Brisbane to Hobart by … is it Qantas or not?

…

I knew there was a reason why we don’t travel anymore.

And now, everyone is letting go of the Covid shackles, and the airports are overwhelmed.

Yesterday, the Qantas baggage system broke down and caused endless delays.  Today, we’re in a queue that’s literally a mile long, just to be screened before we even get into the terminal.

And, we are in a smaller plane operated by Qantas Link, the main airline’s feeder.  Confusingly, it has two names, National Jet Systems, and Qantas Link, the name painted on the aircraft.

Our plane is a Boeing 717, but it is actually an MD 95, made by McDonnell Douglas before Boeing took them over.


And so, it begins…

Boarding time comes and goes, as it always seems to, this time that age-old excuse, the flight attendants are on an incoming flight that is delayed but is on the ground.

That could mean almost anything, but in this case, we’re told, that they are coming from another satellite some distance away.  Well, at least they will get some exercise.

9:56. The attendants arrived.  They just got off the plane from Newcastle, so it can be confusing, going from destination to destination, well, at least for me it would be.  For them, it’s all in a day’s work.

I asked for early boarding because Rosemary cannot walk very well, so it remains to be seen if this happens.

It does, and it’s a slow walk downstairs, and upstairs, but we have to wait because there is a sewerage spill and while waiting to get clearance to board, we’re getting a birds-eye view of the poor man who has to clean it up doesn’t make the wait any easier.

By 10:10, we were on the plane and seated.

We’re organizing a wheelchair and assistance at Hobart, to make things easier.

Minutes later our traveling companions are boarding.

Some confusion reigns, we are sitting in the wrong seats, row 5 instead of row 6.  A bit of seat shuffling and everything is good.

10:30:  The sewerage spill has been cleaned up.  The front door is still open, but they just connected the tow vehicle.

10:33: Doors closed.  10:35:  Push back.  10:40: Heading to the runway.  10:45: Take off, or is that wheels up? It’s not on the new second runway, perhaps because there are so many complaints from the residents nearby.

11:00: Time for a snack.  It’s Tomato Salsa with corn chips, almonds, and pretzels.  60 grams worth, small but reasonably tasty.

Now we’re left to our own devices, as there is no onboard entertainment, and the plane is too small and too old to have onboard Wi-Fi.

Perhaps a siesta, but the seat is too uncomfortable to find a position that will allow it, so I guess a bit of writing is in order.

That and staring out the window and noticing that we have been hugging the coastline almost all the way south, except for when we were crossing Bass Strait, 32,000 feet above the waves.

Bass Strait is not a waterway you want to willingly cross at the best of times, and I have, once, crossed it at the worst of times, and it wasn’t fun.

1:00: Startin that, you would expect from such conditions.

I had expected, given the forecast for rain and heavy winds that we would have a treacherous landing but it was not, the rain had passed and the wind not as bad, and got on the ground without much ado.

It was exactly as the pilot said, 1:30 pm.

We were the last to disembark, with a wheelchair at the end of the disembarkation ramp, there are no air bridges here in Hobart.

My first impression of the airport, it’s like a country town with a tin shed, though the terminal looks a lot different inside than outside. And they do have international flights.

Our bags we out by the time we reached the baggage carousel, then it was off to the car rental counter for an effortless and pain-free pickup.

The worst thing was the distance from the terminal to where the car was parked.

Hobart in June – Winter – Day 1 – Saturday

…

Overnight the rain began and hasn’t stopped.  It is cold, and the heater in the room is not quite adequate for the space it has to heat up.  Fortunately, the bed has electric blankets, and it was warm, lying wake listening to the raindrops.  That warmth makes it difficult to get out of bed, but this is a holiday, and we have to get motivated.

We have a balcony, and from there the bleakness of the early morning is stark, but at least the rain is light if not a fine mist.

Worse, it alternates between this fine mist and a short downpour, which means the umbrella goes up and down until you give up.  Later, the rain is not heavy, and just tolerable.

We head off to the Salamanca markets, happening only on Saturday morning.  Unable to walk long distances, we drive, about four minutes from our apartment, but miss a turn, it takes 10, then and 5 to assess the parking situation which, in the end, was the easiest part of this expedition.

