Qantas is an Australian owned airline (with a kangaroo as its logo - hence the title just in case you were wondering!) but they fly all over the world. For us British citizens who might use Qantas a bit, this means we don't have to pay to be a member of their frequent flyer program whereas Australian and New Zealand citizens do. So if you are flying with these it is a good idea to join and if you don't ever use the points you accrue then hey - it was free anyway so you haven't lost anything! To join just go to their website and fill in the online joining form and voila! You earn a point a mile so they do add up. If you fly return to Australia from the UK you would have enough points for a free flight anywhere in Europe which I think is really good!
I recently flew from Heathrow to Sydney on Qantas with an hour stop in Bangkok to refuel.
**Check
in** Check in was two hours before for the international flight, it was really easy and proceeded with no blips! For economy class your baggage allowance is 20kgs.
**Leg room** Although nothing in comparison to the business class and first class seats which were really roomy (why do they always make you walk through these to get to the economy part?!), the economy seats were fine. Of all the international long haul flights I have done the only one I would have to see didn't have enough leg room was Cathay Pacific, all the others have been about the same. There wasn't one spare seat on our 24 hour flight to Sydney but I didn't feel cramped.
**Entertainment** The entertainment was really good. There was a large selection of movies, tv shows, documentaries etc to watch and some CDs to listen to. You could choose when to watch what you wanted and you had control for it so you could pause it for a while etc. instead of having to watch whatever movie they happened to be showing at the time. I found Qantas second only to SingaporeAirlines in the entertainment department and that is only because on Singapore you can put the songs you like into a playlist rather than fishing through them - not really something that would put me off booking with a particular airline but you have to be critical sometimes all for the sake of Ciao! Qantas also has some video games to play which were really good, I sometimes prefer playing these as they engage my mind rather than just watching movie after movie!
**Food** After boarding the plane at almost midnight we were served with dinner of: Green leaf salad with dressing Choice of: Coq au vin with beans, peas and potatoes OR Lamb Navarin Cheesecake Tea and Coffee and Hot Chocolate
The food was nice as far as airline food goes although I did find it didn't fill me up too much (this could have been because I was so starving by the time we got served but this was just the time of my flight, not the airline's fault!) So I was pleasantly surprised when we were given a goody bag called "snack on Q" containing fresh fruit, a packet of Werther's original, some rice cakes and a bottle of water.
For breakfast we were served with juice, a fresh fruit salad, yoghurt, a fresh bread roll and a choice of muesli or omelette followed by coffee and tea. I had the muesli which arrived in a 50g packet and was yummy!
Next was dinner (we somehow managed to miss lunch because we were in outer space and time does funny things when you're travelling!). This consisted of: Eggplant salad Choice of: Beef and pumpkin curry OR pasta with bacon, spinach and mozzarella Cheese and crackers Tea and Coffee and Hot chocolate Ice cream
Then our last meal before landing in Sydney was breakfast of juice, a danish pastry, yoghurt, muesli and a tropical fruit platter.
On the whole the food was really good and when we had a choice of 2 things for dinner I always got the one I asked for. All drinks (a range of wine, beer, spirits and soft drinks) were included and could be asked for at any time during the flight.
**Service** The staff were friendly and courteous at all times and really helpful. We took off about an hour later than scheduled but we made up this time (not sure how that works!) and had a little less time in Bangkok than we were supposed to so we only landed in Sydney about 10 minutes late, which I think is acceptable considering it was a 22 hour flight.
All in all I would definitely travel Qantas again, especially now I have joined their frequent flyer program! Oh and an interesting fact about Qantas - they are the only major airline to have never had a crash, so you can hope you are pretty safe too!
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Mar 9th, 2007
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