The first hour is traffic. You leave Dubai at the same time as everyone else, and the Sharjah stretch moves in fits and starts. By the time it clears, you would like a car that has done some of that work for you. That is what ProPILOT Assist does in the INFINITI QX80. It keeps a set distance from the car ahead and helps with steering, with your hands still on the wheel. And if the car needs attention at any point, AWR Automotive has INFINITI service centres along the route. 

In Ras Al Khaimah you turn inland for Jebel Jais. The road to the top is about 30 kilometres of hairpin bends, and this is where a heavy car is tested, in how it climbs and in how the people in the back feel on the way down. The QX80's 3.5-litre twin-turbo V6, with 450 horsepower and 700 Nm of torque through a nine-speed automatic, handles the climb. Ras Al Khaimah is also one of the places where AWR Automotive has an INFINITI service centre, so the climb can be taken without a second thought about the car. 

The cabin was cooled from your phone before you walked out of the door. The front seats massage, and the seats in the first two rows are heated and ventilated. In the second row there is a separate climate zone with an infrared sensor that reads passengers' body temperature and adjusts the cooling, so the question of whether it is too hot in the back never comes up. 

The air suspension, with adaptive dampers, keeps the body level through the bends, which matters to anyone in the back who is prone to carsickness. On the inland stretch the Klipsch Reference Premiere system, 24 speakers and 1,200 watts, keeps everyone in the back entertained, and the speakers in the front headrests carry a call to the driver alone while the music plays on for everyone else. 

Past Masafi the road drops towards the Gulf of Oman, and by late afternoon the east coast opens up ahead, with Fujairah's beaches and corniche close to wherever you park. Everyone steps out in a good mood, which is the clearest sign that the cabin has done its job. 

If something does need looking at, AWR Automotive has INFINITI service centres along the route in Sharjah, Umm Al Quwain, Ras Al Khaimah, Fujairah and Dibba, for a routine check or a quick tune-up, and aims to have a car back within the hour on its Express Service. New QX80s come with a five-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty and five years of 24-hour roadside assistance. 

So you plan the weekend around where you want to go, with the car and the support behind it already taken care of, and the drive becomes one of the reasons you went.