Running in to checkpoint four of the desert trek, Mari Chandler of team DART-nuun was excited to share photos she'd just shot of camels in the desert.

"I saw my first camels!" she said, pulling out her camer to show me the images. "Glenn promised me camels. Now my trip is complete!"

Well, not quite. Still miles to go on the desert trek, and one final day of running, ropes and biking before the Abu Dhabi Adventure Challenge comes to an end.

Chandler was undeterred. The Michigan native's eyes were still wide open to the wonders around her. "We have sand dunes in Michigan, but they're nothing like these." I concur.

Most teams that arrived at this remote checkpoint in between the dunes of Abu Dhabi's Empty Quarter looked like they could use a good night's rest. Not so the members of team Nike. Athletes Mike Kloser, Michael Tobin, Sari Anderson and Chris Forne appeared ready to hit the trail. Instead, they took a few minutes rest in the shade of a Jeep. They ate and drank, bantering happily, and soon left. Several other teams decided to see if they could keep pace with Nike, and left at the same time. Nike's commitment to perpetual motion has worked well for the team in the past. Will they be able to hold the lead during the desert trek? We'll know more when the sun comes up tomorrow.

SOLE arrived at a remote checkpoint between dunes during the Abu Dhabi Adventure Challenge and wanted two things. First, water. Second, a doctor.

One journalist started up a conversation with SOLE co-captain Karen Lundgren, asking her if the desert trek was what she expected.

"Sun and sand," Karen said. "It was exactly what we expected."

What wasn't expected was an increasingly painful muscle injury suffered by co-captian Paul Romero. He said he tweaked his right quadricep while running in the sand. With a little TLC from the doctor on site, and a lot of tape from her medical kit, Romero was soon on his way.

Day four of the Abu Dhabi Adventure Challenge sent teams on a punsihing trek through sand dunes the size of small mountains. Team Salomon/Crested Butte's strategy of marching through checkpoints looked great on paper, but the reality of the massive undertaking slowly unraveled the plan.

"We went out with everybody at the front of the pack from the very start," team member Jon Brown said. "At the first checkpoint, we just blew right through to stay in front of the pack. Some teams stopped for 15 minutes to rest and drink water. They ended up making a smarter decision."

The revised strategy? Rest wherever they find water and shade.

I'm starting to think Paul Romero of SOLE is just messing with me.

First he told me he saw dolphins while paddling during day one. That same day, he claims to have run over a cat during the bike section of the course. Day two supposedly saw Romero nearly running down a smallish large game animal.

Now Romero claims he encountered a massive sea snake on day three's lengthy paddle on the Arabian Gulf! I'm gonna start demanding evidence. In the shot I got of SOLE paddling on day three, there were no sea snakes in site. Just four blissed-out athletes.

Eric "Sully" Sullivan of team Salomon/Crested Butte is a scrappy looking guy, but that didn't deter a foot-long fish from taking a shot at him during day three's long kayak leg.

"Fish were jumping around the boat all day long, but one jumped up and hit me in the PFD and in the chin. It scared me!"

Aside from the fish incident, Sully said the paddling was placid. "It was like paddling on a lake all day long," he said. "You didn't even need a spray skirt."

Sometimes it's the little things that make for a great day of adventure racing. Mike Tobin of team Nike gave me the lowdown on the desert island camp and the following day's paddle.

"We were on a tiny little island with all the other teams, enjoying a beautiful sunset. We hat lots of food."

And the next day: "We had a light breeze at our back all day long. No big swells on the Gulf. And a nice temperature."

The team's certainly had worse! They may come away from Abu Dhabi wondering if they'd been in an adventure race, or something of a race/vacation hybrid!