A new flyer's first flight and Sydney shopping.

[JeniSkunk]

I'm just a newbie to flying, and a Nothing Red in Velocity, heading down to Sydney on VirginBlue for a daytrip shopping.

BNE-SYD -24hours:
Opened the DJ site in Safari for Windows, to use OLCI as planned. Entered my info, clicked Next, and immediately hit a problem: the OLCI won't work with Safari for Windows, as it won't pass the entered data through to allow second step in the OLCI, seat selection.

Windows and Safari version:
Windows 7 Home Premium 32bit.
Safari 4.0.5 for Windows 32bit.

Had to do the OLCI in Firefox. Still, I managed to get a very good seat, 5F, for the flight BNE to SYD.

SYD-BNE -24hours:
This time I opened the DJ site in Firefox and completed the OLCI without any problems. Got the same seat location as on the flight to SYD.
One oddity though turned up when I carefully read the boarding passes. For the flight to SYD the pass says fare type R, for the flight back to BNE the fare type is A.

Both fares when purchased were Blue Saver.

Jenifur Charne

 

[JeniSkunk]

Updating my TR with the posts of how the day itself went. I'll split the TR into 3 posts. BNE DOM, Sydney shopping, and SYD DOM.

The day seemed to be one for screw-ups and things not going as planned.

Plans to be nice and early in getting to BNE did not work as expected. I was running late to get to my local train station as I forgot to take my cellphones off charge and put them in my bag and didn't realise I'd left my cellphones behind till I was half way to the station. Had to go back home and get them, then go to the station.
As a result of running late to BNE, there was nowhere near enough time to use the DJ Lounge at BNE.

At BNE, there was no notification to pax that the expeced aircraft had been changed. Instead of the 737-700, it was a 737-800, which had no seatback IFE. Thankfully, despite the aircraft change, there was no change to the seat I'd selected. The flight boarded and took off on time. As I was boarding, the male FA who was handling the boarding pass check was very interested in my cabin roll-on.
Having no-one in the middle seat made for a pleasent flight. No fights over the armrests.
Travel was slightly rough on the climb through the cloud layers due to the weather conditions.
Once at cruising altitude, the food trolley was bought out. I much prefer being able to select what food I want from a decent range even if I have to pay for it, rather than have to take a very limited selection for free.

Jenifur Charne

 

[JeniSkunk]

Departing the plane at SYD, I had a brief look at the retail and food court area, before heading down to the station to catch the train to central. Any hopes for a recent train such as the Tangara or Millenium were to be dashed, as what turned up was an old C set.
Exiting from the platforms underpass at Central, I was surprised to see seagulls battling with the pidgeons for foodscraps at the station. Growing up on the Gold Coast, and living in Brisbane, I've never seen seagulls in the city proper. Only on the beaches. I then spent an hour or so wandering around the Central Station and Railway Square area, so I'd know where I needed to go for the afternoon.
Checking the map I'd downloaded and printed of the Railway Square bus interchange, I found where the buses to the Queen Victoria Building departed from on George St, and headed through the underpass to catch a Metrobus 10 to the QVB.

Walking through the Druitt St entrance, and looking up at the 3 levels of up market shopping above, it clearly made the Brisbane Arcade look decidedly poor in comparison.
While in the QVB, in the window of the pets toys shop, Paws A While, I saw what would be my first purchase of the day, a large toy fox. I asked, but unfortunately they cant get any skunks.
I spent a good hour or so wandering through the various levels of the QVB, before going to the Westfield shopping centre at Centrepoint, and Myers.

Jenifur Charne

 

[docjames]

Just thought i'd post since no-one else has. Enjoying your TR - it's nice to see the view of a trip from someone who hasnt done a lot of air travel.

 

[drron]

Yes it is refreshing to see something through the eyes of someone who is not yet an obsessive point collector,upgrade fanatic or MR tragic as many of us are here.

 

[JeniSkunk]

Thanks for the comments, drron and doc james.
I'm just a newbie to air travel, and due to my finances, will always be one who is an infrequent flyer. As for the trip, having grown up on the Gold Coast, the idea of visiting tourist places doesn't grab me at all, so I'd planned the trip as simply a day's shopping expedition.
As for the TR itself, like the way the day went, things aren't going quite to plan.

