TRIPREPORT: Qatar Airways | Doha (DOH) -> Miami (MIA) | Economy | Airbus A350-900

Good early morning from Doha, Qatar :qatar: where I may have chosen the wrong time to visit :sweat_smile: only a few hours after I arrived from Bangkok, Thailand :thailand: on Qatar Airway’s Airbus A380, the country’s airspace was closed due to tensions between Israel :israel: Iran :iran: and U.S. :united_states: which I won’t go into to avoid controversy. But this essentially caused a disruption of traffic in the region including Qatars and Emirates. Lots of their aircraft had been diverted to other regions and the hustle and bustle of both Dubai International and Hamad International Airports were a ghost town for a few hours. After the restrictions were lifted, I went to explore the city and it’s really beautiful with some great people, architecture and culture. It’s not exactly like Dubai, UAE :united_arab_emirates: which I had the pleasure of visiting last year, but it’s still something worth to remember and honestly represents this region of the world much more in my opinion with the amount of museums. While this city was great in the day hours, once it got dark it was STUNNING :star_struck: exactly how I imagined it while on my flight from BKK to DOH the night before. I even got the chance to check out The Pearl Qatar, a few islands homes in the Persian Gulf which also provided a great view of the activity of Hamad airport. While I enjoyed my stay here, it unfortunately couldn’t last forever as it was eventually time to head back to the airport to catch my flight home to sunny Miami, FL :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: on Qatar Airway’s Airbus A350-900 in economy class, I’m glad your joining me once again and let’s get going!


I arrived at Hamad airport at around 4:00am to catch my 8:05am flight to MIA or so I thought. Given the popularity of Qatar Airways and general tourism to Doha, the lines were absolutely HORRENDOUS and it took me 40 MINUTES just to drop off my bags. Luckily, security was a much much better situation and we were through within like 10 minutes. Due to the conflict, Qatar’s operations were very disrupted with a lot of flights delayed. Some a few minutes other a few hours and unfortunately our flight to the 305 :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: was one of those that were delayed SEVERELY so instead of departing at 8:05am and arriving in the afternoon, we are now scheduled for a noon departure and evening arrival which would suck in a normal airport but quite a different story here in DOH. The airport itself is a crown jewel of not only the city but the country as a whole everything from the lamp bear to the multiple amenities here like a spa, gym and even an indoor tropical garden. It’s not Singapore Changi level but it’s still great and it honestly made me happy about the delay since I got to explore much more of Hamad Airport than I initially planned to. As much as I have been praising Hamad airport throughout the trip, I only realized the biggest flaw of the airport once I entered the boarding area. Here you have those special gate containment systems like I experienced when I flew with Emirates last year to and from the Maldives :maldives: and like I saw in Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport although I didn’t use those since the new concourse didn’t have them. It’s not really that big of a deal unless the flight is SEVERELY delayed like mine today I was aware of the delay but some weren’t and were trapped for 5 HOURS in this tiny space with no access to restrooms. If you’re gonna have these spaces, at least install restrooms it’ll relieve a lot of the passengers, literally :joy: jokes aside I scanned my boarding pass to enter the “cage” and awaited our aircrafts arrival.


FLIGHT INFO:

Origin: Hamad Intl :qatar: (DOH/OTHH)
Destination: Miami Intl :united_states: (MIA/KMIA)
Flight Time: 13:49
Airbus A350-900 (Qatar Airways)
Server: Expert


Taking me back to Miami :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: this afternoon will coincidentally be A7-ALE the same exact Airbus A350-900 that brought me here from MIA. In case you didn’t see the first part, it’s an almost 10 year old A359 delivered to Qatar Airways in October 2015. It’s pretty fitting that the aircraft that began this memorable trip will be the one to end it :face_holding_back_tears: considering we were running 4 hours behind schedule and many that have been in this cage longer than that, the crew wasted NO time beginning the boarding process once the cabin was deplaned and cleaned. Unfortunately, the gate agents couldn’t organize the boarding process well so it really turned into a free for all towards the doorway leading down the jet bridge.



