgot you had. Keep your face out, don't shave that morning, wear water shoes, and bring more rinse water than you think you need because you will exit crusted like a pretzel.

When to go

November to March, full stop. Summer out here is an anvil, and the shallow water goes hot-tub warm while the crust glares white enough to hurt. Within the season, the light show is the point: sunrise turns the lake pastel pink and you'll likely have it alone on a weekday; the last hour before sunset makes the salt formations glow and brings the photographers. Midday flattens everything and burns everyone.

Make it a loop: the fossil dunes

Fifteen minutes away stand the Al Wathba fossil dunes, wind-carved limestone waves frozen mid-break, with a managed site, marked paths and night lighting. Salt lake at golden hour plus fossil dunes after dark is the best free evening in the emirate, and both together still cost you nothing but fuel. The protected Al Wathba Wetland Reserve (the flamingo one) also sits nearby and is worth a separate winter visit during its opening hours; just don't confuse the three sites.

Is it worth it?

If you like your sights slightly absurd and completely unfenced, this is a top-five Abu Dhabi experience. It asks a little competence in return: right search term, right parking judgement, water and supplies carried in. Bring a friend with a 4x4 and a thermos and you've got the kind of evening the mall version of the UAE can't sell you.