At Myers, I looked briefly at the fashions on display. Exacttly the same stock as what I could get here in Brisbane, and absolutely none of it had that impulse 'buy me now' appeal. I then made my way up to where the books, luggage, and home entertainment departments were. The luggage range was better than what I'd seen at my local branch of Myers. The books was a waste of time as none of my favourite authors were in stock at the Centrepoint branch, and I was unsuccessful in finding where the cordless phoes were in the home electronics area.

After that depressing visit to Myers, my stomache reminded me as to what time of day it was, so I headed down to the food court for lunch. Nothing really special to report about the food court, only that Boost Juice franchise in the food court still had the old menu running. For me, that was good, as I was able to get my favourite Boost smoothie.

After lunch, I headed back up to Myers to check their watches, figuring that if I drew a blank at Myers, then I could try Prouds later. The first watch I looked at, a Maxum womens sports digital was a perfect fit. An immediate buy.
Exiting Myers, I then headed for another major venue on my list of places to visit. The Pitt Street mall.

The Pitt Street mall could learn from the Queen Street Mall here in Brisbane. Place had hardly anyone in the mall. Folks were walking between the ends of the mall, but there was hardly anyone in the middle of the mall using it. More than that, it FELT empty and lifeless, just a street without cars, because the Pitt Street mall has no businesses running the length of the mall down the middle of it.
After the Pitt Street mall, it was on to jewellery shopping at Prouds. I could have spent more, but decided to be sensible in my spending, purchasing a small heart shaped pendant.

That done, it was then time to head back to Central for the train SYD DOM. Whilst I'd been thorough in checking the Railway Square area in advance of the trip, I hadn't done the same for the QVB/town hall area and that slackness on my part came back to bite me. I spent about 30 minutes looking for the correct stop for the Metrobus 10 Leichhardt bus, and could not find it, so I gave up looking for the stop and headed down to the Town Hall station for a train to Central.

Jenifur Charne

 

[JeniSkunk]

At Town Hall station, I had a 15 minute wait for the next train to Central. My luck with mis-timing public transport was holding at 100% for the day. The train I caught back to Central was an R set, and at Central, it was a 13 minute wait for the next train back to SYD T2, an S set. No luck at all for the day in catching a Tangara or Millenium.

Getting back to T2, I headed to the bag drop, throgh security where the walkthrough detector was set off so I got the pat down and sweep with the hand held detector, then over to the Virgin Blue Lounge figuring on relaxing there for the approx hour and three quarters before I needed to head down to the gate for my flight home.

Entering the lounge, I saw it was going to be fun trying to find a seat. The place was extremely busy. I put together a plate of some breads and cold food, managed to find a vacant table and settled down to relax and start working on my TR. Over the PA, I heard about a flight to the Gold Coast that had been cancelled, so I periodicaly checked the arrivals and departiures monitor to see the status of my flight, as I'd not heard mention of it on the PA.

At about 30 minutes before scheduled departure, I headed down to the boarding gate and as expected, it was busy with a mix of pax from the calcelled Gold Coast flight, pax who were on the same flight as myself, and also a V Australia flight. As there were no spare seats, I headed back towards the shops and food court to fill in the time, and paid attention to announcements over the PA. Returning at about 10 min before the flight's scheduled departure, the monitor was still not showing that the flight was boarding. At 5 minutes to go, a DJ staffer moved to the boarding scanner and asked that anyone on the cancelled flights to come to her desk now. That had me worried. Flights. Plural. I was lucky, being the third person she served, so I didn't have to wait long to learn the bad news. My flight had been cancelled, and DJ would be arranging for me to fly home on a QF flight in 3 hours time. The staff member told me to go to 'Baggage Blues' and while her directions might make sense to someone familiar with the airport, they weren't at all clear to someone who had no idea where the Virgin baggage claim desk was. As I commented to her, maps would be useful to have on hand for things like this.

Jenifur Charne

 

[JeniSkunk]

And here's the last part of my TR.

