Things to Do During a Layover
Unfortunately, for many of us there are fewer direct flights to our desired locations these days. If you live in or near a major city, particularly an airline hub, you may not have to connect as much as some others, but layovers are a fact of life for most travelers – and especially for those headed to remote or underserved locations.
We’re usually willing to pay more for a direct flight, but when that’s not possible you may run into a conundrum: How long do you want your layover to be? The immediate answer might be “as short as possible,” but if you book flights with super-short connections, and the second flight is only once a day, that may cause you to miss a day of your trip. Headed some places that’s not the end of the world, but if you’re planning to get on a float plane or a boat that cannot wait for you, it could be a disaster. I always prefer to have at least a couple of hours, and when we’re headed to Mazatlán through Dallas, where there is indeed just one flight a day, we often come the night before. As you’ll see below, sometimes it’s possible to make the layover into an integral or valuable part of the trip.
If you have a connection time that’s too long just to twiddle your thumbs, but not quite long enough to see the city, you have to consider your options. A lot of this depends on whether you can leave the airport. For domestic travel, you almost always can. For international travel, it depends on the location, the visa requirements and any security concerns. During the COVID pandemic, when many countries required tests to enter, it was often substantially more difficult to just “country hop” simply because you had the time and energy.
Here are some ways to make the time pass quickly or productively, or both:
Sleeping in Airports
For most of us, long haul travel is not restful, but some people can sleep just about anywhere. If you’re going to need the rest because you’re: (a) wiped out from battling giant fish; (b) need to be at work in the morning; (c) you’re taking a redeye; (d) you’re flying across many time zones; or (e) all of the above, and you can’t or won’t get a hotel room, it pays to get comfortable and settled in. There are ways to maximize your Z time. In fact, there are websites devoted exclusively to this topic with reviews and guides and plenty of articles about getting good rest in this situation.
Bottom line: Make sure it is allowed in the particular airport. Make sure your possessions (and your physical person) will be safe while asleep and don’t forget to set an alarm.
Eat and Drink
Most airports have some sort of food service or bar, and in many of the larger hubs there are increasingly great options. Research this ahead of time to find out which are considered to be the best and if they’ll be open while you’re there. If you’re at a large airport oftentimes the place you’ll want to visit may be in a different terminal – check if you’ll need to go back through security after walking/riding there. If so, allot enough time to get back. I hope that it goes without saying that you should avoid eating too much of anything that will cause you intestinal distress or otherwise inconvenience/disgust the other people on your plane.
If you elect to drink, don’t overdo it if you tend to get a little rowdy. The last thing you want in life is to end up in airport detention or a foreign jail, or to miss your next flight. Even if you can handle your liquor, be sure to drink enough water to stay hydrated on the plane – since air travel is already naturally dehydrating.
Use the Lounge
One of the best options available is to use an airport lounge. While they vary in quality from bare bones to absolutely luxurious, most of them offer some combination of the amenities that will make your layover go by more quickly and/or comfortably. If you have airline status or you are traveling in the right class of service, lounge access may be included. Otherwise you might have it through a credit card. We formerly had a card that had access to Priority Pass affiliated lounges, and in airports that did not have such options they sometimes gave us a credit toward food in certain restaurants. Oftentimes, if there is space in the lounge you can pay a daily rate to use it. At $50 or so per person, it might provide you with sanity and enough food/drink to more than pay for itself. It might also provide secure storage for your carry-on luggage so that you can do things within or outside of the airport without having to tote around your bag.
Many lounges have not only food and drink and a modicum of privacy, but also private showers to refresh yourself between flights. Before you spend on a lounge that’s not already included through your flight, status or credit card, check online or ask at the desk what they have. You might even inquire whether you can inspect the premises. We’ve been to some, like the Virgin lounge at Dulles and the Qatar Air lounge in Doha, that included five-star meals and other amenities bordering on opulence. We’ve been to others that were serviceable (note: during COVID, some of the lounges closed or severely ramped back their food offerings), and others that were just a dank room with soft drinks and light snacks.
If You Have to Remain Awake in the Airport with No Lounge and No Place to Eat
I love to read, but find it difficult to do so when there’s lots of noise around me in any form, but particularly vacuuming staff, screaming babies, and battling spouses. It pays to find a quiet corner to yourself, but that may not be possible. Investing in some noise-canceling headphones, or even foam ear plugs, are your next best bet. Beyond that, you can bring a packable board game (Hanna loves some Travel Scrabble) or a deck of cards, or you can download movies and television programs to your electronic devices to pass the time. Just remember to keep your cords and chargers in your carry-on so you don’t use up all the juice.
If you’re more ambitious than that, you can exercise – even just walking the hallways while pushing or toting your bag is enough to get your heart pumping.
