Japan Here We Come!

With Qantas' sale at the moment we have jumped on flights from Sydney to Tokyo for under $1000 each!

Two months from today we'll be on our way over. I have so much planning to do! Not the least of it getting time off work... Really should have organised that first...

We're planning on spending just over a week in Tokyo, including a few days at Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo Disney Sea, and then a week in either Osaka or Kyoto, we haven't worked out the nitty gritty yet, but that's the basis of our trip.

We're very excited!

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Posted in: cheap flights,flights,holiday,japan,qantas,sale

Cheap flights from Australia to Japan

Jetstar are currently holding a sale for flights between Australia and Japan during September and October.

Be flexible with dates and you should be able to find return flights for around $500 between the Gold Coast and Tokyo.

Cairns to Tokyo (Narita) 01 Sep - 31 Oct 2011 $209

Gold Coast to Osaka 01 Sep - 31 Oct 2011 $229

Gold Coast to Tokyo (Narita) 02 Sep - 31 Oct 2011 $229

Cairns to Osaka 01 Sep - 31 Oct 2011 $249

Sydney to Osaka 01 Sep - 20 Sep 2011 & 12 Oct - 27 Oct 2011 $290 - Via Gold Coast only

Melbourne (Tullamarine)to Tokyo (Narita) 06 Sep - 20 Sep 2011 & 12 Oct - 25 Oct 2011 $303 - Via Gold Coast only

Melbourne (Tullamarine)to Osaka 01 Sep - 20 Sep 2011 & 12 Oct - 25 Oct 2011 $303

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Posted in: cheap flights,flights,gold coast,japan,jetstar,tokyo

A Letter to Richard Branson

This has been circulating on the web since early 2009, but I saw it for the first time today, and thought it was a clever response to my own entry regarding flying with Virgin:

Oliver Beale


17th December 2008

Dear Mr Branson

REF: Mumbai to Heathrow 7th December 2008 Flying Club number obscured

I love the Virgin brand, I really do which is why I continue to use it despite a series of unfortunate incidents over the last few years. This latest incident takes the biscuit. Ironically, by the end of the flight I would have gladly paid over a thousand rupees for a single biscuit following the culinary journey of hell I was subjected to at the hands of your corporation.

Look at this Richard. Just look at it:



I imagine the same questions are racing through your brilliant mind as were racing through mine on that fateful day. What is this? Why have I been given it? What have I done to deserve this? And, Which one is the starter, which one is the desert? You don’t get to a position like yours Richard with anything less than a generous sprinkling of observational power so I KNOW you will have spotted the tomato next to the two yellow shafts of sponge on the left. Yes, it’s next to the sponge shaft without the green paste. That’s got to be the clue hasn’t it. No sane person would serve a desert with a tomato would they. Well answer me this Richard, what sort of animal would serve a desert with peas in:



I know it looks like a baaji but it’s in custard Richard, custard. It must be the pudding. Well you’ll be fascinated to hear that it wasn’t custard. It was a sour gel with a clear oil on top. It’s only redeeming feature was that it managed to be so alien to my palette that it took away the taste of the curry emanating from our miscellaneous central cuboid of beige matter. Perhaps the meal on the left might be the desert after all.

Anyway, this is all irrelevant at the moment. I was raised strictly but neatly by my parents and if they knew I had started desert before the main course, a sponge shaft would be the least of my worries. So lets peel back the tin-foil on the main dish and see what’s on offer.

I’ll try and explain how this felt. Imagine being a twelve year old boy Richard. Now imagine it’s Christmas morning and you’re sat their with your final present to open. It’s a big one, and you know what it is. It’s that Goodmans stereo you picked out the catalogue and wrote to Santa about. Only you open the present and it’s not in there. It’s your hamster Richard. It’s your hamster in the box and it’s not breathing. That’s how I felt when I peeled back the foil and saw this:



Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking it’s more of that Baaji custard. I admit I thought the same too, but no. It’s mustard Richard. MUSTARD. More mustard than any man could consume in a month. On the left we have a piece of broccoli and some peppers in a brown glue-like oil and on the right the chef had prepared some mashedpotato. The potato masher had obviously broken and so it was decided the next best thing would be to pass the potatoes through the digestive tract of a bird. Once it was regurgitated it was clearly then blended and mixed with a bit of mustard. Everybody likes a bit of mustard Richard. Jesus Christ.

By now I was actually starting to feel a little hypoglycaemic. I needed a sugar hit. Luckily there was a small cookie provided. It had caught my eye earlier due to it’s baffling presentation:



It appears to be in an evidence bag from the scene of a crime. A CRIME AGAINST BLOODY COOKING. Either that or some sort of back-street underground cookie, purchased off a gun-toting maniac high on his own supply of yeast. You certainly wouldn’t want to be caught carrying one of these through customs. Imagine biting into a piece of brass Richard. That would be softer on the teeth than the specimen above.

