Yes, This Is Real Life Part 10 - Royally Jordanian

Yes, This Is Real Life- Preview

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 1- Location, Location, Location

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 2- Brits In Beantown

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 3 - Shades On, Wheels Up

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 4 - Welcome to Ghost Port

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 5 - When You Layover During Ramadan

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 6 - Birds In Doha

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 7 - Dealing With Dragons

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 8 - A Place Most Exceedingly Rare

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 9- I Still Can't Believe This Is Real Life

This is not a post about flying Royal Jordanian.  I have, to date, not flown Royal Jordanian.  It is, however, a post about transiting their home airport of Amman, Jordan in all of 90 minutes, and I thought it a rather snappy title. 

Even for me, this day of flying pushed the ridiculous.  Now that I'd been re-routed, my layover was shorter and I literally flew the same plane in and out of Jordan right back to Doha.  It was about a three hour flight each way.  I had the same cabin crew, and even the same seat.  You've just got to laugh sometimes.  My flight attendant sure did.

So, here's how it went-

I left the lounge, and boarded on time for AMM.  They fly a a330 between these cities, which is still definitely a widebody plane, but not as big as the 777 or the 350.  The seats are lie flat, but not nearly as spacious as the 777 seats, or the 350 seats.  It's still fantastically comfortable for this length of flight, and would be fine for an overnight as well.  The cabin is laid out in a 2-2-2 configuration, so the window seats don't have aisle access.  Once again, I had no one next to me.

Instead of a pre departure beverage, since it was Ramadan and they weren't serving alcohol on any planes flying soley between middle eastern destinations, the cabin crew came around to offer coffee and dates while the rest of the flight boarded.  They did serve a meal on the flight, but also offered a boxed meal to go to passengers observing the holy month.



Regional amenity kit

I ordered the ful medames (quickly becoming my local go-to, the same way I always grab a bowl of congee in Asia) and pita as a snack, and kicked back to watch the IFE and doze a bit.  The flight went quickly, and we arrived on time to AMM.  Here's where the fun started.

Now,  I've done several transfers between itineraries like this, where you can't check in for your onward flight until you get on the ground at the destination, and so you don't have a boarding pass to clear transfer immigration.  The most hair raising example of this was definitely going through Jakarta, an experience I'd prefer not to repeat...but if I'm honest...I probably will at some point.

I had asked if I could get my AMM-DOH boarding pass on leaving DOH, but since the itinerary was technically a separate one way ticket AMM-DOH-IAH, they couldn't print it.  They did, however, print me the read out of the booking details so I had that to hand over in AMM.



Waaaaiiiittting to get my passport back

The transfer desk/area doesn't have a Qatar agent at it, and so I had to hand over my passport to an airport employee who then left to go down to the ticketing desks to procure my boarding pass.  This is simply never a good feeling, but is unfortunately how it's done many places.  I had to wait 30+ minutes for him to return, all the while staring out the window at the plane I arrived on, and was scheduled to depart on shortly.



Finally made it back upstairs- AMM Airport

The total transfer time I had available was only 90 minutes, so by the time I cleared security and was sent back to the departures level, I just headed back to the plane and boarded a few minutes later.  This was quite entertaining to my flight crew, especially as I was in the exact same seat as before. 

It went something like this:

FA: Welcome, boarding pa... Oh, it's you again!

Me: Um, yep. Again.

FA: Seat?

Me: 4F, again, apparently.

FA: (Laughs)  You missed us?

Me: It's a long story...

On arrival back at DOH, I took a few minutes to check out the arrivals lounge, simply because I hadn't been before and I'd gotten in earlier than the prior two days.  It's reserved for business and first class arriving passengers, and is located past security.  There's a made to order menu, not as extensive as the airside lounges, but plenty of options, as well as drinks, places to relax, and showers.  I didn't spend too long, just enough to get a look around.



Arrivals lounge seating



Menu

Since I also had the 'stopover package' for this night, I'd stopped and been given my hotel and meal voucher, as well as my info for the free shuttle before clearing immigration.  As seemed to be the most common set up, I'd been given a night at the Oryx Rotana hotel, which while not the Ritz, is still quite a nice hotel to have for free.  It's not in the main part of town, or up by the Pearl, but since it caters to one night stopovers that's no big issue.

After a short shuttle ride, I was checking in to my third and final hotel of the weekend.  How the last night went, is coming up.

 

~CruisingAltitude

 

Read next: Yes, This Is Real Life Part 11: Up All Night To Get Miles

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 8- A Place Most Exceedingly Rare

Prior adventures:

Yes, This Is Real Life- Preview

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 1- Location, Location, Location

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 2- Brits In Beantown

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 3 - Shades On, Wheels Up

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 4 - Welcome to Ghost Port

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 5 - When You Layover During Ramadan

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 6 - Birds In Doha

Yes, This Is Real Life Part 7 - Dealing With Dragons

I have a pet peeve about the current state of IFE on many airlines.  Actually I have plenty, but this pithy one is relevant to my life currently.  That is that each time you want to watch a program-  no matter if it's a 3 hour movie, or a 22 minute TV show, you have to watch an intro with several segments.  There's usually one about the airline, and then some adds from whatever company they currently have a contract with. 

