A bit about travelling.

I can't believe that I forgot to mention one of the most useful links: Trip Advisor. I don't use it for booking vacations, what it is great for is the hotel reviews. Readers can sumbit reviews of the hotels that they stayed at and this gives you a great insight into what hotels to stay in, and what ones to avoid. Just search for "hotels in XYZ" and the list will come up. I try to use hotels that have at least 10+ reviews (better chance that the reviews have not been stacked by hotel management logging on and giving it a fabulous review). I've used the reviews when picking hotels for the past 3 years and it hasn't steered me wrong yet. Check it out next time you are planning a trip.

I have discovered that the airlines in this region: Qatar Airways, Gulf Air (Bahrain), and Emirates (Dubai) all have an interesting trick. I always wondered why flights back to Doha were full of people who were using Doha as a transit point to their next stop and assumed that the airlines were cutting their prices for transit passengers going to Asia and other destinations. Turns out, and a friend and I checked this out online, that flights to a destination are cheaper if transiting though the regional hub than if you were going there from the hub directly. Example:

Doha -> New York on Qatar Airways: ~$1,125
Dubai -> Doha -> New York on QA: $878

Doha -> London on QA: ~$1,200
Doha -> Dubai -> London on Emirates: $906
Dubai -> London on Emirates: ~$1,150

What the heck is up with that, pay more and take one less flight!? Gulf Air does this as well. You pay a couple of hundred more to fly from the regional hub than if you transited through the hub. Next time I book a ticket I might go down to the airline ticket agency and ask why this is, maybe they'll give me a discount to keep quiet. ;-)