I was exhausted. All I wanted to do was relax but obviously I had to sit with that mess in front of me for half an hour. I swear the sponge shafts moved at one point. Once cleared. I decided to relax with a bit of your world-famous onboard entertainment. I switched it on:



I apologise for the quality of the photo, it’s just it was incredibly hard to capture Boris Johnson’s face through the flickering white lines running up and down the screen. Perhaps it would be better on another channel:



Is that Ray Liotta? A question I found myself asking over and over again throughout the gruelling half-hour I attempted to watch the film like this. After that I switched off. I’d had enough. I was the hungriest I’d been in my adult life and I had a splitting headache from squinting at a crackling screen.

My only option was to simply stare at the seat in front and wait for either food, or sleep. Neither came for an incredibly long time. But when it did it surpassed my wildest expectations:



Yes! It’s another crime-scene cookie. Only this time you dunk it in the white stuff. Richard…. What is that white stuff? It looked like it was going to be yoghurt. It finally dawned on me what it was after staring at it. It was a mixture between the Baaji custard and the Mustard sauce. It reminded me of my first week at university. I had overheard that you could make a drink by mixing vodka and refreshers. I lied to my new friends and told them I’d done it loads of times. When I attempted to make the drink in a big bowl it formed a cheese Richard, a cheese. That cheese looked a lot like your baaji-mustard.

So that was that Richard. I didn’t eat a bloody thing. My only question is: How can you live like this? I can’t imagine what dinner round your house is like, it must be like something out of a nature documentary.

As I said at the start I love your brand, I really do. It’s just a shame such a simple thing could bring it crashing to it’s knees and begging for sustenance.

Yours Sincererly

Oliver Beale

I am proud to say that V Australia's food looks nothing like anything pictured! I don't think I could have eaten anything on that flight either.

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Posted in: flights,inflight meals,oliver beale,ref: mumbai to heathrow 7th December 2008,richard branson,virgin

V Australia - Sydney to Los Angeles

In February 2011 we jetted off on our second trip using V Australia as our main carrier.

We flew from Sydney to LA non stop with the rest of the commoners in economy class. According to Virgin’s web site the economy seats have 81cm of leg room, and a 15cm recline. If you so desire, you can also organise to have an “Extra Leg Room Seat” which gives you just that.

Each seat also has its own personal screen with the ability to choose from dozens of movies and TV shows to keep you occupied during the flight. Also available is seat to seat chatting and games where you can challenge other passengers.

I love individual screens when flying, with just a couple of movies, a TV show or two, dinner, breakfast and a bit of a sleep you find yourself arriving at your destination in what feels like no time at all. They really do take the hassle out of flying and I find myself checking for this feature when booking flights as well.

Boarding was on time and quick and painless, with the V Australia staff taking the smart option of loading from the back of the plane to the front (which avoids people standing in the aisle while you’re trying to get past).

During the flight, we were met with Virgin’s amazing customer service. During a casual conversation with one of the flight attendants my then fiancé mentioned we were on our way to get married, before we knew it we had complimentary glasses of champagne brought to our seats – drinks are free anyway, and I don’t drink alcohol, but that didn’t stop it from feeling special. An upgrade would have been nice, but I suppose beggars can’t be choosers.

Meals were hot and tasted fresh, with 3 or 4 options to choose from and came with a few cold sides. I remember from our previous flight that there was a snack area that you could help yourself to at any time during the flight, and it was always kept well stocked with soft drinks, water, packets of chips or pretzels, nuts and biscuits. However on this flight I found that the snack area never seemed stocked. Water was always available from a fountain, but I only once saw any food available there. V Australia may have cut back on the snack availability to save money, but I hope that’s not the case, as there were a few times when I really could have gone for a quick snack without having to track any of the attendants down.

Overall I was very happy with our flight, Virgin’s customer service is amazing, the meals are tasty and filling and the entertainment is free and varied. We will fly with V Australia again, and I look forward to it!

All pictures have been “borrowed” from The Age – I always feel uncomfortable taking pictures inside an airplane – how about you?

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Posted in: cheap flights,customer service,flights,long haul economy,V Australia,v australia review

Getting cheap flights with V Australia

Chris and I are planning a destination wedding for March next year. If you're a follower of my blog it should come as no suprise to you when I say we're getting married at Disney World in Florida.

Plans are going great, and I will make sure to post many pictures and stories of our travels while we're over there.

