- Joined
- Jul 17, 2004
- Posts
- 3,979
Back in 2019 BC (Before Covid) I had in mind to take a trip to Dubai and UK(Scotland and England) even found a AFF thread on one of the options I was looking at. Worlds shortest flight
So 2020/2021 and 2022 were pretty much wiped for travel so it wasn’t until 2023 that the Scottish trip was put back into plans.
There would be 2 of us traveling, the idea we would fly from Brisbane to Dubai stop for a few days, then fly into Glasgow Scotland. Spend a few days in Dundee Scotland and then drive south towards London where I would fly Qantas direct to Perth and then onto Brisbane while the traveling companion would stay an extra week in London to see a few shows before flying back to Dubai for a few days before flying back to Brisbane. As one of us, me is aligned with Qantas I was looking to fly on Qantas flight numbers while the other wanted Emirates flight numbers.
In January 2023 Emirates announced a 2nd daily flight to Dubai ex Brisbane, EK to increase BNE frequency from June 2023 with a 2:50am departure and arrival into Dubai soon after 11:00am, if I am going to have seat on a plane I would rather the flight be mostly day time as I then wouldn’t be forcing myself to sleep, we were going to be flying economy anyway. Just a small hitch, Emirates flight is scheduled but where is the Qantas codeshare going to be added. There was always a chance that it would never be added, so what was I going to do, eventually Qantas added their code share and flights were booked soon after. We would be the on the 2nd service of the 2nd daily flight although it was only going to operate as a 777-300, better than nothing but not as good as an A380.
Flights to Glasgow Scotland were booked along with a week hire car rental, picking up the car in Glasgow and dropping it off in Manchester. One idea was then to fly or train from Manchester to London and spend a few days there (4 for me, 11 for the other) but after looking at eye watering hotel prices for London it was decided to stay in Liverpool and then Chester for a few days instead of dropping off the car and heading to London.
When Qantas announced a direct flight from London to Perth it was always a bucket list flight to catch, ideally in business or premium economy, instead of the booked economy seat with a long connection in Perth (5hours) before booking the late afternoon flight to Brisbane and then going to bed. 1 overnight flight I always felt better for avoiding jetlag instead of 2 overnights with an arrival in the AM.
As it had been a few years since I had traveled long haul almost 5 years, long haul I consider anything over 12 hours, I did a bit of youtubing to catch up on any new travel ideas or gadgets.
I usually travel with a Samsonite black hard case 2 wheeler which is just on carry on dimensions 50-35-22cm I think it might be just a touch too wide but I have never been pulled over for it, with a black back pack.
In the back pack I usually carry Bose noise cancelling head phones, laptop,(apple macbook) toiletries change of clothes and a small portable battery and a small bag of cables and adapters.
A couple of things I did end up buying was a shoe bag and a set of packing cubes, I was looking for some compression cubes but where I was looking they didn’t seem to be available. The packing cube was good for my winter jacket that I would need in Scotland but that I could leave packed during our stay in Dubai.
I was looking to purchase a replacement battery case but I kept the one I had although it only does 1 charge it was lightweight and I could carry it and that I had all the right USB slots. Another item was a wall adaptor which had 3 USB C and 1 USB A, I found that I needed both charging cable options for the phone as some places used a USB A and some places had the USB C, so sometimes its worth still packing both. I kept the power bank and power adaptors and cable and computer mouse in a previous supplied Virgin amenities bag.
The other thing I purchased was a small bottle of my favourite hair shampoo, usually I used to just use the hotel provided shampoo but I think after reading a thread on AFF I thought that my trip was longer than a few days and my skin does not like the wrong type of shampoo.
Another thing I did pack, and which in one famous movie “Up in the air” which was thrown out but I kept was a neck pillow as all my flights were in economy I thought it a good way to help in getting some rest.
I purchased an Airalo esim as Vodafone doesn’t have Dubai as a roaming location. I do have a dual phone sim card, esim Vodafone for personal use; mainly data and a work Telstra mobile number.
