United Arab Emirates

In just five decades, the United Arab Emirates has done something no other country on earth has quite managed, building a global destination almost entirely from desert and ambition.

Dubai has made a language out of superlatives. The Burj Khalifa pierces the sky as the world's tallest building, the Burj Al Arab remains the defining image of Gulf luxury, and Dubai Mall draws more visitors than almost any destination on earth. Yet the city that dazzles is also the city that surprises — in the spice-scented souks of Deira, the trading history of Dubai Creek, the wind-tower lanes of Al Fahidi, and the desert that begins just beyond the city's edge.

Abu Dhabi made a different choice: to become the region's city of culture. The Louvre Abu Dhabi and the Saadiyat Island museum district are the clearest expression of that ambition, quietly building a cultural capital that the world is only beginning to take seriously.

Inland, the dunes of the Liwa Oasis mark the edge of the Empty Quarter, the largest continuous sand desert on earth. To the east, the Hajar Mountains form a dramatic backdrop to Ras Al Khaimah and Hatta, while Fujairah's coastline opens onto the Gulf of Oman.

A federation of seven emirates that transformed within a single lifetime yet still deeply connected to the desert and sea that shaped it.