The plan is coming together, but not without some hiccups...

Writing this from FCO (Rome) Airport in Italy. It is now Monday afternoon at around 2:00pm local time. We are here waiting for our connecting flight to Tirana, Albania later this afternoon.

When we left our apartment in Dar es Salaam, we had to be out by 11:00am, but our flight wasn't until 9:30pm. So we just went to the airport and hung out. We took an Uber taxi from the house, and we couldn't believe how cheap it was. For the 12 km (7.5 mile) trip, it cost 10,500 shillings ($5.65 CAD, $4.50 USD). I thought they made a mistake, but our host had told us it was the cheapest way.

And, because it was a Sunday, there was hardly any traffic. I had read horror stories of people who did it during weekly rush hour traffic and it took two hours. Glad we didn't have to go through that even though we had lots of time.

Nobody around!

Yep, that's us!

Empty.

The International Terminal 3 was built in 2015, so it's still pretty new. Nicely air conditioned, and the WiFi worked well, which was more than likely because we were pretty much the only ones there! Not entirely true, because there were a few flights that came and went during our waiting time, but not very many.

Our flight was leaving at 9:35pm, so we didn't expect to be able to check our bags until around 6:00pm or so. They had said on the departure board which check in counters were to be used by our airline, but we could see them from where we were sitting and there was no activity going on. Eventually, I went for a walk, and they had changed the check in counters! 

We went up and they pre screen you depending on where your final destination is. We were given paperwork for arrival in Italy where there are still very strict entry regulations. But we aren't leaving the airport, just connecting. Still, they gave us papers for arriving in Italy which didn't make any sense to me at all.

Then, when we were getting our boarding passes, this one guy in charge said that we needed an exit ticket booked for Albania, which we didn't have. At this point, we don't know where we are going from Albania... or when, exactly. I argued, but he was adamant, even though Qatar Airways was only getting us to Italy... Alitalia is getting us from Italy to Albania. This guy wasn't even with Qatar Airways... he was just the local counter staff they use because there aren't that many Qatar flights out of DAR.

Anyhow, he made us sit and book a ticket then and there, which I found very stressful. I like doing the proper research and making sure we're paying the right price. But, I (wrongly) assumed that the 24 hour cancellation rule would apply, so went ahead and booked a cheap Wizz Air flight to get from Tirana to London on May 3rd. It was only like $60 each or something like that. Then after I got it booked, I went with another lady and checked with the one Qatar Airways booking personnel who was in their airport ticket office who said it was only my flight TO Albania that was important. Well Wizz Air flights are non refundable. I was not a happy camper. Worse case scenario, we lose the money, but we still might be able to make use of it because from London you can fly pretty much anywhere. We'll see.

This all took up about an hour and a half. Time was getting tight to get to the boarding gate on time!

Good thing there was hardly anybody on the plane. It was a big Airbus A350-900 which normally seats about 350 people. There might have been a dozen! But, this was only for the very short flight from Dar es Salaam to Zanzibar where a bunch of people got on.

Qatar Airways have a fantastic seatback entertainment system

And, they give you a free hour of high speed Satellite internet.

And, lots of leg room.

Us!

And pretty much nobody else!

Leaving Dar es Salaam.

Goodbye Tanzania!

It was only a 20 minute flight to Zanzibar, then we were on the ground for two hours before we took off again. I think I watched a whole movie while we were waiting. The plane ended up being about 2/3 full and we had an empty seat in our row.

Watched a couple more movies, and napped a little in between. Arrived in Doha, Qatar at something like 5:00am and had a couple of hours to walk around and stretch our legs before the flight to Rome.

That's enough for now! I'll get another post up in time for tomorrow morning!

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