The hardest part, walking among the very large crowd of people defying the rain and cold.  I can tolerate large crowds but today, they seem to want to stop suddenly, and just stand and talk in the middle of the walkways making it difficult to impossible to maintain any sort of continuity.

There were hundreds of stalls, the most predominant, micro distillers for some odd reason, selling expensive spirits for about $90 a 700ml bottle, which I regard as overly expensive.  My son has made Bourbon some years ago and it cost him about $10 for 4.5 liters, so it must be a lucrative sideline, even after you’ve added the excise.

There were a great many food stands, and choices, one of which was a curly potato skewer, which was interesting to say the least.  On a meat pie quest, we found a stand that sold pies, but they were warming a new batch, and the waiting line was about 50 or 60 people long.

I went back a half-hour later and they had sold out.  They must be one of the highlights of the market to be so in demand, and that people would stand in the cold and rain just to get one.

Having been defeated by aches and pains, the cold and rain, as well as the large crowd, and the absence of anything we wanted, it was fortunate that time had expired on our parking space.

We had contemplated finding a restaurant to have lunch, deciding it was time to have a proper meal rather than a snack, there didn’t seem to be any places open, and the cafes were packed.

This sparked off an odyssey to find a decent restaurant.

After leaving the markets, we find a road that follows the coastline.  Aside from houses either side, and at one point a marina and the Wrest Point casino, which was not a place we intended to visit, the further we went, the less chance it seemed of finding what we were looking for.

But we did find a tourist attraction, a shot tower, and a museum.

And a tea room that had afternoon tea.  Not exactly what we were looking for.  That said, and feeling like going any further would not fix the search parameters, I go to Google maps and search for restaurants near us.

There’s a Vietnamese restaurant, 6.1 km back the way we came, and being the best choice out of five or six others, we go.

And here’s the thing, it’s just around the corner from where we’re staying.  Go figure.

 But, there is a twist, we drive past one of the hotels that were recommended to us back at the apartments, so we go there, the Hotel Doctor Syntax.  We figure we’re more likely to get the vegetable component there than the other place.

It turns out to be a master stroke, getting steak, pork belly, roast potatoes, gravy, asparagus, and seafood on the side.  All having generous servings as one would expect from a hotel bistro.

The food must be great because they were full and had to turn people away.  We were very lucky to get the last table but one, and that one didn’t last very long.

After a long, leisurely lunch surrounded by warmth and atmosphere, we had one more stop.  Coffee and cake at Daci and Daci, a café recommended to us.

It was worth the experience, although it took some fortitude to fit it in after such a large lunch.  I suspect before we go back for a second visit, yes, it was that good, we will make sure we are less full of lunch first.  The cake I had was delicious but very filling.  The coffee?  Excellent.

Hobart in June – Winter – Day 2 – Sunday

…

It is not raining when we woke, but it had been most of the night.  After a cold start, the weather, seems to have improved, if only for the time being.

Today’s expedition is the Cascade Brewery, which doesn’t have tours at the moment because of staff issues with Covid, but does have a bar and restaurant.  There is also a historic site, an old women’s prison, and botanical gardens.  I’m not sure how far we’ll get in the gardens, but the bar and restaurant is looking good.

We get there and decide on lunch first then a visit to the women’s prison.

Fail.  The bar and restaurant are packed and there are no tables left.  Time for a photograph of the old brewery, and move on.

Instead of going to the prison, just down the road, we go off in a different direction, to Mt Wellington, thinking it might give excellent views of Hobart.

Only a sign says the road is supposed to be closed, but it is not, so we and a dozen others are venturing up the road towards the summit.

The road was probably opened temporarily, but it is getting more treacherous as the snow appears and the road is wet.  We make it about 2km before deciding it’s unsafe.

The adventure continues because at the bottom of the hill we decided to go to Huonville, hoping to chance upon the apple orchards and all things apple.

It was an immense letdown.  There was nothing, except for one innocuous building with a sign out front saying it was open, but for all intents and purposes looked like it was completely empty.

