Despite the length of the last post I’m not even halfway to the destination yet! So after a bit of work in the business lounge it was time to head off for my long flight – really long. However, much to my delight I score an upgrade so business using points. I’ve always wanted to experience a long haul in business and now I get to. I settled into 11A the middle row of the 3 row smaller area at the back of business. I sipped my champagne I was offered after boarding and looked at my menu and breakfast card. Soon after, they came around with Qantas pyjamas and I was very happy!
I filled out my breakfast card (it felt weird calling it breakfast as we would be eating about lunch time, but I went with it). I went for a simple option of fruit salad with yoghurt, muffing and orange juice. You may have to suspend your disbelief but you read it right – I didn’t order coffee. My thinking was that I we land in the afternoon and I want to sleep at night so no point having more caffeine. (and I had already had 3 coffees!)
I’m not going to go blow by blow though the flight and some of the details are a little fuzzy but lets see if I can whip though the highlights. The drink were good and there were a lot of options. I stuck to red, white and champagne and even them tried to limit my intake. I had a couple of drinks in the Melbourne business lounge and wanted to sleep so after my boarding drink I only had a couple more glasses.
The food was great. I was sad to miss out on the tasting plate for entree but the skewer was still yummy. The fish for main was very nice and I enjoyed the cheese platter to finish (see menu above for details). I considered a cheeky Bailey’s but instead decided on a nice desert wine to have with the cheese platter, and it was really good.
I don’t know if I mentioned before but I started watching NCIS: Origins on my first flight and I was enjoying so I watched a few more episodes. After dinner was cleared I decided it was time to try and get some sleep. I changed into my snazzy Qantas pajamas setup my seat and popped a Tamazepam. Lie flat seats are great – I’d choose it for every flight if I could, but they’re no bed. It’s a little cramped, hard to find a comfy spot and you have a seat belt to wear. The tamazepam got me off without too much trouble and I got probably about 3 hours sleep before I woke up. I lay there and it was still restful but didn’t go back off. So after a while I took another temazepam and probably got another 3 hours so I had about 6 hours of pretty decent sleep. Not really enough but I didn’t want to sleep much longer in order to try and be in a semi correct wake/sleep cycle for arrival. Other than that flights in business are just more pleasant. I got a nnice toasted sandwich and juice during the flight. Business seats are roomy. I filled the time with more TV, music and even some work and a little bit of gaming. It was more than bearable. Breakfast came and I kind of wished for more (especially coffee) but it was nice and it meant the end was in sight! Touch down in Dallas. That post wasn’t too long and even had some pretty pictures. I’m over halfway through the travel to the us now!
Well, I’m back. I guess the good thing about international trips is it usually brings me back to this blog! So as usual, I didn’t finish the last trip (though I did do fairly well I think). I still do have a draft with some more thoughts about Universal, I’m not sure whether I’ll post that or not. This trip is shorter and arguable less happened, so maybe I’ll be able to document the whole trip. Saying that, today is my last day so I am behind already! At the moment I’m in Starbucks (shocker I know) but let’s start at the beginning. I did start typing some of this on one of my flights, so let’s start with that!
Well I’m off again. Actually at this point I’m just under an hour out from landing in Dallas. But it’s the start of what seems to be turning into my annual pilgrimage to the US. That’s not a bad thing at all – FPS has been a part of my life for a long time and I still see a lot of value in the program.
This year is a much shorter trip – travel is not super cheap and while having the airfare paid helps a lot, 3 weeks in the US still adds up. So this year I’m mainly going for the finals. I’ve got a few days after in Indianapolis, but in general it’s a much shorter trip.
So my travel started about 24 hours ago, this point yesterday (the date line is involved so this could get confusing so ~4am 3/6) I was jumping in the shower to get ready after lying awake in bed for about an hour. I went off to sleep OK (with the help of Tamazepam) but I woke about 3 and because the wake up time was soon I couldn’t really get back to sleep.
Nothing exciting, showered, dressed ordered an Uber. I’m glad I didn’t end up reserving one – it cost my $18 while if I had reserved one if would have been $45! I had to quickly thrown the last few things in my bag as the Uber that was supposed to be 6 minutes away arrived one minute after I ordered it.