It took me an hour to find Baggage Blues, and it was the Qantas lost property desk at T3 that told me clearly where Baggage Blues was. I got my suitcase back, then returned to T3 to check in for the QF flight, stopping in at the Qantas Lost Property desk to thank them for helping me find where I had to go to get my luggage. Second stop at T3 was the Qantas Sales Desk to confirm that DJ had organized my fare and to see what I needed to do next. The fare was sorted out, so it was use the check in kiosks, managing to get a better seat than initially given, and then bag drop. The bag drop scales refused to settle on one single weight figure for my suitcase, flickering between 3.7Kg and 3.8Kg.
Bag drop attended to, it was time for my third pass through security for the day. Again the walk through beeped and I got the pat down. Then I was asked to go through the secondary walk through and it beeped. The hand held scanner used by the security staff ID'd what had set off the walk throughs. The metal ends and slide on the zip of my jacket.
Security cleared I walked to where the gate for my flight was, and then looked for nearby place to have a bite to eat. As it was well after 7:00pm by this time there, wasn't a whole lot of choice to be had. I grabbed the last tuna and red capsicum sandwich from Gloria Jeans, and an orange juice, and had dinner.
Periodically, while I was waiting, there would be beeping as a Qantas transporter made its way up past where I was then turned around and headed back to the other end. I never saw it carry any pax on its bench seating.

By about 8:30pm the gate area for my flight was crowded, no seats spare, and a queue haphazardly forming. Over the PA for the preceeding 10 minutes or so there had been calls for a last pax for another flight to report immediately to the next gate. It turned out she'd fallen asleep in a chair at the gate for my flight. She woke up, heard the announcment and hurried to the boarding scanner desk for her flight. 15 minutes later, the queue for boarding my flight began forming up in earnest. We needent have bothered.
Not having staff in the right place at the right time caught Qantas out for the 9:05pm CityFlyer, QF556. They had to fly in FA from MEL for this flight, which had a number of extra pax from the cancelled DJ flights. Waiting on the extra FA to arrive and go through their checks, meant that the boarding of QF556 did not start till near on 10 minutes after scheduled departure time.
The flight itself took near on 20 minutes to board.

The flight home was dull, being so late, a whole lot of blackness with the moon reflecting on the clouds was all there was to see out the window. There was video tearing noticible on the overhead monitors and projector while the news was playing, so I think Qantas are still running video tapes on their 767-338. The complimentary drinks trolley was ok, if you wanted alcohol, I didn't, and the pax across the aisle from me managed to spot and nab the last can of Bundaberg Ginger Beer, before I had a chance, so all I had to drink was still spring water. The savoury scroll was poor at best, in comparison to the ones I've had over the years at various bakery franchises. Descent starting, the same pax who'd nabbed the ginger beer, turns on his iPhone. The FA noticed this and made it clear that the iPhone had to be turned off. No ifs, buts, or maybes.
I was glad once we touched down at BNE DOM and were at the aerobridge, so I could stand up and stretch my legs whilst waiting for the crush of pax ahead of me in the plane to clear. I headed down to the luggage carousel and and waited to get my bags. About 15 minutes later the bags started trickling along the carousel, mine would be among the last. Thankfully, it was only a 5 minute wait in the taxi rank queue for my taxi home.

8:00am DJ BNE-SYD - DJ924 on time
6:00pm DJ SYD-BNE - DJ973 cancelled
9:05am QF SYD-BNE - QF556 late

Jenifur Charne

 

[medhead]

I have also enjoyed your trip report. It was a really shame about the return flight. I was wondering which day you did your trip. A bit late now but if it you did this on Thursday, I would have happily guested you into the Qantas club during the 3 hour wait.

Lucky you for getting the scroll, and not to get the beetroot chips, on my late night flight the savoury scroll is the pick of snack options, IMO.

On the question of trains, I usually see the older trains on the airport line. Where I see the tangara and the Millennium train most is the line to King's Cross, so the cronulla line. I was also going to mention that Town Hall station might have been a better stop going from the airport to QVB. But still it is fun to look around. When going back to the airport Museum Station is the best.

But it takes time to find out all these little things. Good to see you had a good day, even if a hassle at the end.

 

[JeniSkunk]

I have also enjoyed your trip report. It was a really shame about the return flight. I was wondering which day you did your trip. A bit late now but if it you did this on Thursday, I would have happily guested you into the Qantas club during the 3 hour wait.

Glad you liked the TR of an air travel newbie.