Until you drove around the back to the carpark where there were hundreds of cars, and inside, totally packed.

It’s where everyone in Huonville had gone.

And not where we were going to get a distinctly Tasmanian meal.

We had to settle for another pie from Banjo’s in Sandy Bay.

Hobart in June – Winter – Day 1 – Saturday

…

Overnight the rain began and hasn’t stopped.  It is cold, and the heater in the room is not quite adequate for the space it has to heat up.  Fortunately, the bed has electric blankets, and it was warm, lying wake listening to the raindrops.  That warmth makes it difficult to get out of bed, but this is a holiday, and we have to get motivated.

We have a balcony, and from there the bleakness of the early morning is stark, but at least the rain is light if not a fine mist.

Worse, it alternates between this fine mist and a short downpour, which means the umbrella goes up and down until you give up.  Later, the rain is not heavy, and just tolerable.

We head off to the Salamanca markets, happening only on Saturday morning.  Unable to walk long distances, we drive, about four minutes from our apartment, but miss a turn, it takes 10, then and 5 to assess the parking situation which, in the end, was the easiest part of this expedition.

The hardest part, walking among the very large crowd of people defying the rain and cold.  I can tolerate large crowds but today, they seem to want to stop suddenly, and just stand and talk in the middle of the walkways making it difficult to impossible to maintain any sort of continuity.

There were hundreds of stalls, the most predominant, micro distillers for some odd reason, selling expensive spirits for about $90 a 700ml bottle, which I regard as overly expensive.  My son has made Bourbon some years ago and it cost him about $10 for 4.5 liters, so it must be a lucrative sideline, even after you’ve added the excise.

There were a great many food stands, and choices, one of which was a curly potato skewer, which was interesting to say the least.  On a meat pie quest, we found a stand that sold pies, but they were warming a new batch, and the waiting line was about 50 or 60 people long.

I went back a half-hour later and they had sold out.  They must be one of the highlights of the market to be so in demand, and that people would stand in the cold and rain just to get one.

Having been defeated by aches and pains, the cold and rain, as well as the large crowd, and the absence of anything we wanted, it was fortunate that time had expired on our parking space.

We had contemplated finding a restaurant to have lunch, deciding it was time to have a proper meal rather than a snack, there didn’t seem to be any places open, and the cafes were packed.

This sparked off an odyssey to find a decent restaurant.

After leaving the markets, we find a road that follows the coastline.  Aside from houses either side, and at one point a marina and the Wrest Point casino, which was not a place we intended to visit, the further we went, the less chance it seemed of finding what we were looking for.

But we did find a tourist attraction, a shot tower, and a museum.

And a tea room that had afternoon tea.  Not exactly what we were looking for.  That said, and feeling like going any further would not fix the search parameters, I go to Google maps and search for restaurants near us.

There’s a Vietnamese restaurant, 6.1 km back the way we came, and being the best choice out of five or six others, we go.

And here’s the thing, it’s just around the corner from where we’re staying.  Go figure.

 But, there is a twist, we drive past one of the hotels that were recommended to us back at the apartments, so we go there, the Hotel Doctor Syntax.  We figure we’re more likely to get the vegetable component there than the other place.

It turns out to be a master stroke, getting steak, pork belly, roast potatoes, gravy, asparagus, and seafood on the side.  All having generous servings as one would expect from a hotel bistro.

The food must be great because they were full and had to turn people away.  We were very lucky to get the last table but one, and that one didn’t last very long.

After a long, leisurely lunch surrounded by warmth and atmosphere, we had one more stop.  Coffee and cake at Daci and Daci, a café recommended to us.

It was worth the experience, although it took some fortitude to fit it in after such a large lunch.  I suspect before we go back for a second visit, yes, it was that good, we will make sure we are less full of lunch first.  The cake I had was delicious but very filling.  The coffee?  Excellent.

 Brisbane to Hobart by … is it Qantas or not?

…

I knew there was a reason why we don’t travel anymore.

And now, everyone is letting go of the Covid shackles, and the airports are overwhelmed.

