It opened on September 24th. On Friday the 26th, we got up and got moving as early as we could, and we were at Atlantis by 10am. To get there, you drive out the trunk of the Palm Jumeirah, one of Dubai's man made islands. The hotel is stunning. We visited the aquarium where they have a whale shark. Very few places in the world maintain whale sharks in their aquariums, and we are hoping Atlantisreleases the whale shark soon, as they said they would, since whale sharks do not typically do well in captivity. 
There is also a huge water park at the hotel, called Aquaventure. It is kind of extreme for the kids, so we probably won't be going to that water park any time soon.
The Atlantis had a fire in the lobby just prior to the grand opening, so they were doing some work to the exterior and much of the main lobby was closed. In the lobby, we were able to view an amazing Chihuly glass sculpture made to look like sea grass with all kinds of creatures. It was gorgeous and almost as high as the very high ceiling.
We ate at two places in the hotel. The first was Seafire, an Italian restaurant. We enjoyed a lovely lunch there, and there were good options for the kids which is usually our biggest challenge when eating out. The second place we ate was at Cold Stone Creamery, the same ice cream place that is in the States. The scoopers sang for their tips, and even better, they tossed the ice cream. One guy would scoop and throw it to another guy waiting by the registers with the cup (the red square is the ice cream flying).
Pretty impressive!
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