It was indeed on the Thursday that I did the trip. I didn't think to use the net cafes for internet access to see if there were any AFFers in T3 at the time I was unexpectedly there.

For the final part of the day, getting home from BNE DOM, I'd originally planned on Airtrain BNE DOM to Eagle Junction, CityTrain from there to Toombul and a taxi to home at Toombul, as Thursday is late night shopping for Brisbane suburbs.
As things turned out, I learned from having to catch a taxi at BNE DOM direct to home, I'd be paying near on the same total fare as if I'd done all the transport changes I'd originally planned on.

Lucky you for getting the scroll, and not to get the beetroot chips, on my late night flight the savoury scroll is the pick of snack options, IMO.

Beetroot chips.... EWWWWWW!
The complimentary foods on QF flights, while a nice thought for whY pax, is not a patch on being always able to select exactly what you want from a menu irrespective of travel class.

On the question of trains, I usually see the older trains on the airport line. Where I see the tangara and the Millennium train most is the line to King's Cross, so the cronulla line. I was also going to mention that Town Hall station might have been a better stop going from the airport to QVB. But still it is fun to look around. When going back to the airport Museum Station is the best.

But it takes time to find out all these little things. Good to see you had a good day, even if a hassle at the end.

I might look at checking out the Cross next time I go to Sydney. The main place I want to go to for my next trip to Sydney is the Powerhouse Museum.

I know full well about it taking time to learn the best ways to get around a place. I used Central and Railway Square for the trains and buses mainly as it is such a landmark location. Because I'd done all the walking around Central earlier in the day, it was a breeze to get my ticket and get to the correct platform for the train to SYD DOM.

Even with all the glitches over the course of the day, it was great to be able to do a trip like that. The air travel bug has bitten me well and good as I'm already planning my next trip.

Jenifur Charne

 

[medhead]

It would be a pretty lucky chance that another AFFer would be there at the same time, especially on a Thursday. I also could have thought to check and offer, when you first posted about the trip.

I would suggest there are better places to check out than the Cross, something to see once and then to run away, IMO. Whatever you do, now that you have the bug I'm sure it'll be fun.

If the next trip is to sydney and on a Thursday, then you have an open offer to access the Qantas Club.

 

[Australian]

hey this travel report was awesome!!! thx for posting!

really cant believe u're a newbie though - lol ... you got the 'talk' down-pat!!!! u sprout AFF-slang like it's ur mother tongue (not sure that's a compliment, tho )

anyway thx ~ back to sunny qld.

 

[JeniSkunk]

It would be a pretty lucky chance that another AFFer would be there at the same time, especially on a Thursday. I also could have thought to check and offer, when you first posted about the trip.

How many newbie TR posters start posting their TRs the day before they depart on their trips, medhead?

I would suggest there are better places to check out than the Cross, something to see once and then to run away, IMO. Whatever you do, now that you have the bug I'm sure it'll be fun.

The Cross has been on my list of places I want to go and see for decades, medhead. Your mentioning of which trains usually service the stations and lines it's on simply moved it up the queue a bit is all.

If the next trip is to sydney and on a Thursday, then you have an open offer to access the Qantas Club.

Initial planning for my next trip to Sydney is looking at flying down on Tuesday late morning, doing the major thing on the trip; visit the Powerhouse Muesum on Wednesday, and flying home Thursday early afternoon.
Visiting the Cross would fit in well for what to do on the Tuesday afternoon.

hey this travel report was awesome!!! thx for posting!

really cant believe u're a newbie though - lol ... you got the 'talk' down-pat!!!! u sprout AFF-slang like it's ur mother tongue (not sure that's a compliment, tho )

anyway thx ~ back to sunny qld.

Glad you liked the TR of a newbie to flying, Australian.
Always having been interested in technology, I learned early to quickly pick up on abbreviations, acronyms and slang. That now well ingrained habit has paid off here on AFF.

Jenifur Charne

 

[medhead]

How many newbie TR posters start posting their TRs the day before they depart on their trips, medhead?

Jenifur Charne

I have no idea really. Probably why I never bothered to ask.

I didn't mean to put you off seeing the cross, trying the various trains is an excellent reason.

If interested in trains have you seen the Sydney meeting for 14 November?

 

[serfty]

Thankyou for your trip report. I quite enjoyed it.

May there be many more.