Yesterday, the Qantas baggage system broke down and caused endless delays.  Today, we’re in a queue that’s literally a mile long, just to be screened before we even get into the terminal.

And, we are in a smaller plane operated by Qantas Link, the main airline’s feeder.  Confusingly, it has two names, National Jet Systems, and Qantas Link, the name painted on the aircraft.

Our plane is a Boeing 717, but it is actually an MD 95, made by McDonnell Douglas before Boeing took them over.


And so, it begins…

Boarding time comes and goes, as it always seems to, this time that age-old excuse, the flight attendants are on an incoming flight that is delayed but is on the ground.

That could mean almost anything, but in this case, we’re told, that they are coming from another satellite some distance away.  Well, at least they will get some exercise.

9:56. The attendants arrived.  They just got off the plane from Newcastle, so it can be confusing, going from destination to destination, well, at least for me it would be.  For them, it’s all in a day’s work.

I asked for early boarding because Rosemary cannot walk very well, so it remains to be seen if this happens.

It does, and it’s a slow walk downstairs, and upstairs, but we have to wait because there is a sewerage spill and while waiting to get clearance to board, we’re getting a birds-eye view of the poor man who has to clean it up doesn’t make the wait any easier.

By 10:10, we were on the plane and seated.

We’re organizing a wheelchair and assistance at Hobart, to make things easier.

Minutes later our traveling companions are boarding.

Some confusion reigns, we are sitting in the wrong seats, row 5 instead of row 6.  A bit of seat shuffling and everything is good.

10:30:  The sewerage spill has been cleaned up.  The front door is still open, but they just connected the tow vehicle.

10:33: Doors closed.  10:35:  Push back.  10:40: Heading to the runway.  10:45: Take off, or is that wheels up? It’s not on the new second runway, perhaps because there are so many complaints from the residents nearby.

11:00: Time for a snack.  It’s Tomato Salsa with corn chips, almonds, and pretzels.  60 grams worth, small but reasonably tasty.

Now we’re left to our own devices, as there is no onboard entertainment, and the plane is too small and too old to have onboard Wi-Fi.

Perhaps a siesta, but the seat is too uncomfortable to find a position that will allow it, so I guess a bit of writing is in order.

That and staring out the window and noticing that we have been hugging the coastline almost all the way south, except for when we were crossing Bass Strait, 32,000 feet above the waves.

Bass Strait is not a waterway you want to willingly cross at the best of times, and I have, once, crossed it at the worst of times, and it wasn’t fun.

1:00: Startin that, you would expect from such conditions.

I had expected, given the forecast for rain and heavy winds that we would have a treacherous landing but it was not, the rain had passed and the wind not as bad, and got on the ground without much ado.

It was exactly as the pilot said, 1:30 pm.

We were the last to disembark, with a wheelchair at the end of the disembarkation ramp, there are no air bridges here in Hobart.

My first impression of the airport, it’s like a country town with a tin shed, though the terminal looks a lot different inside than outside. And they do have international flights.

Our bags we out by the time we reached the baggage carousel, then it was off to the car rental counter for an effortless and pain-free pickup.

The worst thing was the distance from the terminal to where the car was parked.

Melbourne airport – an underwhelming experience

…

Let me sum up this experience at the start, in one word.

Terrible.

I know it’s not much past post-Covid, but tell me, what were the airport administrators doing for two years, other than lamenting the lack of plane traffic and sitting on their hands? Did they think no one was ever going to travel again?

Let me suggest what they should have been doing, getting onto every one of the retailers that had to close, and making sure that from day one of reopening, it was back to pre-Covid.

Instead, it’s a desolate nightmare.  There was only one dedicated Cafe and a bar and two bookshops down the Qantas end.

And the food was basically stale sandwiches and muffins. And if you don’t like muffins…

We had to walk a mile to get to the Cafe and get a decent cup of coffee and a toastie, which the Cafe itself and coffee and food scored a ten out of ten.

If you didn’t know it was there, God only knows what you would do if you wanted something decent.