I was super lucky this time to manage to use points to upgrade to business both from Perth – Melbourne and more importantly Melbourne to Dallas/Fort Worth, but more on that to come. As usual, I was checked in but had to go to the counter because they need to see your passport. They gave me all my boarding passes, including my internal flight DFW-IND on AA. Unusually and some what annoyingly it won’t show me my boarding passes in the app so I have to use the physical ones each time. I did manage to get the AA boarding pass from the AA app, but the other ones aren’t working. Generally I prefer the app because it live updated information – not all of which is available when you leave ~25 hours before your last flight.
Security at Perth was super busy, apparently early morning is a bad time. Even going through the priority line I reckon it took 20+ minutes. As usual my bag was pulled aside, but as has become more common they checked on the computer and I was told it was fine. So upstairs to the business lounge. I had time for a coffee and to look at a few email, less time that I thought and then I was boarding.
Being in business I was in group 1 so on of the first to board and had to find seat 5F – it took my a second because 5F is in the middle, but roughly in line with seat 4 on the window side – go figure. It was an A330, which made business worth it as it was the suites. Unfortunately it was an international A330 which meant no internet, so I couldn’t get any work done. So I browsed the entertainment system and found NCIS Origins. When I watched the Pilot I thought it was decent but hadn’t got back into it. Having watched several episodes on both flights now, I am enjoying it.
Breakfast was served and was typical good business fare. Bircher muesli with berries and nuts and coffee, so I was happy! It was a super short flight they says 2 hours 50 minutes but with no internet I decided to take advantage of business class and had a rest / dose for about half the flight.
Being in business meant I was one of the first off the flight and it’s a very quick walk from Melbourne terminal 1 to terminal 2. Security and immigration were the polar opposite to Perth, it was almost straight through both, basically now wait at all. I worked out where my gate was. This turned out to be conveniently close the the lounge precinct. This was a new experience as whenever I’ve transited through Melbourne it always been inbound, so I’ve only experienced the domestic lounges before.
Melbourne International Business Lounge is nothing to rave about, it’s downstairs so there’s no natural light and the food wasn’t that impressive. The good thing was the internet – it was very fast. I arrived and order a coffee (yes that’s number 3 for anyone counting.) I’m going to pause this entry now as the cabin crew have been told to prepare the cabin for landing so I have to fold down my iPad. This looks lik…
That’s were the post ended and it looks like it’s really long so I’ll end here and pick up with Flight #2.
It’s about half and hour later and we’re in the air. I’m comfortable ensconced is my 8F business class seat. I do love the space in business – I can actually use my laptop and my mouse.
So, universal! I’m probably not going to give you a detailed account of what I did when – after all, look up a universal day plan and you’ll have a pretty good idea. My plan for the first arvo/evening was to get my bearings in the park and maybe see jump on a ride or two if the lines were short. So I entered Universal Studios and set off to the left, through Suess Land, just checking out the sights. I got to the MIB ride, which I had seen on my plan, and the single rider queue was <5 mins, so I took advantage of that. It was fun, one of my reflection from Universal, at least early on was that I like the ‘in the dark’ motion rides.
After this I kept walking and found myself approaching Diagon Alley. Here’s a few photos to start, there will be more later.
I only had a quick look around Diagon Alley at this stage, but I knew it would be something I would explore much later, probably tomorrow! It occurred to me that this might be a good time to catch the Hogwarts Express. I had been ummimg and ahhing over when the best time would be and how it wouldn’t interfere with time in the parks. This seemed like the perfect time, so I headed to King’s Cross station. Unfortunately no single rider line for this so it was a long wait.
The excitement of getting on the train was exciting, so the actual ride wasn’t that amazing – it was a pretty short train ride. However, the windows were screen so that did provide some exciting scenery and some things such as flying cars and Hagrid on his motorbike. There was also audio – you could hear Harry, Ron & Hermione walking past our compartment. We disembarked at Hogsmeade (point of trivia – in the books do they actually arrive at Hogsmeade station? I think they do in the movies.) I decided not to take any time to look at Hogsmeade at this point (now in Islands of Adventure) and I pretty much headed straight out of the park, back to City Walk and the bus back to Adventure hotel. It was getting late and I wanted to have some dinner and get a good sleep anticipating big days in the parks ahead.
I had dinner at Bar 17 Bistro, the rooftop bar at Adventure hotel. Briefly, the Chicken Katsu I had was excellent and the cocktail I tried (I can’t remember which one) was very ordinary, I didn’t like it at all. Bed time. I’ll also finish this post, it’s not that long, but the pictures take up lots of room!
