jsd
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jdevereux3's Marvelously mad mileage run across Australia After 12 months of planning it came down to this: 7 Australian cities, 3 different airlines and a healthy mix of Business and Economy travel. All crammed into one short week. Am I crazy….Yes, but the old saying stands “Why go direct when you can connect”.
The trip ended up something like this, however due to the volcanic ash cloud a few flights and times have ended up a little different from their originals:
HBA-MEL (QF)
MEL-SYD (QF)
SYD-BNE (QF)
BNE-ROK (QF)
ROK-MKY (QF)
MKY-TSV (QF)
TSV-CNS (QF)
CNS-MEL (JQ)
MEL-PER (DJ)
PER-SYD (DJ)
SYD-MEL (JQi)
MEL-HBA (QF)
So enough with the intros, here comes the report
Qantas Airways QF1010
HBA-MEL
June 06, 2011
Departure: 06:05 (scheduled) 06:02 (actual)
Arrival: 07:20 (scheduled) 07:11 (actual)
Seat: 1F - Business
Aircraft: Boeing 737-800 VH-VXE Coffs Harbour
I dragged myself out of bed at around 0300 to prepare for the day ahead, my lift arrived 20mins ahead of schedule so I arrived at the airport at around 0350, some 10 minutes from check-in opening, I tried to use my Q card to check in at the pole but because of the number of sectors on the booking it directed me to the service desk so I lined up at the front of the business class queue… from my understanding Qantas domestic check-in opens 2 hours prior to the flight departing, that was fine by me. So 0405 rolled by in no time, so did 0415 and 0435, at around 0440 a lone check-in agent rolled up and looked surprised to see someone in the queue. I was quite frustrated at this point as I’d now been standing in line for around 45 minutes but I didn’t say anything as I wasn’t going to let it ruin the day ahead.
Shortly after I had all my boarding passes for the day in my hand and I went to the Qantas Club to grab some breakfast and see if I could secure better seats for the flights in economy which was quickly done with a smile by the Club attendant.
VH-VXE warming up for its day ahead after overnighting in HBA
I left the Qantas Club before the boarding call was made as people that live in Hobart generally have no idea of how to form and orderly queue and I like to be the first on-board anyway.
Boarding was started and I was quickly trudging across the tarmac to our aircraft form the morning, once on board I was quickly offered a welcome drink of orange juice while we waited for all the riff-raff up the back to board and we were soon on our way to Melbourne a few minutes ahead of schedule.
Mmmmm, So much legroomies in Business Class
Once in the air the CSM introduced himself and the rest of the crew and breakfast was soon served. Today’s meal was a simple warm quiche with a mixed museli served with tea/coffee or a cold juice which I downed in no time (The quiche has gone missing from the picture below, I wonder how that happened
).
Business Class breakfast - pretty stock standard fare
Sunrise over the Bass Strait
After the meal was done I tuned into the IFE which filled in the rest of the flight, we arrived into Melbourne 4 minutes ahead of our scheduled arrival time, disembarking was fairly quick given I was in row 1 and all
.More to come soon....real soon
Next Up: Qantas Airways QF414 - Melbourne to Sydney
