Trip Planning: Connection, Drive or Y?

[Leroy87]

I'm doing some planning for a trip to South West WA from Melbourne.

I'd not paid much attention to it before, but QF run a 3xWeekly PER-BQB service (Busselton regional). It doesn't cost any more points to tag the flight on, so why not see what lines up?

I can get J awards on the A330 on QF761 (0640 MEL - 0850 PER) but sadly not on QF763 (0905 MEL - 1115 PER). QF1750 departs PER for BQB at 1230.

So here's the question. Would you...

- Take the J awards and the longer connection (~3hr sitting in Perth Airport)?
- Take the J awards and just do the drive down (~3hr sitting in a car), skipping the tag flight?
- Fly Y with the ideal connection?

A few other data points that may or may not sway the answer:
- I'm non-status, so there's probably no lounge access in PER unless I can scrounge some passes.
- Car hire out of BQB is surprisingly plentiful and much cheaper than Perth Airport (go figure?).
- Primary school aged kids are in tow (x2)

Would love some ideas!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I would be taking the early morning flight anyway! The one arriving at 1115 is a bit too tight, especially if there are any delays leaving MEL.

Three hours isn’t that long… time to get off the plane, and boarding half an hour before departure. Only leaves a couple hours.

 

[Leroy87]

I would be taking the early morning flight anyway! The one arriving at 1115 is a bit too tight, especially if there are any delays leaving MEL.

Three hours isn’t that long… time to get off the plane, and boarding half an hour before departure. Only leaves a couple hours.

Not a bad call actually.

Having just looked at recent timings for QF769 (the 0905 departure at this time of year) there's two instances in the last 10 days alone of it being late enough to completely miss the connection!

One 1244 arrival and one 1307 into PER (both due to delays leaving MEL).

That may have neatly answered the question .