Al Maryah Island's Galleria, Abu Dhabi
Part of the full Abu Dhabi's Grand Mosque on an AUH Layover
Al Maryah Island, the financial district in the middle of Abu Dhabi, puts 400 shops and a row of waterfront restaurants on one block, with a flat track of about four kilometres running round the outside of it.
The Galleria’s 400 shops and waterfront restaurant row
The mall fills most of the island’s landward side: 400 stores, a hundred places to eat, and a laser IMAX screen, all of it under one roof and open 10am to 10pm. That roof is the point of the place in August, when the alternative outdoors is 42°C.
What has collected on the water side is a different proposition: Zuma, LPM, Coya, Nusr-Et, Almayass and Asador de Aranda within a few hundred metres of each other, tables out facing the channel, keeping going long after the shops have shut. It is the densest run of well-known restaurants anywhere in the city, and the reason people cross onto this island who have no intention of shopping.
The one stretch where luggage is genuinely awkward is the mall’s ground-floor concourse, which doubles as the district’s main pedestrian route between the towers and the waterfront and fills up at lunchtime.
A track of about four kilometres rings Al Maryah Island
Running round the outside of the island is a flat, step-free waterfront path, lit after dark, with the channel and the older city on one side and the glass towers on the other. An hour covers it at a walking pace, and it comes back to where it started, which makes it a different shape of walk from the city’s long linear seafront.
Three small parks sit along it: one for families, with climbing frames and slides, one laid out with outdoor exercise equipment, and one built as a raised deck over the water. All three cost nothing. Shade is the thing they do not have much of, so from June to September this is a walk for after sunset rather than the middle of the afternoon.
Al Maryah stays open past the hour the museums shut
Most of what a visitor comes to Abu Dhabi for closes at eight in the evening. The mall here runs to ten and the restaurant terraces well past that, which is why this island suits a flight leaving at one in the morning better than it suits an early afternoon.
Getting back is a taxi, 25 to 35 minutes to Terminal A at Zayed International Airport (AUH) for roughly AED 60 to 80. The A1 airport bus ends at Al Zahiyah and the A2 at Al Danah, both on the main island rather than this one, so either leaves a second leg across a bridge. Allow 90 minutes at the terminal on top. If the hours you have fall in daylight instead, the ticketed buildings in the full Abu Dhabi route are the better use of them, and the seafront walk runs along the north-west shore of the main island, a bridge and about four kilometres away.
Frequently asked questions
What should I do during a layover near Al Maryah Island in Abu Dhabi?
Eat, then walk it off, and stay indoors for whichever half of that the weather decides. The Galleria holds 400 shops and 100 places to eat under one air-conditioned roof and opens 10am to 10pm, with a laser IMAX screen inside it. Outside, a waterfront track of about four kilometres runs round the edge of the island past the restaurant terraces and three small parks. Three or four hours covers all of it. Nothing here needs booking, which is the argument for this stop over the ticketed buildings elsewhere in the city.
Is the waterfront track walkable end to end?
Yes, and unlike the city's long seafront it comes back to where it started, which is the practical difference. The track runs about four kilometres around the edge of the island, flat and step-free the whole way, past the restaurant terraces on the water side and the towers on the other. Allow an hour at a walking pace. There is very little shade on it, so between June and September this is an after-dark walk and the mall is the daytime version.
Is Al Maryah Island a good dinner stop before a late flight?
It is the densest concentration of well-known restaurants in Abu Dhabi, with Zuma, LPM, Coya, Nusr-Et, Almayass and Asador de Aranda all on the same waterfront strip, plus the casual end of the range inside the mall. That makes it a reasonable place to eat properly rather than at an airport gate. The terraces keep going after the shops close at 10pm, so a departure at one in the morning still leaves room for a sit-down meal beforehand.