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Forget travelling around the world in 80 days! Our member harvyk recently completed a journey around the globe in just ten days, and their experiences have been compiled into a trip report.
Although our member’s real destination was Seattle, some creative flight routings meant some time was spent in Los Angeles and London before completing the eastward journey home via Dubai.
The first couple of days were spent in Los Angeles, with visits to attractions like Santa Monica, the popular fast-food chain “In-n-Out Burger” and the Reagan Library, where among other things an old Air Force One jet aircraft was on display.
After travelling onwards to Seattle, the next stop was London. Although Qantas provided excellent service in Premium Economy to the United States, British Airways failed to deliver on this next leg. Stuck in a middle seat at the back of the plane, our member experienced what some might call the “flight from hell”.
I resigned myself to 57F, a middle seat in the middle row, at the absolute back of the bus, I was not happy at all, and I plan to have some words with American Airlines as I see this as their fault. The flight itself was terrible, terrible food coupled with a Flight Attendant whom just could not care less. Example, when coffee was served, they served everyone except myself and the person next to me, I’d even taken my headphones off waiting in anticipation.
In the UK, a day trip to Cambridge was in order. Some time was also spent in the metropolis that is the English capital itself, and there was even a meet-up in a typical English pub with a fellow AFF member. “AFFers” can be found all over the world, and London is no exception!
Keeping connected overseas was relatively painless. Our member was able to make use of $5/day roaming through Vodafone Red. By global roaming standards, that’s a pretty good deal.
But our member had less luck with some fraudulent card transactions. Fortunately a backup was in place.
Just before going to bed I got a call from Mrs Harvyk asking where all our money was. Very confused I jumped on internet banking to find that thanks to Alamo swiping my card multiple times, hundreds of dollars had been put on hold. It was at this put in time I was super happy I had listened to my gut instinct before going and had left some emergency money sitting in another account.
After just ten days of travel, our member returned to Sydney via Dubai, having officially circumnavigated the globe!
The plane from Dubai tracked very south, right over the top of Perth, so for the last 3.5 hours it looked like nothing more than a Perth Sydney red-eye on the moving map. Sure enough before too long we’d landed in Sydney, and I now officially been right around the world.
Such fast-paced travel may not be for everyone, but it does make for a great story to tell the kids! Follow the journey HERE.
