Top Gear Middle Eastern Special May 2026

It seemed like a good idea at the time. Send three middle-aged men—one who looks like a confused geography teacher, one who dresses like a rejected 90s pop star, and one who is, well, a hamster—into the furnace of the Middle East. Give them three cheap, decaying convertibles. Tell them to find the lost city of Ubar, also known as "The Atlantis of the Sands."

What could possibly go wrong? Everything. Gloriously, explosively wrong. top gear middle eastern special

The defining moment of the special is, of course, the dune. Not a hill. A mountain of sand. Clarkson, in a fit of "power and arrogance," floored the BMW. He made it 200 meters. Then the sand swallowed the Bavarian beast whole. It seemed like a good idea at the time

What followed was an hour of sweaty, cursing, hopeless physics. The more they dug, the deeper the BMW sank. It was a metaphor for British foreign policy in the region, but funnier. Tell them to find the lost city of

And James May? He bought a 1996 Fiat Barchetta. A tiny, flimsy, Italian two-seater that looked like a ballet shoe. "It is the prettiest car here," he noted, peering at the engine. "It also appears to be leaking all of its bodily fluids onto this pristine hotel driveway." The Middle East special is not about driving. It is about survival. As the trio crossed from the UAE into Oman, the ambient temperature hit 48 degrees Celsius.

By Jason Barlow (for Top Gear Magazine)