My membership year for Qantas finishes soon. I had intended to keep my Qantas Gold Status for another year. With Qantas announcing, their double status credit promotion last week, this changed. Enticed by the earning of double the number of status credits on every flight booked between now and May 4th for travel until 16th April, 2o17, I began a stocktake of my miles situation. A few bookings later, it looked like I would be close to Qantas Platinum! Platinum gives access to One World First Class lounges internationally and Business Class in Australia. The Qantas First Lounge in Sydney is one…
My Musings (Sundays)
Category Archives for My Musings (Sundays).
I’ve Visited Airports starting with 23 letters of alphabet
As air travellers are aware, airports are marked by a three digit code managed by IATA. This system allows for 17,576 airport codes with all the combinations. Apparently there are 43,982 airports in the world so many apparently do not have commercial service! Some of these three digit codes are “logical” eg SYD for SYDNEY, SEA for Seattle and EDI for Edinburgh. Some are less so EZE for the Buenos Aires suburb that the airport is located in. Toronto Pearson, Canada is YYZ for historical reasons and IAD is Washington-Dulles. I was struck by a post on Boardingarea site: Pointswithacrew about…
My Easter Prayer
Today is Easter in my tradition. It seems like a day to reflect on our world and think through what we can do to bring light.
Je Suis Ankara (#2)
Last Sunday, on, 13 March 2016, at 635pm local time a 1995 BMW laden with explosives was exploded in a street location where there are many bus stops. 37 people were killed, 125 injured, with 19 severely injured, a bus was completely burnt up, along with many cars. The Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK), claimed responsibility for the attack. They had also been responsible for the 17 February Ankara bombing. They insisted that they were aiming for a Police station nearby and did not intend to harm citizens. This is either a monstrous lie or the group…
Madness: Malaysia refuses checked baggage
Imagine arriving at the airport for your European vacation or business trip to find that you airline is NOT accepting checked luggage. Malaysia Airlines passengers on all flights from Kuala Lumpur (KUL) to London, Paris and Amsterdam were told from Tuesday January 5th that Economy Class passengers could only take luggage weighing seven kilograms (about 15 pounds) onboard, while Business and First class passengers could board with carry-on bags that weighed 14 kilograms (about 31 pounds). I understand passengers could book their luggage on but it would arrive separately! The outcry was significant as you can…
Happy New Year for 2016
Thanks for journeying with me in 2015. I had my quietest year for air travel since 2003 with only three flights a month! All of my flights were in Australia and Asia. I flew just six airlines in the whole year but two were new airlines for me: Nok Air and Thai Smile! This brings me to 1064 flights in my life with 90 airlines (see right for my lifetime stats) to 48 countries. I have also travelled to four countries by bus, two by ship and six by train. Giving a total of 6o countries In 2015, I had…
Happy Christmas
Celebrating Christmas today in Melbourne, Australia by the beach. To those celebrating around the world, I wish you a Merry Christmas.
Pray for #Paris
In view of the situation in Paris, I have withdrawn my original post. Praying for our world and especially those impacted directly by these events. Paris is my favourite city in the world and I feel very sad for this day. May we work to create peace not division between all of us on this one small wonderful planet.
United opens up to hear from us
United is the airline, I love to hate. And I am not alone. Their on-time arrival performance declined in 2014 while their mishandled baggage rate increased. The airline had a higher customer complaint rate in 2014 compared to 2.14 in 2013. Brent D. Bowen and Headley in their 2015 Airline Quality Ratings gave them ninth place out of 12 US carriers. Skytrax customers have given them a 3/10 rating. Since new CEO, Oscar Munoz took over in dramatic circumstances, just three weeks ago, he has been reaching out to try and change the airline. He has…
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