The Barossa was fabulous; I had some fun at such as Yalumba and some boutique wineries but for the moment Adelaide Hills and McLaren Vale would have to wait.
So decision made last Tuesday I needed to get home asap. I decided not to try Etihad. My flights had been booked via Expedia and the downside of that, I believe, is that I would have had to use them to reorganise my existing booking. Also bearing in mind that booking included a Virgin Australia flight ADL-MEL I could see that there might be some bother in getting a simple fix. I might be misjudging things and it could have worked out perfectly but I just needed to get a taxi to Adelaide and get a flight straight home, without complications.
Emirates fly to Adelaide and seats were available on the EK441 leaving that evening at 22.35 local. That connected to the EK001 from Dubai to Heathrow.
Economy tickets were available at a couple of price points but I opted for the more expensive as I noted that the number of miles required to upgrade from economy to business was 62,500 which fortunately was the EXACT number I had in my Skywards account. The cheaper ticket required over 80,000.
So flights booked and then upgraded except that, when it came to it, I could only upgrade the 13 hour flight to Dubai, as there was actually no availability on the London bound 001. No problem at all, I was quite happy being in Y on the London daytime flight, the key one to upgrade was the long flight so I could get a decent sleep.
So a taxi down to the airport and a couple of hours chilling in the Qantas lounge. Adelaide airport only has one terminal and pre departure security screening is done at the entrance to the international departure gates. The lounge services both domestic and international passengers so is land side and was perfectly ok, the wifi was good and the food and drink offerings were fine. It was also very quiet.
So to screening and after the usual bags stuff I was selected for the full body thing. No problem and, as I have said in that “don’t whistle near me” article in the other forum here, the lady complimented me on my....tan.
So onto the triple 7. I had got a seat (7A) in the small two row business class cabin immediately behing First. Fabulous place to be as the size of that cabin makes it feel very exclusive.
It was made to feel even more exclusive because only four of the fourteen suites were occupied. To say that the service thereafter was exemplary would be a considerable understatement. The cabin crew was one of EK’s good teams, fun, proactive and attentive. The food was fantastic; the chilli chicken photographed being one of the great dishes I have consumed on a plane. And, philistine that I might be, I like bog standard Moet...which is as well because my glass was pretty much continually topped up. And any airline which serves Cloudy Bay sauvignon as one of its onboard whites will always get my vote.
So it was a brilliant flight. I drank and fed well and destressed in a hassle free environment. The wifi was efficient and I like EKs new pricing policy, first10mb free and thereafter US$1 for 500mb and that is in all classes.
We arrived in Dubai on time. After a 25 minute coach ride to the Terminal I had a couple of hours to kill before the EK001 to London. Nothing much to report on that, It was a perfectly ok flight in Economy on a full A380.
I do like the business class products on both EK and EY, they are far superior to anything else I have experienced, more testing is required before I decide which is the best.
Unless I get back to OZ beforehand, the next flights for me are in April on VS to UVF where the wonderful East Winds waits!! Lucky me.
Regards
David.
Last edited by HWVlover on 09 Feb 2016, 22:25, edited 1 time in total.
. Thanks also for revealing where the "missing" window on row 7 is. I'm still going to try to get four of us into that forward cabin for our ex CPT flight in the summer, but am stymied at the moment by seats being blocked out for SAA codeshare passengers.
