My wife and I recently travelled MEL-DOH-NBO in QR Y to go on a safari tour of Kenya and Tanzania.
We have travelled on the QR A380 MEL -DOH before in Y and the long haul flight was a pleasant experience again. I'm not sure if its the seat pitch or width or design but the long time in the seat was relatively painless compared to 777 or 787 flights of similar length. Service was good throughout the flight (or maybe it was a pleasant surprise after a recent horror experience on LATAM flying MEL- SCL).
DOH is a pleasant airport for a large one with plenty of space to find a seat for a rest between flights. However prices are expensive (A coffee the equivalent of AUD9 +). All arriving pax pass through security before proceeding to the general shopping area and gates. On some flights, such as our return flight to MEL there is another security check before entering the gate lounge. The problem is that there is insufficient seating for an A380 load of pax, which encourages people to delay passing through security to the gate lounge. Wi-fi is free (requires your eticket number) but drops out after an hour or two.
Our next flight DOH-NBO departed from a stand off apron (Surprising since it was a 787) so we were bussed from a downstairs gate (C21 - 29) , reminiscent of the bad old days of CAN. IN flight service was again good with a full meal followed by refreshments later on the 6 hour flight to NBO.
On the return flight I was dreading a 6 hour flight NBO - DOH on an A320, (after painful experiences on JQ A320 flights of much shorter duration) but Qatar's A320 are well set out with good seat pitch, and the in flight service was of the same high standard.
QR seem to have a better boarding approach by sector of the aircraft than say QF and were turning back anyone trying to sneak past with the incorrect sector on their boarding pass.
We have travelled on the QR A380 MEL -DOH before in Y and the long haul flight was a pleasant experience again. I'm not sure if its the seat pitch or width or design but the long time in the seat was relatively painless compared to 777 or 787 flights of similar length. Service was good throughout the flight (or maybe it was a pleasant surprise after a recent horror experience on LATAM flying MEL- SCL).
DOH is a pleasant airport for a large one with plenty of space to find a seat for a rest between flights. However prices are expensive (A coffee the equivalent of AUD9 +). All arriving pax pass through security before proceeding to the general shopping area and gates. On some flights, such as our return flight to MEL there is another security check before entering the gate lounge. The problem is that there is insufficient seating for an A380 load of pax, which encourages people to delay passing through security to the gate lounge. Wi-fi is free (requires your eticket number) but drops out after an hour or two.
Our next flight DOH-NBO departed from a stand off apron (Surprising since it was a 787) so we were bussed from a downstairs gate (C21 - 29) , reminiscent of the bad old days of CAN. IN flight service was again good with a full meal followed by refreshments later on the 6 hour flight to NBO.
On the return flight I was dreading a 6 hour flight NBO - DOH on an A320, (after painful experiences on JQ A320 flights of much shorter duration) but Qatar's A320 are well set out with good seat pitch, and the in flight service was of the same high standard.
QR seem to have a better boarding approach by sector of the aircraft than say QF and were turning back anyone trying to sneak past with the incorrect sector on their boarding pass.
