I think it’s the first time we’ve had a night flight from Melbourne so hopefully I’ll be able to sleep.
Swiftly through security and immigration although we were late boarding for some reason.
We’d booked seats, 2 aisle next to each other so it was a bit of a lottery as to the person I’d get sitting next to me.
A rather large lady was my companion for the next 14 hours and it appeared she decided she’d paid for her seat and half of mine. She was also unable to keep still and was constantly elbowing me. I just hoped she would sleep. There was a middle aged guy by the window, he sat down and didn’t move for about 10 hours.
The food took ages to come out, it seemed they’d waited until everyone was about to pass out before they served it. We’d pre-ordered, I had Thai beef salad and Song had fish. Mine was quite nice.
After supper (served at about 01:30) I put my earphones on, spent 10 minutes creating a play list then waited for my neighbour to finish organising herself – she took her shoes off, pulled out 2 blankets, earphones, hairnet, hand cream, and finally she was set.
I actually slept pretty well, not constant but would wake up and find I’d missed a load of the music so must have been asleep for a while.
Luckily neither of the other 2 in my row had weak bladders and hardly got up at all.
At one stage I woke up with a headache which got progressively worse – I can’t remember the last time I had such a bad one. I even felt sick, and I don’t think I’ve ever been sick on a flight. I was so bad I refused the hot breakfast and had fruit. Took a couple of panadol and it went after a while, but not before I seriously contemplated booking business class next time.
I didn’t watch any movies (Song saw 5), got near to the end of The Matrix then we were on the approach to Dubai so packed my gear away.
We had a 4 hour layover in Dubai, then on to Doha, but tried to see if we could get an earlier flight.
Off the plane, asked about our connecting flight and were put on a bus. Took a trip around the airport, told to get off the bus, through security into what looked like the old terminal because it was a bit low-rent; pretty average shops. Asked about our connecting flight at information and were told to go back to where we just got off the bus to get on a bus to get to the other terminal. Very disorganised – we’re flying Qatar Airlines and it seems that anything not Emirates is second class here.
We had hoped to see if we could get an earlier flight to save us the 4 hour layover but that looked increasingly unlikely as we sat waiting for a bus to the terminal.
Bus arrived, guy announced it was for terminal 1 and 2 but I still asked if it was Qatar because I didn’t trust them.
On the bus again, another trip around the airport to a deserted terminal. Wandered around and saw some people, through security again and checked in. No chance of getting the earlier flight anyway because it was taking off as we checked in.
Found the shops and cafes and sat down, I took out a small can of coke from my bag that I took from the plane. Which I had just taken through 2 security checkpoints. Not exactly confidence inspiring.
Cleaned up a bit then went for a wander around the shops looking at stuff we can’t afford.
Sat down again, neither of us hungry so didn’t bother going to one of the cafes but nibbled on some snacks we’d brought along for just such an occasion.
The flight to Doha was just an hour, we’re staying for 2 nights to break up the first leg. Flight was fine, very short, then into the immigration queue for about 40 minutes. Had to pay for a visa and I considered refusing on principal but the guy was pretty grumpy so didn’t want to annoy him. We’d now been travelling for 24 hours so were ready for a shower and some food served on a plate instead of out of a packet. Got the courtesy shuttle bus to the hotel, but the room wasn’t ready. Put on my sad face and the receptionist said we could use the showers in the swimming pool area. It was either the sad face or the smell that convinced her.
Decided to get something to eat. Looked at trip advisor but there was nothing decent nearby. Wandered around the hotel but most of the restaurants didn’t open till 18:00 and the prices were steep, but beggars can’t be choosers and we ended up at one of them. Song had a club sandwich and I had chicken curry. I was pleasantly surprised – it was really good, very impressed. Mine cost about $25 aud which was pretty good, although I also put on about 2kg. I took a photo and put it on instagram only to accidentally delete it 4 seconds later.
The room was finally ready so we collapsed and tried not to go to sleep too early, watched tv I’d downloaded.
Tomorrow we’re visiting the Souk – a traditional shopping mall.