I flew with VA from Melbourne to Sydney today. It offered on board entertainment streamed via wifi to your devices. It looks like the airline’s movies and TV shows catalogue has not been updated for a while - the most recent movie on far is Barbie from six months ago. The on board entertainment line-up is mostly from Warner Bros although there are a couple of kids shows from the ABC such as Bluey.
It’s the first time since 2019 I flew with Virgin, and also the first time since the major renovation at Terminal 4 at Melbourne Airport was completed, which saw a combined security checkpoint for both T3 and T4 passengers.
My flights to and from Sydney did not get cancelled (thanks goodness), although the return flight from Sydney departed 20 minutes later than scheduled and arrived in Melbourne 15 minutes late.
I’ve flown with VA a handful of times since the T3 & T4 security checkpoint merger. I think it’s great as it’s no longer a bottle neck around that area where T3 security was and of course more time to spend in the VA Lounge beforehand.
Question for those who know Brisbane, planning a visit in April, tossing up between staying at South Bank or near Queen Street Mall, which side would you recommend? I’ve narrowed the search down to the Rydges South Bank, Mantra South Bank Brisbane and the Hyatt Regency Brisbane. The budget is $2000 or less for four nights.
Queen St. Mall has lots of nice restaurants and shops within walking distance. It is slightly seedy at night, but it isn’t terrible.
South Bank (besides the ‘beach’) has plenty of cafes, restaurants, museums, art galleries, concert halls, and other activities also within walking distance if that is what you like.
Both are great places though. Hope you enjoy Brisbane!
Virgin Australia and Link Airways have announced a codesharing partnership on 17 regional routes, effective from March this year, allowing travellers the opportunity to fly to 42 Australian destination on a single booking.
Turkish Airlines will launch the Istanbul-Singapore-Melbourne service on March 15. The flights will initially operate three times a week, with the potential for daily flights in the future.
Turkish will become a dominant player in the medium to longer term once they get their long range aircraft. Also good to have a daytime flight SIN-MEL.
They will likely become a dominant player for Aus to Europe once they start non-stop flights from multiple capitals.
Direct QF flights to London whilst announced, are still not guaranteed. Airbus having some issues with that A350 for Qantas and the extra fuel tank.
Daytime flights Asia to Australia are generally hard to come by, normally only Singapore and Cathay. Qantas nothing as per usual.
We flew a daytime flight USA-Oz once, Virgin flew it once a week, have normal breakfast in LA, wheels up 11am, landed Brisbane at 6. Sort of kept to a normal body routine. Worked well.
If it gets the inflight seating, services and airfares right, Turkish could pose a serious challenge to other Middle East carriers such as Emirates and Etihad.
Etihad only have two flights a day, fairly token. I flew them probably a decade ago, on the A380, was at least two/three flights a day from Melbourne and Sydney.
Qantas is probably the one that will lose market share if they can’t get these A350s approved. One SIN-LHR, PER-LHR, and a seasonal Rome flight is fairly token.
Qatar are obviously stuck in a rut for a while yet.
There is another Etihad like airline launching very soon, based in Saudis Arabia. Potentially another Australia-Europe option later this decade. One to watch.
Probably meaningless for most of us here, but I read with interest that South African are restoring the Perth to Johannesburg service from April 28. Unlike when they last flew here which was 5 return services a week with PER-JNB departing at about 9:45PM WST (from memory) being an overnight service (arriving before 5AM in JNB) they’re offering 3 return services with PER-JNB departing at 14:40 on Mon/Wed/Fri scheduled to arrive at 19:35. JNB-PER flights depart on Sun/Tue/Thu at 20:55 which is similar to the times they flew in the past.
My overseas travel plans are on hold for now ,until I can get a suitable part time job so I can earn some extra money.
I don’t want to use up my remaining superannuation yet😕
when i fly to London i generally fly Singapore leaving Brisbane at 23:25. this is good because i work all day Friday, fly out Friday night, get sleep on the plane to Changi.
Leave Changi at 9:00 and arrive at Heathrow at 15:20. by the time i clear customs and get to my hotel its close to 5pm and i’m knackered and not needing to stay up for hours to get onto London time.
Yes evening or late arvo arrival times are good. I’ve done a Melbourne to NYC flight before, was an hour late in so we missed the connection, put us on the red eye so hit NYC at 6am. Then the hotel gave our room away, meanwhile we were like zombies. Was not a pleasant experience.
We overnight in Los Angeles now. Would look at these new directs going forward next time though, via Auckland-New York. Next trip we have agreed to stop via Hawaii, ie Sydney-Honolulu-New York.
These 20+ hour missions Qantas is proposing seems a bit too long.
