Flying Home with BA and Qatar over Christmas
Dec 24, 2013, 8:35 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Saint Andrews, Scotland
Posts: 53
Flying Home with BA and Qatar over Christmas
Being rather disorganised, I booked my ticket home to Hong Kong relatively close (20 odd days) to Christmas, and end up having to fly on Christmas eve and Christmas Day to save a few pennies. My routing is as follow: EDI-LHR on BA metal, EDI-DOH, and DOH-HKG on Qatar Airways.
I have flown 2 years ago with Qatar to Vienna from Hong Kong, as was blown away by the service. I have since looked for opportunities to fly again with the airline, but the right fare never presented itself, until two weeks ago.
Arrival at Edinburgh is uneventful. My friend Paul who drove me to the airport expected traffic jams as a result of other people's last minute Christmas shopping. Luckily he was pleasantly surprised. Check-in at the BA counter took seconds, as there was no queue. However, the male agent was not particularly friendly, and was unconcerned by the fact that he could not present me with an onward boarding pass (despite all flights being on the same booking). He gave no instruction on how I would obtain one, and just said 'You will have to deal with Qatar'. Not classy, BA.
Sleazy Jet, as Paul likes to call it!
A pre-departure coffee.
I have flown 2 years ago with Qatar to Vienna from Hong Kong, as was blown away by the service. I have since looked for opportunities to fly again with the airline, but the right fare never presented itself, until two weeks ago.
Arrival at Edinburgh is uneventful. My friend Paul who drove me to the airport expected traffic jams as a result of other people's last minute Christmas shopping. Luckily he was pleasantly surprised. Check-in at the BA counter took seconds, as there was no queue. However, the male agent was not particularly friendly, and was unconcerned by the fact that he could not present me with an onward boarding pass (despite all flights being on the same booking). He gave no instruction on how I would obtain one, and just said 'You will have to deal with Qatar'. Not classy, BA.
Sleazy Jet, as Paul likes to call it!
A pre-departure coffee.
Dec 24, 2013, 12:25 pm
#2
Original Poster
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Saint Andrews, Scotland
Posts: 53
EDI-LHR
BMI counter at EDI, looking forlorn and sad
BA A319 Bulkhead, with framed photographs, which give the plane a more residential feel.
Leg room, and a Stephen Fry book I lost shortly afterwards while waiting for the bus connecting T5 to T4!
BA A319 Bulkhead, with framed photographs, which give the plane a more residential feel.
Leg room, and a Stephen Fry book I lost shortly afterwards while waiting for the bus connecting T5 to T4!
Dec 25, 2013, 6:47 pm
#5
Original Poster
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Saint Andrews, Scotland
Posts: 53
Dec 25, 2013, 7:18 pm
#6
Original Poster
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Saint Andrews, Scotland
Posts: 53
Transfer from T5 - T4
LHR-DOH Packed Full, according to the gate agent at the T4 transfer desk. There I got my boarding passes to HKG issued. T4 was rather charmless, so I settled down with a Boots meal deal and read a bit of the news.
LHR-DOH on an A330-300. Apologies for the poor quality of the photos - I was a bit self-conscious about taking photos in a full cabin. The flight was not an easy one for the crew, with one meal service and a snack service in 6 hours. Most passengers stayed up for the entire flight, and the call sign was buzzing throughout.
Transfer in Doha: the current Doha terminal has the feel of a Greyhound Terminal. I was expecting a long queue at security and then a mad dash to the gate. It was very fortunate that passengers from our flight was released directly into the concourse without further security screening. With about half an hour till boarding, I went to my favourite place in the terminal.
I got to the gate at 7:10 for the 8:10 departure, and it was already last call. After a 15-minute bus ride around the tarmac, I found myself inside an old A330-200.
The seats were so old that they even have ashtrays in the arm rests!
New Doha International Airport to the right.
The flight was 1/3 full, so I had a row to myself
Verdict: Qatar Airways is perfectly adequate. My only complaint would be that the crew lacked warmth and personality, which BA crew seems to be better at. Also, it wasn't very nice to be subjected to 5 minutes of commercials on one's PTV before landing.
LHR-DOH Packed Full, according to the gate agent at the T4 transfer desk. There I got my boarding passes to HKG issued. T4 was rather charmless, so I settled down with a Boots meal deal and read a bit of the news.
LHR-DOH on an A330-300. Apologies for the poor quality of the photos - I was a bit self-conscious about taking photos in a full cabin. The flight was not an easy one for the crew, with one meal service and a snack service in 6 hours. Most passengers stayed up for the entire flight, and the call sign was buzzing throughout.
Transfer in Doha: the current Doha terminal has the feel of a Greyhound Terminal. I was expecting a long queue at security and then a mad dash to the gate. It was very fortunate that passengers from our flight was released directly into the concourse without further security screening. With about half an hour till boarding, I went to my favourite place in the terminal.
I got to the gate at 7:10 for the 8:10 departure, and it was already last call. After a 15-minute bus ride around the tarmac, I found myself inside an old A330-200.
The seats were so old that they even have ashtrays in the arm rests!
New Doha International Airport to the right.
The flight was 1/3 full, so I had a row to myself
Verdict: Qatar Airways is perfectly adequate. My only complaint would be that the crew lacked warmth and personality, which BA crew seems to be better at. Also, it wasn't very nice to be subjected to 5 minutes of commercials on one's PTV before landing.
Dec 25, 2013, 10:00 pm
#7
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: Dubai
Posts: 3,301
Yes, the 'greyhound terminal' is way past its prime, hard to accept Qatar as a real competitor to Emirates until they open the new one.
Hate that when it happens, especially when you're trying to see the end of a movie
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