We've just booked our flights for the trip, and we got an awesome price! From Sydney to Orlando return we're paying $1243 per person. At the moment you can't even get that price to go from Sydney to Los Angeles with V Australia, so we were very happy with it.

I'm now trying to encourage my guests to book their flights with this great offer, as many have expressed an interest in taking the same flight from Sydney. However many are reporting that they are unable to find these cheap flights.

So, what follows below, is my attempt at step by step instructions so our guests can get cheap flights to the states. - They might even help those who are looking for flights around the same time!

1. Go to http://www.vaustralia.com/

2.On the left hand side under find flights select Sydney as the departure and Orlando (MCO) as the destination.

3.For the dates I’ve found that 22/02/11 and 4/03/11 work really well, however when you press find flights it shows you all of the available days, and how much for each flight. So you can select what works best. I’ve just done the search and it shows $648 on the 22nd, and $598 on the 4th – total of $1246 return.

4.Now here’s the tricky part. We have booked our flights leaving Sydney on the 22nd, however when we arrive in Los Angeles we’ve arranged to catch the connecting flight the following morning. You don’t need to do this, however we’ve decided that we don’t want to be flying through the night, so this works best for us.

5.To do this though, you have to call to book your flights. Usually it costs more to book flights by phone, then what it does online. So you need to explain to whoever is on the phone that you’ve found the flights online, however you want to do a one night stopover in LA. Tell them how much the flights are you’ve found, and they should be able to find a similarly priced flight.

6. You’ll need to pay by credit card, so have it ready, they may also ask for passport numbers but this isn’t needed right now.

7.If this doesn’t pan out, Delta are currently offering cheap flights, and I believe so are United.

Good luck!

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Posted in: cheap flights,destination wedding,flights,florida,guests,instructions,los angeles,sydney,wedding

Monday 10th March. Last day!!!

No photos today, just a heck of a lot of writing...

Once again we woke up today bright and early. Most of our stuff had been packed the previous night, so we finished off packing and checked out of the hotel. They stored our stuff for us for the day as well.

Today wasn’t going to be a full day, because unfortunately we were flying home... It was a late flight, but we wanted to make sure we had enough time for everything.

First we went into DTD to pick up a few more souveneirs, then we caught the monorail into DL.

I’d brought my Mickey ears with me to get embroidered today, and I took them into the embroidery place to get them done. There were a few people lined up to purchase their ears, but there was only the CM at the embroidery counter, so I walked in through the door and up to her, and asked if I could get my name on my hat.

She got the name off me – I wanted Bec, and said “no problem. Where’s your receipt?” And I said “ahh, packed in a suitcase” ...? This is when she proceeded to tell me that they couldn’t embroider the ears without a receipt. I asked “Well how about I buy another set and you use that receipt to embroider the ears?” I had a plain set of ears, but I wasn’t against buying a fancy set too, that way I could have a personalised one, and a pretty one... But no go, they wouldn’t do that either. The CM called the manager over and he just said the same thing. He asked me when I bought them and I told him, 2 days ago at the World of Disney store. He asked where the receipt was and I said, buried in amongst one of 3 suitcases. I’m not sure which, and they’re stored in the hotel... It was at this stage that I was getting very disappointed, and worried, I was starting to think that they were going to take my ears off me because I didn’t have a receipt. So I said “Whatever!” and stormed off. They were not going to take my ears off me! I was pretty pissed that they were treating me like I stole them too! Well, they may not have really thought that, but it was starting to feel that way.

So now I was grumpy... hehe – not the dwarf, but you know what I mean. Luckily, Chris had spotted that there was another embroidery place right next door. So we headed in there to try again. Now in here was a lovely CM. I explained my problem to him, and put on big puppy dog eyes, and I may have even started quivering my lip... But hey, what it comes down to, is that he did it for me! Sure I had to pay to get it done, but I got to choose the font and the colour. I stuck as close to the free one as I could anyway, but I felt good knowing that I had the choice. He told me that it would be ready at 12pm. Great.

So I spent time wandering the shops, and then decided that I hadn’t really gotten my sister anything, and the first thing to spring to mind for her was one of the painted parasols with her name on it. So I went and ordered and paid for one of those. It would be ready by 2pm... Not so great, but manageable...

You see, while our suitcases were already packed, they were most likely extremely over weight. Plus, we’d just bought a heap more stuff. So we knew that we had to head to Target before heading to the airport to buy another suitcase. It had been the plan all holiday, but we’d never made it to Target. So we had to fit that into our time.

We hung around until 12, and I picked up my ears. Then we decided we’d head to Target, get what we needed, and then come back into the park for the other stuff.

