Hello from Jeddah! I just wrote about my bizarre Jakarta Airport transit experience. Well, that was like a vacation compared to my Jeddah Airport transit experience, which involved five ATMs, a harrowing one hour drive, and getting in a yelling match with a driver.
Let me explain… but first let me acknowledge that in retrospect I would have definitely handled this situation differently. I made some rookie mistakes and much of this was avoidable, and this wasn’t my finest moment. I’m not too proud to acknowledge my mistakes, though, and at least it makes for an entertaining story. I’ll blame it at least partly on my exhaustion.
I knew my Jeddah Airport transit would be complicated
On my current review trip, I ended up connecting in Jeddah, where I had an extended layover of around eight hours or so. That ended up being the best option (by some masochistic definition of “best”), given the airlines I wanted to review.
I knew my transit wouldn’t be straightforward. I was arriving at the Hajj Terminal on Garuda Indonesia (from Jakarta), and was departing from Terminal 1 on Etihad (to Abu Dhabi). When I wrote about my planned trip, some kind readers warned me that my transit experience would be a bit complicated, as the two terminals are 20 kilometers apart by road, with no easy airside transit option.
I figured that was an exaggeration. Nope, by road the terminals are in fact 20 kilometers apart…
Transit between terminals in Jeddah
My expectation was that I’d clear immigration at the Hajj Terminal (I had a Saudi Arabian e-visa, after all), and then I’d take a taxi to Terminal 1, et voilà! What could go wrong? Well…
My Jeddah layover was worse than I could have imagined
My Garuda Indonesia flight arrived at the Hajj Terminal. This was honestly quite the cultural experience, as this terminal is used by foreign carriers largely operating flights for pilgrims. While Jeddah’s new Terminal 1 is beautiful, the Hajj Terminal is… not.
Jeddah Airport Hajj Terminal
Even though the terminal has jet bridges, we were put on a bus and sent to immigration. Immigration was seamless, and the immigration officers were super friendly, and welcomed me to Saudi Arabia with a big smile.
The arrivals area was pretty deserted, since most pilgrims are traveling in groups, taking buses, etc., so there aren’t many individual visitors. I first opened the Uber app, but it said there were no vehicles available. Uh oh, that’s not good.
Fortunately there was a taxi desk in the arrivals hall, but the guy working it didn’t speak a word of English. So I figured I’d deal with that later, and would first go to find an ATM, since I’d need cash to pay a driver. I tried the ATM closest to the terminal exit, but after entering all my information, the machine said that there was no cash. Strange.
Jeddah Airport Hajj Terminal arrivals hall
I was approached by a friendly Pakistani man, who asked if I needed a taxi. Let me state very clearly that ordinarily I’d never accept a ride from someone doing this kind of soliciting at an airport. However, I wasn’t sure there was necessarily a better option, and I didn’t have any safety concerns here as I would in the United States, since Jeddah has little crime. I figured that worst case scenario, I’d be ripped off a bit, but that’s not the end of the world.
I didn’t see any official taxi queue (aside from the desk with the guy who didn’t speak any English), so I asked him how much it would be to Terminal 1. He said 120 SAR (~$32). I explained that I still needed cash because the ATM didn’t have any, and he said that wasn’t an issue, and we’d stop on the way.
So I accepted the price, even though I should have probably haggled, partly because I knew I didn’t have many other options to get cash.
At this point we started walking toward his car. He then revealed he’d be driving one other person, who then started walking with us. Okay, odd, but whatever…
Things are going great so far!
I can’t really do justice to the scale of this terminal, but it was a solid 20 minute walk before we got to the parking lot. He told us to wait, and that he’d get his car. I heard his car several seconds before I saw it, because it was the biggest screeching pile of junk I’ve ever seen/heard, and I don’t know how many accidents it had been in. It just consistently made the loudest whining noise imaginable (yes, more than I’m whining in this post!).
Okay, at this point I should’ve probably reconsidered, but it would’ve been a 20 minute walk back to the terminal, and I didn’t necessarily have a better option anyway. I mean, how bad could it be? Well, I’m happy you asked…
This guy was the worst and most careless driver I have ever seen in my life:
He spent most of the drive texting without even looking up every few seconds to see if there was traffic; I repeatedly asked him to stop, but then he’d stop for a minute or two, until his phone chimed again, and then it was back to more of the same
The road near the airport is five lanes in each direction of traffic, and when the road curved, he didn’t want to actually turn the wheel, so in a matter of seconds we’d be driving diagonally across five lanes of traffic, and he didn’t even look in the mirror to see if there were any cars in the lanes
He only seemed to have two modes of driving — either fully accelerating or slamming on the brakes
I don’t know how many dozens of times we got honked at; his driving was so bad that I almost felt like I was in a comedy skit, except there was nothing funny about it
Look, usually I have a lot of faith in drivers, even if they drive wilder than I would. After all, they do this for a living, and I figure that if they’re alive to still drive me, they can’t be that bad. However, I didn’t quite get that level of confidence from this guy, and his car’s “battle scars” also didn’t do much to reassure me.
By the way, rather than drive the 20 kilometers shown in the above map, we actually drove left, covering a distance of 28 kilometers. I think that’s because there are more ATMs in that direction.
So about halfway through our drive, we stopped at an ATM. The first ATM said there was no cash available. So then we stopped at another one. The same thing happened. Then we stopped at another one. The same thing happened. This guy obviously thought I just had no money in my account, rather than there being a problem with ATMs.
Jeddah ATMs leave a bit to be desired
Finally we arrived at a drive-thru ATM that probably had a queue of 20 cars waiting to use it. It almost felt like waiting at a gas station before a hurricane. Okay, so I guess Jeddah has a cash shortage, or something? Does anyone know why all these ATMs don’t have money? I mean, it doesn’t exactly seem like Saudi Arabia is short on cash…
Rather than waiting in line for the ATM, he drove to the very front, and then told me to get out and cut the people and use the machine.
“They’re also waiting, I’m not going to cut them.”
“No, just explain to them, they will understand.”
“Explain what? There’s a line to use the ATM.”
“Just cut, it’s fine. You can just explain.”
“No, what am I supposed to explain? You explain, if that’s what you want me to do…”
At this point I just sort of stood in the drive thru ATM, with me and the driver yelling at one another. He kept insisting that I should cut the line, while I told him I wasn’t comfortable doing that. The man in the car who was next to use the ATM clearly took pity on me and noticed how uncomfortable I was, and invited me to go in front of him.
Another 30 minute drive later, we finally arrived at Terminal 1. As I went to pay him, go figure he didn’t actually have change, so I basically ended up having to give him a huge tip. Oddly the other guy being driven wasn’t actually going to the terminal. I’m not sure if it was a friend of his, or what…
I can’t even begin to express how happy I was to be out of the car and in the new terminal after this ride.
Jeddah Airport Terminal 1
Bottom line
My experience transiting Jeddah Airport was awful. I knew the transit from the Hajj Terminal to Terminal 1 would be complicated, but I wasn’t prepared for the worst drive of my life, plus so many ATMs in Jeddah not having cash (what’s up with that?).
Ironically enough, the actual immigration process was super easy and everyone was friendly. It was just the getting between terminals that was a bit complicated. Next time (okay, there won’t be a next time, but if there were), I’d be sure to plan the transfer a bit differently…
