The journey went smoothly. The only hiccup was a diversion off the A702 near Penicuik which was not included on the Traffic Scotland website.

The two Qatar Airways flights were high quality, even in economy class.  I was very impressed with the Boeing 787  which had all mod cons, and even self-tinting windows. The shorter hop from Doha to Riyadh on an Airbus 333 was less fancy but perfectly adequate.

Saudi Immigration was thorough - questions, fingerprints and photo taken, but quick and efficient. The booked transfer from the airport to the hotel was waiting for me and took about 20 mins. Mind you, the roads were still quite busy at 3am.

The hotel is an Ibis next to Kingdom Tower in the city. Probably 3 star, clean and well run. This is quite a westernised area of the city, with luxury shops and malls. First impressions of the Saudis is that they are well dressed and speak good English. But these are of course the public facing ones, other types may exist elsewhere!

I met up with the consultancy contract leader in the afternoon and will get into the office tomorrow.