We got the same taxi driver to Target as we had the other day. So, we had some more laughs, at unknown subjects. Seriously – couldn’t understand half the things he was saying!

First we headed to the suitcase section of Target and picked out a bag. Then we decided to stroll around and see if there was anything else there that we could want. We ended up picking up some noise cancelling headphones. I was dying for something like this on all of our other flights, so it was good to know that we finally had some.

We grabbed a couple of drinks and headed back out to catch a taxi back to DL. We ended up catching a bus. Stupid taxis... But that was fine.

We got back and by now it was after 2pm. Chris went and collected our bags, while I headed into DL to pick up the parasol. It was pretty sad knowing that this was the last time I’d be here for ages, and I didn’t have time to do anything... So I walked slowly anyway. I really had to because it had gotten so busy!

I picked up the parasol and it was beautiful. I wish I gotten myself one now, and I started the slow journey back to the gates. It wasn’t very nice... But at this stage, I still had no voice whatsoever, I was coughing constantly and I’d given up on my new contact lenses, because I didn’t think they were right. It was time to go home.

We waited for the bus for ages. I could have sworn that the time table said it picked up and dropped off every half hour, but no, apparently it drops you off a DL every half hour, but only picks up every hour...

We finally got to the air port and the check in and everything went fine. It was only once we went past security though, that we found out our flight had been delayed. It wasn’t going to be flying out until 12am... It was only 6pm... So we got some dinner and then wandered through the shops. I wasn’t as impressed as I’d hoped I’d be with the duty free, but it annoyed me more that the only time I was offered help by anyone who worked there was in a small little store that I only looked in because I’d looked in all the others. I probably could have spent a fortune in the cosmetic shops...

We ended up sprawled out on a few chairs waiting for our plane. It was then that I discovered we’d put our headphones into our checked luggage... D’oh!

So we sat, and waited, and waited and sat... We played games on Chris’ phone, and waited and sat... Then an announcement came over. Our flight was further delayed until 1am... Sigh...

I decided I'd go back and buy one of those neck rest thingies for the flight and I wanted a hot chocolate. So I headed back towards the shops. To discover that they’d all closed!! Fair enough, it was 12am. I’m sure the poor people wanted to go home, but I honestly thought, that in large international air ports, with flights coming and going at all times, that these shops would be open 24 hours... I was wrong, and very annoyed...

Once again, back to the chairs... Getting very tired. As I’d found out during the last few weeks. When I got tired my cough would start up, and get really bad. Tonight was no exception. I was sick of cough lollies – or cough drops, whatever you call them - that didn’t work, and I was sick of cough medicine – not that I had any on me, but it hadn't worked all week anyway. But still, I kept on sucking on my cough lollies hoping that they would change their minds, and start doing something, but no they didn’t and my cough just got worse...

After all this though, the thing that really pi**ed me off the most during my entire holiday, was when some bloke – probably doing it out of the kindness of his heart – gave me another pack of cough lollies and said “It’s going to be a long flight with that cough...” I mean this really annoyed me! I politely said thankyou and took them from him, and even popped one in my mouth. But on the inside I was fuming!! Who was this man, to think that I’d done nothing about my cough! That I was just waiting for someone to introduce me to cough lollies, like I’d never seen them before!?! Did he really think that I was ok with my cough!?! Like it wasn’t bothering me, like it was everyone else!?!? I mean I must have gone through 3 bottles of cough medicine, and several packets of cough lollies to stop my cough, to help me get even 1 full hour of sleep during my holiday, and nothing had worked. This JERK decides that I haven’t tried his cough lollies and they make all the difference!!! Jerk...

Sorry, that was a bit of a rant there. But it really got to me...

Anyway, we eventually hear one person, who had been speaking to a flight attendant say to their friend that if the plane wasn’t ready by 1:30am, they were going to put us all in the hotel for the night. They were apparently working on the plane’s engine...

Now I didn’t want to spend another night, sure it would be like extending my holiday for a whole day! But, like I’ve mentioned. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t stop coughing and I couldn’t talk. I just wanted to go home. However, I would much prefer that they take their time with the air plane engine, then to rush it and for us all to die a horrible death... I must say that I was surprised to see a lot of people lined up at the desk complaining about how long everything was taking... Were they happy with an air plane that could fall from the sky???

Eventually at 1:15am they boarded us onto the plane. I must say I was pleasantly surprised to find that Chris and I had 4 chairs between us! So we managed to sleep most of the flight home. It went super fast!!

We were greeted at Sydney air port by my whole family, which was really nice.

The End!!

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Posted in: delay,Disneyland,down town disney,flights,holiday,travel