Immigration Lines Are Just As Bad To Exit Vietnam!

I’m live-blogging my SAS EuroBonus SkyTeam Milion Mile challenge this week. Click here for background and route information.

Any hopes that stamping out of Vietnam would be less cumbersome than stamping in were quickly dashed when I saw the huge lines waiting to leave at Ho Chi Minh City’s Tan Son Nhat International Airport.

I had a bit of a dilemma on my hands. I had a 9:05 am flight, but I wanted to maximize every minute of sleep and breakfast at the Park Hyatt Saigon.

Yes, I wanted to have my cake and eat it too.

But I also knew that if we cut it too close and missed our flight, I could end up losing the value of my Vietnam Airlines,  Garuda Indonesia, China Eastern, and Korean Air tickets. So by 6:50 am we left the hotel. Traffic was light at that time and we made it to the airport in 20 minutes…whew.

We used Grab to get around in Ho Chi Minh City…very easy!

But stepping inside, I saw the lines…yikes.

We checked in for the flight, hoping for some sort of priority boarding due to my SkyTeam Elite Plus status, but nope…everyone goes through the same line in SGN.

While the lines were just as bad, thankfully they moved faster…in fact, we even had a few minutes to visit the Vietnam Airlines Lounge before boarding our flight to Singapore.

But give yourself time! You don’t want to miss your flight because it took too long to stamp out of the country.

Next: Vietnam Airlines Lounge Review