Your first trip abroad from Pakistan, a checklist from passport to boarding
What to do three months out, what to do the week before, and exactly what happens at the airport on the day, written for someone who has never flown out of the country.
Published 12 August 2026 · About 5 minutes to read
Nobody explains the airport to you. People explain destinations, and then you are standing in a departure hall at two in the morning holding a passport you have never used, trying to work out which queue is yours.
This is the whole sequence, in order, written for a first trip.
Three months out, or as early as you can
Your passport comes first. Everything else waits on it. Check the expiry date. Countries require a period of validity remaining beyond your travel dates and the requirement differs, so confirm the number for your destination rather than assuming. If yours is close to expiry, renew it before you book anything.
Check the name. The name on your passport is the name that has to appear on your ticket and on your visa, spelled the same way, in the same order. A small difference is a real problem at check-in.
Decide where the visa is coming from. Either you are applying yourself, in which case start reading the mission's checklist now, or you are travelling with an operator who applies for you. On our tours the visa is inside the package and our desk files it, which is set out on the visa page.
When you book
- Give your name exactly as it is printed in your passport, and check the booking confirmation against the passport rather than against your memory.
- Give the documents you are asked for early. On a group departure the visa files go in together and a late document holds up your own file, not anybody else's.
- Ask what is included and what is not, in writing.
- Ask what happens to your money if the visa is refused, before you pay a deposit.
- Ask whether travel insurance is included, offered, or yours to arrange.
- If you are not departing from the city the group leaves from, ask about the connecting flight at the time of booking rather than later.
Two weeks out
Your visa should be in hand. Read it when it arrives. Check your name, your passport number, your dates.
Print things. Your visa, your ticket, your hotel confirmation and your itinerary. Keep them in your hand luggage. Phones run out of battery in queues, and a printed page has never failed to open.
Money. Enable your card for international use, ask about limits and fees, and work out what cash you want to carry. That is a subject of its own: how much cash to carry, and where a Pakistani card actually works.
Your phone. Ask your operator what roaming costs, or plan to buy a local connection when you arrive. Download offline maps for the cities you are visiting before you leave.
Medicine. Anything you take regularly should travel in your hand luggage, in its original packaging, with the prescription. Take enough for the whole trip plus a few days.
Baggage. Check your airline's allowance for checked and cabin bags, because it differs by airline and by ticket. Airports also limit liquids in cabin baggage, so put anything you are not sure about in the checked bag. Weigh your bag at home rather than at the counter.
Plugs and weather. Sockets differ by country. So does the weather, and a lot of first time travellers pack for the country they imagine rather than the forecast.
The day before
Charge everything. Pack the printouts and the passport last so they are on top. Put your passport, visa printout, ticket, money and phone in one bag that does not leave your shoulder. Confirm your pick up or the meeting point. Sleep, if you can.
At the airport, in order
Arrive early. Your ticket states a check-in closing time and it is earlier than people expect on an international flight. If you are travelling with a group, arrive at the time you were told, not at the time you calculate.
- Check-in. Passport and ticket. Your bag is weighed and taken, and you are given a boarding pass. Check the gate number and the boarding time on it.
- Immigration. You go through counters where an officer checks your passport, your visa and your ticket. They may ask where you are going, for how long, and who you are travelling with. Answer plainly. This is routine.
- Security. Laptops and liquids out, belt and watch off, everything through the machine.
- The gate. Find it first, then buy your coffee. Gates close before the departure time printed on your ticket.
- Boarding. Boarding pass and passport again.
On our departures the group meets at the airport in Lahore or Islamabad and a tour manager from IBEX travels with the group. You are told who that person is, with a mobile number, before you leave. If you have never done this before, say so when you book. Nobody will think less of you and it changes how much hand holding you get on the day.
On the plane
You may be given an arrival card or a customs form to fill in before landing. Fill it in on the plane with your passport in your hand, because the details it asks for are on the passport and the hotel address is on your itinerary. Keep a pen in your bag for exactly this.
When you land
- Immigration. Passport, visa, and sometimes your hotel booking and return ticket. Have them ready rather than in a bag in the overhead locker.
- Baggage. Check the tag on the bag is yours before you leave the hall.
- Customs. Declare anything you are required to declare, including cash above the amount that country requires you to declare.
- Arrivals. On a group departure your transfer is arranged and you leave together.
Then it is done, and the part you were nervous about turns out to have been about forty minutes long.
What we would add
The trips that go smoothly are the ones where the paperwork was finished early and boringly. The passport, the name spelled correctly, the documents in the hand luggage, the bank told, the bag weighed at home.
If you are choosing a first destination, Baku is where a lot of our first time travellers start, and what it really costs is broken down here.