Score out of ten for the Airport Administrators – minus 5 

Since scoring that I had the unhappy experience of going to the men’s restroom.  It was filthy.  How hard could be for someone to check every half hour to clean up the obvious mess?  I’ll let you imagine how that will affect their current score.

My other bugbear about airports is the scanning of bags before getting to the gate.

Melbourne for some reason has been the worst experience in quite literally the world because it is a complete mess, particularly if one thing goes wrong.

I hate it, and it was no better today and left me shaking, which only happens when I’m extremely stressed.

I can only hope it eventually gets better, but, sorry to say this but they’ve had nearly two years to get the process right and run much smoother, but it’s clear they’ve also just sat on their hands.

Maybe one day someone might do something about it, but we’re talking government here, and it takes them ten years just to create a green discussion paper.

So, not holding my breath.

Of course, in reading about the current parlous state of air travel throughout the world, it seems we are not the only ones having problems. I guess we should spare a thought for those going to Heathrow in London. The many times we’ve been there, it’s been borderline organized chaos, and yes, once, we had to wait an hour for our baggage, but now it seems it just disappears.

Glad I’m not going there any time soon.

But, soon, we’re taking the plunge again, and going to Hobart.

I’ll let you know how that goes.

Brisbane to Melbourne – First time flying after the pandemic

…

So, it’s the end of the restrictions induced by the pandemic, and against my better judgement, we’re travelling again.

The pandemic is not over, it’s just we’ve moved it to one side and trying our best to ignore it.  Try as we may, it ain’t going nowhere.

But we can’t all stay locked up forever.

It’s been over two years since we’ve been to Melbourne where our relatives are, and it’s going to be a two-and-a-half-hour flight, wearing masks, and hoping against hope there’s no one with Covid on the plane.

It’s a forlorn hope, by the way.

These days people have it but aren’t isolated because they can’t afford to.  All the government handouts are finished, making it impossible for people not to be working.

Of course, the country had a very high vaccination rate, and I’m covered, having just had a booster.  If comes died to susceptibility, and so far I’ve managed to avoid it, even with my better half working in an office where nearly everyone has had Covid at some time or other, and at a stage where it could be passed on 

Perhaps it’s just been blind luck.

Going on this plane will be a good test.

We decided to park the car for the six days in the long-term car park.  We were going to get dropped off but it was wet, raining very hard, and the roads were a nightmare, with ghastly traffic jams.

Our driver would have been out recently licence’s granddaughter and it would have been too much for her, even though she wouldn’t say no.

The walk from the car park was long but direct.  Sometimes it can be convoluted when having to park on the higher floors.  We’re on the ground, and it’s easy just to jump in the car and drive out.

Inside the terminal building, its masks on.  This place doesn’t recognise the end to mask restrictions, so the threat of covid I’d very real.  I hope they got that memo on the plane.

It would be pre-flight entertainment if they had to bodily drag a dissenter off kicking and screaming, or dies that only happen in America?

The food choices are still as appalling as they were before the pandemic, and I still don’t get why all the reasonably good choices are down one end, and, you guessed it, not the end we’re departing from.

I go for a walk, but an angry customer returning half-cooked food puts me off everything until I got a chicken schnitzel roll, which after I got it failed to show any sign of chicken, schnitzel or otherwise.

It did have ham, slightly dry around the edges, cheese, tomato, and lettuce, sad the roll itself was quite tasty, so a three out of ten for trying.

The price, like all airport food, nearly broke the bank.  But here’s the thing, they wouldn’t charge it if people didn’t pay it, so it’s everyone else’s fault!

Of course, we wouldn’t need to buy food, if you could call it that, before getting on the plane if the miserly airlines weren’t cutting costs, i.e. food, to make that extra buck to put in the CEO annual bonus.

Once, the meal options were quite good, but over time, these have got less and less and less, until now if you get a cookie, you’re lucky.

It will be interesting to see how further the standards have fallen, anywhere hearing sane said CEO wailing about not being able to fly during the pandemic, showing that he is more concerned about profits than passenger safety.

All while everyone else is citing the mantra, ‘your safety is our priority’.  I guess one day the message might come from the top down, but I won’t be holding my breath.

