Originally Posted by
LukeO9
Assume or hope?
I would buy a ticket for 2021 travel today if QR had a policy to allowed a free flight change that coincided with a Doha stopover.
Alternatively, and perhaps preferably, allow flight bookings for a Doha stopover that can be altered to a direct transfer if Qatar was still not open at that time. Then the wait would be for hotel availability, with flights safely in hand.
Qatar hasn't been a happy place with regards to COVID. The conditions in some of the communities of migrant workers was less than ideal in ensuring social distancing, though there was no transmission from its direct neighbours - a rare advantage of the political isolation it is still living through.
Opening up is likely to be awkward, given the pent-up demand for travel to and from the sub-continent and beyond.
But clearly opening up
is going to happen, though it's probably best to expect this to come hedged with restrictions. I wouldn't imagine re-establishing extended stop-overs for tourists an immediate priority for the government.
But who knows? We'll just have to be patient.