Flight 2: Qantas QF 518 Perth - Canberra
Aircraft: Boeing 747-338 “City of Wagga Wagga”
Seat: 3A
Date: 7 April 2007
Scheduled: 0010
Boarding: 2335
Pushback: 0020
Takeoff: 0032
Descent:
Landing: 0640 (Sydney time)
Gate: 0646

Well, if there’s anyone else on this flight who is crossing the continent for the second time in twelve hours, chances are that they are wearing a Qantas uniform.

Me, I’m dead tired and as soon as we’re up and away, I’m flat out. This is a fairly elderly jumbo and nothing appeals enough to keep me awake, No personal screens, and of course they aren’t showing a movie on the cabin screens this early in the morning,

I actually manage to sleep reasonably well, a combination of fatigue and comfortable seats. A couple of hours out I wake for good and go in search of cabin crew, bear in hand. One crew member is reading in the galley and she poses with Ringbear. We smile together as the captain makes an announcement about air traffic control delays. “Bear with us,” he says.

Breakfast is a choice of Eggs Benedict and something cold involving muesli. That’s no choice at all.

As promised, there are minor delays coming into Sydney, and we circle for a while before descending through a cloud layer and gliding south past the Harbour Bridge into Mascot. One of flying’s most famous views, I should think, though I have to say that it’s not at its best looking east into the rising sun under a grey sky.

Sydney Airport is about as good as it gets for planespotting in Australia, and I’m hanging out the window as we taxi in. I caught a glimpse of Qantas’s first Boeing 707, currently being restored in their maintenance area, but there are other planes to gawk at. Once again I admire the lines of the Airbus 340. Of all the airliners in the world, or at least the currently operational ones, I like the looks of this one best. Something about its proportions. I’ve never flown in one yet, but I’m scheduled to take Cathay Pacific Hong Kong to Heathrow later on in one, and that’s an experience I’m looking forward to. From the inside, it will be just like any other airliner, I know, and heaven knows that the Airbus 330 has no power to thrill me, but there’s something special about the thought of riding a good-looking flying machine, irrational though it is. Bear with me.