This weekend I had the hilarious pleasure of making a pit stop in Abu Dhabi to attend the adrenalin-fuelled Monster Jam event at Etihad Arena. 

It was great, kind of like a baseball game – relaxed vibe, family friendly, lots of kids, especially young boys. 

Then there was total mayhem as the vehicles engaged in gravity-defying tests of speed and skill … dirt flying everywhere.

From the moment I stepped into the Monster Jam arena, I felt like I had been transported to a giant toy box, except the toys were 12,000-pound trucks and they ran on fuel instead of batteries. The sound of revving engines and the smell of gasoline filled the air, and I couldn’t help but feel like I was in the middle of a bizarre automotive apocalypse.

Raging motorheads will no doubt have been familiar with the line-up of flamboyantly painted vehicles. There was Grave Digger, the pickup-style Blue Thunder, the shark-shaped Megalodon and several others – each one making even the Gulf’s biggest 4x4s look tiny in comparison. 

The freestyle competition was a sight to behold. The trucks flew through the air like they had wings, doing flips and twists that would make a gymnast jealous. The only thing missing was the circus music and some clowns juggling chainsaws.