As this is the same aircraft I was on when I flew into Doha, it has the exact same interior so I won’t go back into the specifics all over again. This time I’m seated on the right side of the aircraft in seat 35K which had a pillow, blanket and the same headphones and amenity kit from my previous flight from Bangkok to Doha on their Airbus A380-800. The crew also failed to get everybody boarded in a quick amount of time as we spent an extra 20 minutes on the ground just to get people settled in their seats since they were all using the lavatories because they were trapped in the cage for 5 hours without bathroom access, including my 2 seat mates. Luckily once we got everything sorted out, we pushed back and made our short taxi to DOHs runway 34R for take off!



Till the next time Doha! I definitely have plans to come back soon, maybe when the political climate clears up that is :sweat_smile:



After a beautiful departure out of Doha along with passing over the pearl-Qatar, we have reached our cruising altitude of 32,000ft, Qatar :qatar: itself is a pretty tiny peninsula with majority of the country being a desert :cactus: landscape outside of Doha and we soon crossed into Saudi Arabia :saudi_arabia:


It was around this time that the first meal service began where we were served either a vegan or non vegan meal, I ordered the latter which was waffle with some eggs and turkey sausage which alongside a croissant with butter, crackers, water bottle and beverage choice which I went with a Coke. Like every single meal I’ve had on Qatar, this one SHINED especially since breakfast offerings are often regarded as poor on most airlines. Yes having breakfast was strange considering it was about to be 1pm in Doha and it was pretty much the middle of the night in Miami :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: but we were originally schedule for a morning departure and maybe the catering crew didn’t bother loading lunch and dinner instead of a breakfast and lunch but it’s fine. I’ve had some excellent crews on my 3 previous Qatar Airways and this one was certainly no exception but one small thing is that once the service wrapped up, a lot of them disappeared. It’s like they all went to bed or something which is fine considering they’ve probably been working for a long time and this flight almost being 14 hours in length didn’t help. While they were hard working and friendly, their sudden vanish gives them a 4 star rating :star::star::star::star: that’s still not bad but nothing truly “worlds best airline” quality.


After the meal service wrapped up and the crew vanished, I decided to get some rest as I didn’t get any since I arrived from Bangkok almost a full 24 hours ago so I’ll see you guys in a few!



Considering the comfortable and quiet A350 cabin, I slept like a BABY and was only interrupted by a mid flight snack as we crossed by the “panhandle” type part of Spain :spain: with Portugal’s :portugal: northern border about to begin our voyage across the Atlantic. While I did have a great sleep, it unfortunately cost me views of Cairo, Egypt :egypt: and Barcelona if I used the tail camera but it’s honestly just a minor annoyance to my rest.


We were served a warm sandwich which could’ve been ham or turkey, I chose the former which came along cheese and spinach and ANOTHER beverage choice which I went with a water instead since you gotta stay hydrated on these long flights. It was yet again another solid meal the only real addition they could do is add some chips to accompany the sandwich but other than that, it’s perfectly fine and will be enough to keep me fed until it’s time for lunch.


Considering we’ll be over water for the next 7 hours let’s take a look at what the in flight entertainment has to offer. Like my previous flight on QRs A359 and all their other aircraft, it features the exact same software for both the actual entertainment and the inflight internet. I wanted to catch up on The Big Bang Theory as I started watching it on my flight from BKK to DOH so I put it on to entertain myself just before the final service begins.



Like I mentioned previously, Qatar’s A350s and A380s have these tail mounted cameras on them which help in proving views over the world if you don’t have a window seat or your side doesn’t provide the best view of the landscape below. I decided to check mine out at a pretty good time as we were now approaching the Bahamas :bahamas: with the Great Abaco and Grand Bahama islands visible.


