Monkey got a seat to himself!
17:33
We've just taken off on our first flight, from Sydney to Dubai, connecting onward to Frankfurt. This morning we dropped off some plants with our neighbours Ray and Kathrine to look after, and last night we dropped Scully off with Loki and Rach.
We left home about 13:30, catching the train to the airport. The train we got on at Central had some sort of problem in the carriage right next to ours, and all the people who were on that carriage came through the connecting doors into ours as staff sealed it up, so it got a bit crowded. We made it to the airport about 14:30, and there were virtually no queues to check in for our flight. However we took ages to go through security as the checks there seemed to be going very slowly, even though the queues weren't too long. Eventually we got through into the terminal.
By then we only had an hour or so to wait before boarding. M. got a coffee and we sat around and did some stretches for a bit, then wandered over to the gate, where there were almost no people. We went into the premium boarding lane thanks to silver status, but they didn't really bother with any formalities and just started boarding everyone at once.
Our seats were just behind bulkhead row seats and the flight looked a little empty. We watched anxiously as the extra legroom seats in front of us remained vacant, until M. suggested we ask a crew member if we could move up to them. He said he'd check to make sure no more people were still boarding and then if not we could move. I pre-emptively moved, figuring it was better to make sure and possibly have to move back than to wait and have someone else grab the seats. The crew member came back and said we were good to go, so M. moved up as well. We now have extra legroom seats without paying the extra $200 or so by booking them ahead online!
Monkey got a seat to himself! |
This flight is 14 hours to Dubai. The meal menu says they are serving lunch, a mid-flight snack, and then dinner. I suppose they have to stretch the definitions a bit, as we arrive in Dubai around midnight.