28th June 2019
QF841 DRW-MEL
0035-0520
Qantas 737
Seat 1A

I stopped for a couple of hours at the Darwin Qantas Club
I was not in trip report mode at the time and as such took no photos
For a Qantas Club, DRW is pretty good. It is fairly massive and even when there are several QF/JQ flights going out there is always plenty of seating
My only complaint is that none of the seating has runway views


I had been successful in convincing work to go against their own travel policy and book me on the red eye, thus saving a night in Darwin
I was also successful in getting a points upgrade to J. And, the icing on the cake, the seat next to me remained empty. Result!




The crew was pretty excellent and went round the cabin offering up pre departure drinks (the classic Qantas “still or sparkling water”), and asking for intentions as regards bar service after take off, and being woken for breakfast. I asked to be woken. The seats are reasonable for a domestic J product, being able to scrounge a spare pillow from 1C helped, and I was able to get a fairly solid 2.5-3 hours before being woken by the cabin manager. I was massively confused when I first woke up. She seemed to understand this and brought me a cup of tea before asking again if I wanted to eat.


Breakfast was unstated but basically some kind of sausages with perfectly poached eggs, roasted cherry tomatoes and spinach (really good); there was a Frangipane type tart on the side which was also delicious




We ended up arriving a respectable 24 minutes early and I was disgorged into the delight that is Tullamarine airport

There was some confusion with lounge access and I’m not sure if the confusion was mine or the lounge “dragon”’s- I kind of thought connecting from a business class flight on the same day meant I was able to enter the business lounge rather than the pub. That said the domestic lounges at MEL seem to have been refurbished recently and I was far too tired to enter into a discussion about this, all I really was in need of was a caffeinated beverage


My original MEL-CBR flight (QF804) wound up being cancelled due to fog in Canberra (not an unusual occurrence this time of year). Since I was only due to have around 6 hours on the ground in Canberra before “connecting” on a separate ticket to Brisbane, I asked if I could take a flight straight to Brisbane instead. This was happily confirmed fairly rapidly. Initially I was told I would need to collect my bag and recheck, subsequently the baggage chaps were able to do it for me. The tag adjustment was…interesting. But my bag was waiting on the belt for me on arrival in Brisbane