This came just in time as our final meal service has commenced, it was the typical beef, chicken or pasta option. I chose the chicken which came alongside steamed white rice, warm bread roll with butter, chocolate cake for dessert and a side salad. This was ANOTHER solid meal service chicken was surprisingly over the top for airplane standards and the warm bread roll and rice just made it even BETTER :drooling_face: the salad and chocolate cake were also great but I just preferred the main course and bread a lot more. Alongside the meal was a water bottle and another beverage of your choice which I chose a Coke to wrap it all up. You won’t see me complaining about ANY of Qatar’s meals I had on my travels with them, they were all superb as far as airplane food goes!



The meal soon wrapped up and it was between then and the captain’s descent announcement that I honestly felt like wanting to get off. Don’t get me wrong flying is fun and when you’re on a world class airline like Qatar it’s makes the experience much better, but when you’ve been on a plane for almost 14 hours straight you can definitely feel like all you wanna do is land no matter what you’re at.


Luckily for me, that descent announcement came only 20 minutes after the trays were collected it was FINALLY time to begin our approach into Miami :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: we flew north over the Bahamas :bahamas: heading west towards the treasure coast before turning south heading alongside Palm Beach County, hugging the coast of Broward County passing alongside Pompano Beach, Fort Lauderdale :desert_island::motor_boat: Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport and Hollywood. We’d soon enter land passing over the Aventura/Sunny Isles Beach area in northern Miami Dade County. We’d fly directly north of the airport over Hialeah before turning a bit in the north west direction on the left down leg eventually turning base and coming to land on MIAs diagonal RWY 12.


Out in the distance you can make out Deerfield Beach along with the hometown of famous pop star Ariana Grande and where good friend @CEEKAYDA_97 lives, Boca Raton!



We got closer and closer to MIA along with the sun getting closer and closer to disappearing. That resulted in this BEAUTIFUL :heart_eyes: evening approach into MIAs RWY 12 above the Trump National Doral Golf Club. While an on time arrival is ALWAYS the most ideal scenario, the evening arrival and weather made this feel like a much more pleasant experience than it should’ve.



TOUCHDOWN! After almost 14 hours straight, Mr. 305 welcomes you to the 305! :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: except I probably won’t be as cool as him. After taking 4 flights on Qatar Airways I’d like to give my final verdict on the airline, it’s truly a world class airline not sure if it’s deserving of the worlds best considering a few small factors but it’s not far from the top spot either. They got great meals, crew, seats and a IFE system the only thing honestly holding them back is the whole gate cage system at Hamad airport. Not having access to bathrooms for a long time can get very uncomfortable and almost cost us more time on the ground in Doha than we wanted. I hope they install them or better yet remove the cages but other than that, Qatar Airways is a solid airline and definitely belongs in the world class category alongside Emirates!



Qatar Airways not only brought me to their gorgeous state of the art home of Doha but even brought me to a BRAND NEW modern facility in Bangkok. Now they finish it off bringing me back to the smelly, boring, cramped central terminal concourse E. Yeah if you couldn’t tell I don’t like this terminal AT ALL but one positive thing about it is that we don’t have to use the passport control facility in concourse D which at this time gets easily packed with the arrivals from the Caribbean, Central/South America, it wasn’t all cupcake and rainbows though since we also had to share the facility with passengers from the Iberia flight that landed 10 minutes before us from Madrid, Spain :spain: making the lines longer. Luckily my global entry came in handy and I through in like 10 minutes and by pure luck, my bags were also the first 2 to come out of my flight and I soon back in the humid air of South Florida :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses::motor_boat::performing_arts: I made my way to the parking garage to retrieve my car before driving for ANOTHER hour back home so I can finally get some real rest. :joy:


That will be it regarding my flight on Qatar Airway’s Airbus A350-900 from Doha, Qatar :qatar: to Miami, FL :desert_island::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: in economy class along with this entire trip to Thailand :thailand: stay tuned for mid July where I try another Middle Eastern carrier this time to Africa and as always between now and the next time, see you in the sky! :wink::waving_hand:

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As always, a really interesting trip report and great photos!

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Uh, that would be Seat 35K if it’s at the right side of the aircraft.

And btw, nice trip report. I’ll be flying to Naija :nigeria: on the second week of July. Stay tuned for that.

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Whoops, fixed it now thank you!

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