Qatar takes this intro business seriously.  They currently have an add for a condo building/mall, and an add for the airline, as well as a full length add about Qatar itself.  The tag line is 'Qatar- A Place Most Exceedingly Rare,' which, when you watch it 20, 30, 40 times over a weekend makes you question their use of the English language.  I guess it sounds fancy, but what exactly does it mean?  Sure, this place by definition is rare-it's small, and until the currently diplomatic crisis, not many people knew where it was, but aside from that....?

They do a good job of giving it gravitas I suppose, but I personally think the prior incarnation of their propaganda video was better, and was possibly the best airline self promotion add I've ever seen.  I could watch it all day.

First course... on just a 4+ hr flight

 

Second course.

I landed back from Colombo safely around midnight.  It was a good flight, just over 5 hours.  I had the curry dish which, I kid you not, I have been thinking about since the last time I flew CMB-DOH.  It didn't disappoint.  After the meal, I fell asleep and woke up to the descent announcement.  I probably got around 3 hours of sleep, which was plenty to hold me over through the night.

Just finishing the flight off right.

What was notable about this trip was learning the changing visa situation for traveling to Qatar.  When I came through a year or so ago, there was just a simple paid visa on arrival that cost about $25.  This time, I had a few options, and used a different one by necessity each time.

The current visa rules and countries.

First off, Qatar now has a free multiple entry visa for US (and many other) citizens.  This visa just requires proof of onward travel, and 6 months at a minimum left on your passport.  However, at the time I went on this trip, this wasn't yet the case, and so I was encouraged to check out some of the workarounds.  These workarounds, even though the visa is no longer the issue, are worth knowing about still as they're a great way to get free night's accommodation and sometimes more.

What program you qualify for depends on the length of your stopover, with a few other rules thrown in.  You qualify for their first program, the "Stopover package" or "STPC" if you are flying on Qatar in higher economy classes (N and above), business or first, have a layover of between 8 and 24 hours, and ....this is the kicker... there is NO SHORTER connection you could have taken, even if that connection would have had a different fare.  Certain close destinations (MCT and KWI) are also excluded.

Why these rules are so strict, is that this package gets you not only a night at a good hotel (5-star in the case of business and above, 3-star for econ), but also a sizable food and beverage voucher that pretty well covers your meals, and free airport transfers.  Not a bad deal at all.  I did this package on my third and final night of this trip...so I'll be giving the details soon.

The other program to know about, which is likely more useful to most people since it has far fewer restrictions, is the "+Qatar" program.  This basically is Qatar's way of trying to get people to spend some time in the city on their way through. 

What Qatar is, at least to the limited outsider, is an oil and money drenched peninsula surrounded by desert and neighbors who currently don't like them very much.  What they have going for them, besides all that money that lets them turn this desert into architectural wonders (or eyesores, depending on your taste), is a truly world class airline and airport and they're painfully, painfully, proud of it.

Strong tea & Beautiful tails as far as the eye can see...

 In honesty, they should be.  I get that there's unfair advantage with their government throwing cash behind the investment, but everything, from the food, to the service, to the planes themselves is just a cut above most any other airline out there.  This is to say nothing of the airport, which is just beautiful start to finish.  They're so proud of it, that THIS VIDEO exists of the 'official song of Hamad International Airport.'  And yes, that fully is the big teddy bear in the background at 00:48.  Can you imagine what the symphony of... Newark airport.... would be???  I mean...

This is all to say that especially with the long running blockade in effect, Doha's tourism industry is playing to its strengths and using the constant influx of passengers to its advantage.  The +Qatar stopover program provides free one night's accommodations for passengers on layovers of more than 12 hours.  It lacks the food and transport, but is far less restrictive, and lets you pick your own hotel.  It also provides a free visa for travelers from countries not included in the new multi-entry program.

As a side note, the website appears to be asking you to build a multi-city itinerary, but each time I've done it a simple round trip that defaulted to the long layover time was fine. 

This can be an amazing deal, especially since the hotels are quite nice.  They include some high end and recognizable brand properties that I'd happily stay in even without this deal.  A second night can also be added for just $100, meaning you are getting a great hotel for $50 a night.

 



This deal is technically time limited, and ends December 31, 2018.  However, when I used it last year, it was time limited then, but keeps getting extended.  If the blockade continues, I expect it will keep on rolling along.  I'm crossing my fingers that they push into next year as I have a nice long layover in Doha in January.

On descent into Doha at night.

What has changed though, and what made being in Doha in that perfect storm of Ramadan, summer, and blockade, was that the list of hotels participating was more expansive and had some options that were simply insane to get for free.  Which... is how on my second stop in Doha I was up all night at the Ritz Carlton, by myself.... for abso-frikkin-lutely free.

And that, my friends, is a topic for the next entry...

Read Up Next- "I still can't believe this is real life" : A free night at the Ritz, and the most insane lounge to date.

~CruisingAltitude