One of my pet peeves while flying is when cabin crew turn up the heat too high after a meal.  If someone is too cold they can add clothes or a blanket, but if you are too hot you can’t really strip down.  Some airlines are worse than others at this, in my experience, and British Airways fairly consistently has cabin temperatures in mid 20s C (high 70s F), which in my view is too much to be comfortable.

It seems I’m not alone in this complaint – see the current thread on hot BA cabin temperatures on Flyer Talk.

No, I’m not referring to the Westray to Papa Westray flight which at 1 mile or 2 is the shortest commercial flight in the world.

It was an odd flying day. 2 short flights. 2 unusual landing approaches.

For the first flight we were well ahead of schedule but flew past the airport and did some figure eights over an estuary before landing late.  I think the flight arriving before us was rather late and also slow to taxi off the runway.

For the second flight we were warned at top of descent that poor conditions (namely very low cloud) at our destination may require more than one attempt to land.  So, for the second time in less than a month I had a go around.  We made it down on the second shot, although I was mentally preparing myself for a diversion back to origin where I would have had to spend the night.  Other than me being on the aircraft, there was nothing in common with the previous go-around – different aircraft type, airline, airport (and continent), cause.  It is just one of those things that happens from time to time – I get go-arounds, while lucky does not (yet).

I had a bit more time than usual so instead of using public transport I walked to the airport.  It took 75 minutes on a fine morning. Some great views of the airport activity along the way. I had enough time on arrival to freshen up in the lounge and rehydrate.

Over the years I’ve headed to/from airports on a few different forms of transportation – walking, driving, taxi, bus, train (metro, local and long distance), watertaxi.  What are the ways you get to and from the airport?

When you fly a lot, sooner or later you experience a go around (that is an aborted landing). In a typical year I get a few of these.

Generally they occur when wind conditions change materially just before landing.  Sometimes they happen when other aircraft are in the wrong place at the wrong time.

A go around on a recent flight was a bit more exciting than usual as some wheels had touched down before the captain powered up. I wasn’t too surprised as we had a sideways shimmy just a few seconds before touchdown.

The penultimate Pacific Blue flight within New Zealand was very lame. Just the one mention at the gate before boarding that it was the domestic last flight from Auckland.  A complete contrast with the last couple of Qantas domestic flights.

The check in kiosks and signage are gone now and just some empty check in desks to mark their passing.

Long-term readers of the blog may know I like to fly inaugural flights, but today I’m doing the opposite.  Just a year after the last Qantas domestic flight in NZ (they switched operations to their low cost subsidiary Jetstar), Pacific Blue is also pulling the plug.

It is less than 3 years since Pacific Blue commenced flying domestically in NZ and they’ve never made much traction against fierce competition from Air NZ (by far the biggest network and greatest frequencies) and Qantas/Jetstar (low fares).  From tomorrow there will again be a duopoly in NZ skies.

I’d hoped to fly the very last Pacific Blue domestic in NZ flight but my schedule meant I could only take the penultimate one.  I haven’t gotten attached to Pacific Blue as much as I did previously to Qantas (their NZ-based staff were truly fantastic), but it will still be sad to see them go (pity it isn’t Jetstar leaving).

At least I have a longhaul first class trip in a few days to look forward to.

From time to time Air NZ has one (or a few) aircraft in a special livery. Some are memorable, like the Lord of the Rings ones and the All Blacks front row. Others not so memorable – the green one advertising Air NZ Holidays. The latest special livery has been unveiled for the Rugby World Cup next year – an All Black A320 which will operate on domestic main trunk routes. I expect Air NZ will try to put this aircraft on flights ferrying certain key teams around where possible.

Picture is at the Stuff link.

I use public transport a lot, even when at home. Surprisingly, while I have a few bus & train passes for some cities scattered across the globe I do not have any in my home country.  That changed yesterday when I bought a snapper (smartcard for buses) in Wellington.  I figure if I’m going to be there more often I may as well get a discount on public transport. The initial $10 outlay for the card will soon repay itself.

Every day I get dozens of travel-related emails.  Most of them I don’t comment on, for a number of reasons.  But sometimes I get one that catches my interest, and this one about Iconic Guides was one.

They’ve only just started out with audio guides for a handful of historic sites, but with plans to add a lot more.  Given how many places I’ve visited that have lots of people listening to audio guides this should be of interest to a reasonable number of travellers.  Yet despite that, I’ve never bothered with an audio guide myself – I’ll either have a human guide, or will already have some knowledge of the subject, or just want to take everything as it comes.

For those who do use audio guides – were they useful? Good value?  How do you know you’re getting quality information?

I was reminded this week that sometimes a flight doesn’t need to be particularly long to be eventful.  I was on a 45 minute shuttle flight that had 2 unusual incidents. 

The first when our departure was delayed as the airbridge took some persuading to detach from the aircraft. At one stage they were considering using a pushback tug to drag the aircraft sideways off the airbridge. Fortunately this action was not needed with the airbridge eventually moved.

The mid-flight there was a medical emergency with one of the passengers. Normal cruise speed was forgotten with higher thrust applied to get us to the destination as quickly as possible, and we had a fast landing approach as well.  It is amazing just how much quicker you can land when flightpath shortcuts are opened up for our use and skies cleared of other aircraft.