If you need to do a 9 hour layover in Doha, this is your guide to what you need to do to leave the airport and make the most of your time there.

Having seen the overstretched Doha Hamad International Airport for 2 hours on the way to Vietnam I knew I didn’t want to spend 9 hours there on the way back. We couldn’t even get anywhere to sit for an hour, never mind lay down.

There must be a way to make the most of our Qatar stop over while we were there, I thought. Turns out, there is!

If you’re wondering what to do in Doha airport for 9 hours, I’d say leave it, ASAP.

9 hour stopover in Qatar

I’d been debating for a few weeks before we left for our two-week trip to Vietnam whether to fork out for a hotel in Qatar, or stay the night in Qatar’s Hamad Airport.

Other Qatar Airways passengers can get a hotel voucher when they have a stopover as long as ours, but apparently our super cheap flight meant there was no budget for this.

Check with your airline though, to see if there’s any complimentary transit accommodation before you start doing all this…

I had a look around online and found a relatively cheap hotel near the airport called La Villa, where double rooms were going for around £34. It was right in the centre and close to the Doha Corniche Boulevard