Back Story

I had always wanted to head 'down under' after several of my friends moved and have decided not to return to the motherland. I was even further wanting to go after meeting JohnSydney2000 at the Leeds FT DO. On my return from that DO several of us FTers discussed over Sunday dinner about attending OzFest and eventually they all dropped out or had other commitments until there was only me left!

Alas having spoke with John and finding out the dates and location that OzFest would be held I set about getting the required time off work and finding what I considered to be a 'good' fare.

At last it was there, my leave was booked, I would also be GGL and Hilton diamond so had decided on all Hilton properties and flying in to Sydney with BA and then on to Brisbane with QF before a train to the Gold Coast and a flight back with VA to Sydney for my return journey home.

At this point I still hadn't found a decent fare until one day while randomly searching ITA the price dropped from £2200 to £1700 for an exEU flight from Stavanger to Sydney via LHR and SIN. This would give me another chance to fly on the A380 and my first trip on a 777 as soon as this happened I rang the BA gold line and booked up!

I realised that with trips booked I would achieve GGL on about the 6th January so could use a joker (gold guest list redemption) to open up a seat in first and use a GUF1 (gold upgrade for 1) to put myself in first for the trip there and back.

Unfortunately as I landed at Oslo after a trip to Thailand and connected my phone to the lounge wifi I saw that the UK government was to vote on extending strikes against Daesh to Syria. Knowing this would mean a requirement to increase the amount of aircraft operating out of our base I waited to hear more news.

Upon landing at LHR from OSL I turned my phone off flight safe mode and within 30 seconds I had a call from someone at work telling me I was heading away for an undetermined amount of time and only had 12 hours to return to base and be ready to move. This I knew immediately put my trip to Hawaii over new year with KARFA under threat as well as another trip to JFK with KARFA.

I deployed and soon realised both trips would need to be cancelled and handed it over to my travel insurance (AXA) to sort out who may I add were absolutely excellent in dealing with it and paid up within 10 days of me cancelling and sending the required documents.

This then put a spanner in the works as I wouldn't achieve GGL and also wouldn't get Hilton diamond so I then started looking for another hotel in Sydney and Brisbane. An Accor sale presented me wit the opportunity to save £200 on my Sydney hotel however the rates in Brisbane were favourable so I settled on:

Novotel Sydney central
Hilton Brisbane
Hilton surfers paradise

Enlisting the help of another BAEC FTer I was able to 'borrow' a joker and use my GUF1 to upgrade my flights into F

I returned from my deployment after a long and tiring 4 1/2 months and the excitement started to build for my impending trip to Sydney and OzFest 13!!!!!!!