Are you just doing an overnight stop over in Doha or staying a few days? Have you enjoyed yourself and is it worth the stopover (I am considering doing one myself).
If coming back to Melbourne from Venice with Qatar, one pretty much has to do the stopover, as there is an eighteen hour wait between planes.
We stayed four nights in Doha and thought it was pretty good. To our mind, it was a smaller version of Dubai.
We stayed at the Best Western Plus in their huge Diplomatic suite (see my review at Booking.com). That hotel seems to be the hub for nightlife in the area with hundreds of people showing up every night by taxi to go to the top floor club or the Irish restaurant (chain-smoking was allowed in both places). I picked it because on the map it was close to major attractions like the Islamic Art centre, the museum, Souq Waqif. It turned out to be in the dingy old part of town. At the end of the street were dingy looking shops. But I found a small laneway opposite the hypermarket, which took one to the Souq Al Badi area with hundreds of shops - quite lively to walk around at night, including a dozen perfume shops. Plenty of "restaurants" there, the food was dirt cheap - two people could gorge on several Chinese meals each plus drinks for around 50 Rials. But the ambience was yuk. In hindsight we should have kept walking or taken a taxi to the Souq Waqif area, which has an excellent eating area.
Taxis were pretty cheap. So that it cost us 15 Rials (2.6 Rials to the AUD) to get the City Centre Mall (pretty average mall) or 25 Rial to get the Villagio Mall (very good mall with Venetian theme, though not as good as the one in Las Vegas) or to Katara Beach/ Katara Cultural area. (under construction). Minimum fee is 10 Rials. Note that plenty of people approach you seeing if you want a "taxi". They don't have a real taxi and try negotiate a price - which more often than not is twice the price of a regular taxi.
The best area we saw was at The Pearl, with lots of newer shops and dining areas, much better and newer than where we were staying (though a lot further away from major attractions). My neighbours stayed midway between our area and The Pearl, near the Sheraton Hotel, and they were very pleased with their stay.
Interesting was stuff like getting free buggy rides around the Katara Cultural centre and beach (heaps of guys with buggies just waiting to take you around) and at the airport, guys putting your luggage on trolleys and taking them to the check-in area and refusing any tip - i.e. little things that show the Qataris want tourists to visit, and aren't into gouging tourists.
And we enjoyed flying Economy with Qatar Airways too.
So we will probably be stopping there again in future.
Regards,
Renato
