Arrived on Sunday evening, from KL, which is one of the few international destinations served that could be interesting for members.
Bussed to the terminal. The RH doors were used to discharge passengers. Despite having bet on the LH doors, the walk to the terminal was sufficient for me to be the first into the terminal. Unfortunately the immigration area was full of people from China & it took 45 minutes to clear immigration. Would have been over an hour had I been towards the middle of our plane.
If the Junta want to discourage tourism, having just 3 manned immigration posts is a fine way to do that.
In comparison, there was no wait entering or leaving Malaysia, on both my visits there this year. Very slick.
Due to not spotting an incoming e-mail, I had failed to book a taxi (800 baht). There were no meter taxis in sight either. So I had to go for one of the 5 or so minibus stands, all priced at 250 baht.
I went for the Air Asia branded one, on the naive assumption they might just be slightly better. The ticket was for Kittitron Transport.
Departure within 15 minutes was promised & they achieved about 4 minutes 40 seconds, which must be some kind of record. Lots of people & not being last off the plane must help.
Got to South Pattaya in about 1hr 15, after a couple of drop offs including a detour down to Jomtien.
Despite incompetent organisation of immigration, if you have the chance, arriving at Utapao is way more convenient than Don Mueang.
Arrival at Utapao
Re: Arrival at Utapao
Next month Qatar starts flying 250-seat Dreamliners into Utapao. I suspect that could make things worse, although with an arrival time of 06:30 and departure at 07:50 perhaps the queues won't be so bad.
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Re: Arrival at Utapao
Last month, my flight out of UTP coincided with two charter flights to Russia (B-757s) and one to China. The place was very disorganised, though I suspect that without the charters they would have coped perfectly well.
Re: Arrival at Utapao
After a week in Macau, I returned to Utapao on Wed 00:30am. with Air Asia.
A week ago, departure was from the old building. At 5-6pm the place was pretty much packed. Air Asia flights to Chiang Mai, Hat Yai, Macau and some cities in China were exiting from the same gate one after the other. But the shuttle bus were clearly labelled. The organization was quite good considering constraints of the old facilities. No chaos to report.
Arrival on Wednesday was another shuttle bus ride but to the new terminal. It was up the escalator to immigration then down the escalator again for baggage collection and exit. We were the only flight, the whole thing was a breeze. My pre-booked taxi was waiting.
I noticed that air-bridges are already in place. Hopefully they will be in operation soon.
I'm actually looking forward to planning another trip out of Utapao.
A week ago, departure was from the old building. At 5-6pm the place was pretty much packed. Air Asia flights to Chiang Mai, Hat Yai, Macau and some cities in China were exiting from the same gate one after the other. But the shuttle bus were clearly labelled. The organization was quite good considering constraints of the old facilities. No chaos to report.
Arrival on Wednesday was another shuttle bus ride but to the new terminal. It was up the escalator to immigration then down the escalator again for baggage collection and exit. We were the only flight, the whole thing was a breeze. My pre-booked taxi was waiting.
I noticed that air-bridges are already in place. Hopefully they will be in operation soon.
I'm actually looking forward to planning another trip out of Utapao.
Re: Arrival at Utapao
Landed at 1715, collected baggage and on the road in pre booked Taxi at 17.30.
Beat that! Admittedly, internal flight.
Beat that! Admittedly, internal flight.