I read up on the safety procedures they implement in between flights so I’m expecting to get on a disinfectant-smelling plane with shiny clean surfaces.  It would be a huge improvement over that which prevailed before the pandemic where planes could be anything from apparently clean to don’t look below the surface.

Like I said, having not flown for so long, and the fact the pandemic is anything but dead and buried, there are so many things that could go wrong.

Meanwhile, we’re sitting in the gate lounge ticking off the minutes before boarding.  No matter what changes Covid had brought, that will be the same, people ignoring the seat road loading instructions and others pushing in as though the plane might leave without them if they didn’t.

Good News!

The incoming flight is here, 20 minutes before boarding time, so we’re going to be late leaving.

Or will they sacrifice the deep cleanse?

Stay tuned.

News flash…  9ur crew is coming in on another flight which is running late, no, just landed, so they have to finish up there, and come on over, go through pre-flight, and then we can board.

Yep, we’re going to be late leaving.  Who would have guessed?

Boarding as always is amusing but it’s made even more so by the constant reminder to keep our distance from other passengers, and if you can’t, and as you know sardines have nowhere to go, we should rely on the mask.

Wow.  These people seem to think masks will save us.  Sadly, they won’t, but they know that.  But it looks good and makes them feel better while cramming people into their small planes.

We were supposed to leave at 6:15 pm.  The late arrival of the operating aircraft and waiting for the crew from yet another late-arriving aircraft takes its toll.  

Good news though.  More time to clean the plane.  It looks clean, but there’s no tell-tale disinfectant aroma, so what did they do?

6:37 push back.  Overall, it’s not a bad result, pushing back 22 minutes late.  It’s time, they say, they can make up in the air.

They allow 2 hours and 20 minutes for the end-to-end departure and arrival from and at the gate.  The actual flying time, give or take, is 1 hour and 45 minutes, so we have 45 minutes for taxiing.

6:47 take off, so 1 hour 45 minutes added means we have a touch-down time of 8:32.  Our scheduled arrival time was 6:15 plus 2 hours and 20 minutes, so it would be 8:35.  Three minutes from touch-down to disembarking at the gate.

I don’t think so.

We’ll just have to wait and see.

I must have dozed off for a few minutes because the next thing that happens is food service, and it’s going to be arancini balls, which I like, so it sounds good.  But it’s airline food so it will be interesting

Something else that’s bordering me, the woman on the seat next to me gas a persistent cough.  Mask or no mask this is a problem, especially if she had Covid, and doesn’t know it yet.  Or it’s symptomatic or something else. 

I’m immuno-compromised so anything floating around in that tin can I’m likely to be susceptible to.  Time will tell if it’s serious.

Past that fear, the balls were delicious, all four of them, and a coke for a drink.  We’ve moved on from tea and coffee, and polite flight attendants, because they insisted, that we keep masks on till after they passed handing out the food.

It shows the staff have no faith in the company’s health directives, so they know each flight they’re dicing with death.

Scary thought. 

But, all’s well that ends well, and we make up the time and end up being 7 minutes late which is acceptable in anyone’s language.

8:37 on the runway with a bang, the pilot or co-pilot has not fully learned the subtle art of getting the plane on the ground at the end of a gentle drop from the sky. Those asleep are unceremoniously wakened, thinking the plane has crashed.

8:42 at the gate. It’s always a short time from landing to gate, the pilot wants to get an early night. It would not be the first time we are leaving the plane and the pilots are long gone. One of the advantages of being at the front of the plane!

…

My take on travelling by plane in the post-pandemic world, it’s too soon and vaccinated or not, we are all still susceptible to getting the virus and it is killing us.  I have to travel home yet, but I have to hope the lady in the next seat hasn’t hexed me.

Not after dodging it for so long by keeping myself safe, a proper distance between me and the rest of the world, and keeping away from those in isolation, because those few I could trust would stay in isolation.

For the rest of the world, when money is the driving object to disobey or flout the rules, they become a serious problem, one that nothing is going to overcome, and therefore we will quite feasibly never get rid of the virus.

Let’s hope the trip back is less traumatic.