And last but not least a pack of Apple Airtags, used for insurance when the airline has no idea where your bag is.
Up next flight,
So 2020/2021 and 2022 were pretty much wiped for travel so it wasn’t until 2023 that the Scottish trip was put back into plans.
There would be 2 of us traveling, the idea we would fly from Brisbane to Dubai stop for a few days, then fly into Glasgow Scotland. Spend a few days in Dundee Scotland and then drive south towards London where I would fly Qantas direct to Perth and then onto Brisbane while the traveling companion would stay an extra week in London to see a few shows before flying back to Dubai for a few days before flying back to Brisbane. As one of us, me is aligned with Qantas I was looking to fly on Qantas flight numbers while the other wanted Emirates flight numbers.
In January 2023 Emirates announced a 2nd daily flight to Dubai ex Brisbane, EK to increase BNE frequency from June 2023 with a 2:50am departure and arrival into Dubai soon after 11:00am, if I am going to have seat on a plane I would rather the flight be mostly day time as I then wouldn’t be forcing myself to sleep, we were going to be flying economy anyway. Just a small hitch, Emirates flight is scheduled but where is the Qantas codeshare going to be added. There was always a chance that it would never be added, so what was I going to do, eventually Qantas added their code share and flights were booked soon after. We would be the on the 2nd service of the 2nd daily flight although it was only going to operate as a 777-300, better than nothing but not as good as an A380.
Flights to Glasgow Scotland were booked along with a week hire car rental, picking up the car in Glasgow and dropping it off in Manchester. One idea was then to fly or train from Manchester to London and spend a few days there (4 for me, 11 for the other) but after looking at eye watering hotel prices for London it was decided to stay in Liverpool and then Chester for a few days instead of dropping off the car and heading to London.
When Qantas announced a direct flight from London to Perth it was always a bucket list flight to catch, ideally in business or premium economy, instead of the booked economy seat with a long connection in Perth (5hours) before booking the late afternoon flight to Brisbane and then going to bed. 1 overnight flight I always felt better for avoiding jetlag instead of 2 overnights with an arrival in the AM.
As it had been a few years since I had traveled long haul almost 5 years, long haul I consider anything over 12 hours, I did a bit of youtubing to catch up on any new travel ideas or gadgets.
I usually travel with a Samsonite black hard case 2 wheeler which is just on carry on dimensions 50-35-22cm I think it might be just a touch too wide but I have never been pulled over for it, with a black back pack.
In the back pack I usually carry Bose noise cancelling head phones, laptop,(apple macbook) toiletries change of clothes and a small portable battery and a small bag of cables and adapters.
A couple of things I did end up buying was a shoe bag and a set of packing cubes, I was looking for some compression cubes but where I was looking they didn’t seem to be available. The packing cube was good for my winter jacket that I would need in Scotland but that I could leave packed during our stay in Dubai.
I was looking to purchase a replacement battery case but I kept the one I had although it only does 1 charge it was lightweight and I could carry it and that I had all the right USB slots. Another item was a wall adaptor which had 3 USB C and 1 USB A, I found that I needed both charging cable options for the phone as some places used a USB A and some places had the USB C, so sometimes its worth still packing both. I kept the power bank and power adaptors and cable and computer mouse in a previous supplied Virgin amenities bag.
The other thing I purchased was a small bottle of my favourite hair shampoo, usually I used to just use the hotel provided shampoo but I think after reading a thread on AFF I thought that my trip was longer than a few days and my skin does not like the wrong type of shampoo.
Another thing I did pack, and which in one famous movie “Up in the air” which was thrown out but I kept was a neck pillow as all my flights were in economy I thought it a good way to help in getting some rest.
I purchased an Airalo esim as Vodafone doesn’t have Dubai as a roaming location. I do have a dual phone sim card, esim Vodafone for personal use; mainly data and a work Telstra mobile number.
And last but not least a pack of Apple Airtags, used for insurance when the airline has no idea where your bag is.
Up next flight,