Get a Hotel Room
If your layover is too long just to sit, eat and wait, and too short to really get out and explore, it’s often worth it to get a hotel room. Of course, this often depends on your ability and willingness to leave the airport, as noted above. Most major and even many much smaller airports have a variety of lodging options within a short orbit – often with a shuttle to get you there. For less than the cost of a good meal, you can get some rest, clean up, and feel refreshed for the next leg of your journey. If they include breakfast, or amenities like a pool, that’s even better, and offsets some of the cost.
When possible and semi-reasonable, we’ll pay a premium to stay at a hotel within the airport. For example, at Dallas-Fort Worth International there is a Hyatt that doesn’t require you to go outside of the actual terminal. When we can’t get a good rate on that one, there is another Hyatt directly across the street. That eliminates the hassle and/or cost of a shuttle or taxi. It means we can pop out of bed, roll downstairs, go back through security, and we’re in business.
Some airports also have “sleep pods” or “short term hotels” like Minute Suites that allow you to pay by the hour for a clean and restful place. Sometimes these may even be discounted or included as a premium credit card perk.
Explore the Area
One potentially fun part of an extended layover is the ability to explore a city that you would not otherwise visit. In fact, if you know that you’re going to have to go through a hub that’s not otherwise in your plans, you can often build the same itinerary as a multi-leg trip rather than a round trip (for example, instead of DC to Johannesburg through Doha, buy a ticket from DC to Doha, Doha to Johannesburg, and Johannesburg to DC).
We’ve done this several times:
In Anchorage, we had 7 or 8 hours between our flight from King Salmon and our departure from Anchorage to head home. We rented a car, drove around to see a few sites, and had a leisurely dinner at the 49th State Brewing Company. This one worked out well because even though the flight was around midnight, in July in Alaska it stays light well into the night. We hopped on the plane unexpectedly tired and woke up in the lower 48.
When we went to South Africa through Doha, we had a similarly long layover. Since we had flown business class, Air Qatar offered a program that included expedited customs, a Visa into the country, a ride to a hotel and a hotel room for a very reasonable cost. We could have stayed in the very nice lounge, but we were glad that we elected to take advantage of the offering. We ended up taking a taxi from the hotel to the souk, had a very nice dinner, and got a cultural experience we’d never previously tasted.
Beyond our experiences, several others have also suggested planned layovers as a way to get a bonus experience.
Here’s an article talking about looking at Panama as a retirement option by making use of a layover. Since COPA goes though Panama City on so many flights to Central and South America, this seems like an easy one, especially because the city is so safe and inviting. We’ve loved our two short stays there.
Many of the best flight routes to the Seychelles are through Dubai on Emirates. Somewhat surprisingly (to me, at least) there is a growing sport fishery in the Arabian Gulf for species including trevally and milkfish. Per a description at Yellow Dog Fly Fishing “you are usually fishing in the very heart of the city – often-times directly in front of the 7 Star Burj Al Arab Hotel, Atlantic Hotel, or the more than 200 skyscrapers that dominate the Dubai skyline.” It’s a no-brainer to add this in to an already-pricey trip if you want to make the most of it.
While we’ve never fished during a layover in Miami, our initial peacock bass experience was in the canals directly behind the airport. If you packed properly, you might be able to sneak out and catch some tropical beasts on foot – or you could have a guide pick you up for a 4- or 8-hour trip.
Layovers: Notes and Warnings
If you do schedule an extended layover, be sure to ask at check-in whether your luggage will go all the way through to your final destination or if you’ll have to pick it up and recheck it. Sometimes this depends on how the ticket is booked (i.e., round trip vs. multi-city). For example, sometimes American Airlines has taken our luggage all the way through to Mazatlán and at other times we’ve had to pick it up in Dallas.
I have no proof of this, but somehow it seems logical to me that the longer your layover, the more likely your luggage is to get lost if you don’t get it mid-trip. Even if the airline doesn’t screw it up, it could arrive at your destination early and get misplaced by airport staff. When given the choice, I’d rather pick it up partway, and usually I can explain why that shouldn’t incur an extra charge (if any fee is asked).
Regardless of whether you check your luggage all the way through or pick it up partway, keep all of your medications, electronics chargers, money and travel documents on your person or in your carry-on bag. Never let them get out of your reach. If you head out of the airport in foreign country number one en route to foreign country number two, you are going to run into a world of hurt if you lose your passport, money, or phone.
If you do venture into a foreign city, try to pay for as much as possible with a credit card. Changing money is often a pain in the butt (since you won’t want to change back small amounts), and doing it in the airport is usually done at usurious rates. If you think you’ll need some local currency with you for taxis and the like, get it at home and obtain a sufficient but not ridiculous amount.
One other consideration: Fish storage. If you’ll be bringing fish home as luggage or as a carry-on, you might need to minimize the length of storage, or at least make sure that your interim airport has some sort of freezer facilities. In Anchorage, for example, you can pay to have your fish frozen before you check in. In Panama, however, we’d have to do that through an in-city hotel, which is not always possible. It’s not a small consideration.
