jj

We are thinking of using up all our Aeroplan pts. to fly Air Canada business class(their first class equiv.) to Australia in August. Is it worth it? We would end of with no travel pts. left. Anyone flown bus. class or economy class to Aussie with Air Canada?

leslie

I think yes, absolutely yes. I have flown both ways (Bus. Class on American/Qantas & economy on what feels like every airline who flies to Australia) and there is no comparison - esp. if the plane is full. If you're coming from Eastern Cananda, the flight will be over 24 hrs which in my opinion is waaaay to long to fly comfortably in economy, esp. if you have an option.

marg

I haven't flown Air Canada so can't comment on their business class but it is such a long flight I would think it would be worth every point to do it in reasonable comfort. We've done it several times economy class and believe me, if I could fly business class I would every time.

libby

I have given up going steerage on long haul flights. Although I have not been on Air Canada I flew back from Canada via HK with Cathay Business Class last year and actually had 10 hours lovely sleep. <BR>I am flying back from Argentina next month Qantas Business class, having paid for steerage and using my ff pts for the upgrade. I think it is worth every penny and I will continue to upgrade and pay for econ class in future. I try and get the upstairs section and that is so much quieter with only about 12 people, 3 hosties and toilets - no waiting, no one yaking in your ear while you try and sleep.

doug

use your points eh! u are comming from the east coast of canada? use youre points. im flying to auz from vancouver. wish i could go buisness class! go for it!! see ya! a fellow canuck....go leafs!

libby

Canucks, particular VanCan, I don't know if you can do this on Air Canada but I pay economy and it cost me 40,000 to upgrade to Business class. This is preferable to paying the total in FF points at least for me and/or paying the total cash for Business. If Air Canada has a similiar system you could look into that.

Susan

In 1996, we flew Canadian and Qantas from Toronto to Sydney. The flight was a nightmare - problems from the start, and we arrived in Sydney exactly 24 hours after we were supposed to get there. I swore I'd never go to Australia again, or anywhere that far again. We were flying economy and at one point, I thought I'd lose it. We had already been travelling 36 hours and we got on the flight in Honolulu. We were jammed in a row of 4 seats with another couple. Because there wasn't a lot of leg room, the man beside me sat with his legs sprawled apart so that he didn't bang his knees - unfortunately that meant that he took up some of my space. The flight was by no means full - there were lots of empty seats - but by the time we took off, all the empty seats had been taken. Some people were lying across 4 seats, others had 3. I spoke to a flight attendant who told me she couldn't ask anyone to move. I mean, why not? Had any of those people actually paid for 4 seats? I just couldn't face the idea of another 12 hours or so sitting like that. I spoke to another flight attendant and he did ask someone to move so that my husband and I then had 3 seats between the 2 of us. <BR><BR>We were lucky that the flight wasn't full. If it had been, we would have been out of luck. <BR><BR>We also learned a valuable lesson - if it looks as though there will be empty seats - take them before someone else does. <BR><BR>We may be going back to Australia sometime in the next year or so - my husband's mother is getting old and we should visit again. I know that we won't have enough frequent flyer miles to go business class. I checked the Aeroplan website and it looks as though you're not able to buy an economy ticket and then buy the upgrade with points. With the cost of airfares these days, I think we'll be flying economy again. <BR><BR>The bottomline - if you have the points, use them. I am already dreading the thought of that flight.

liz

Susan, you can't blame other people because they are more savvy about travelling internationally than you are. <BR>The trip from Canada is not really a long one if you check out variables and it certainly can be made much better if you think first. You have the benefit of the Internet and therefore you can see the seeting arrangements beforehand, most airlines will book your seat when you book the flight and so YOU can be in charge of your travel. <BR>Firstly though you must look at the various routes to another country. If you are in Toronto then it would be worthwhile perhaps getting to either Vancouver of LA and doing a stop-over there, use the airline that stops in Hawaii and also have a stopover there. This means that you have small hops and are not crampted up in the airlines for 36Hours!!! ( how you did that from Toronto is beyond me)<BR>Don't blame a country because getting there was made difficult. Use your head and perhaps learn to ask someone if their legs are interfering with your movements, to move them. Don't ask the Stewards to do that for you, most people are accommodating when you ask nicely.

Susan

Liz, I certainly am not blaming a country for the problems we had getting to Australia and I apologize if that's how it came across. (However I have re-read my note and don't see that I did blame Australia! I am not that stupid! Nor do I appreciate your advice that I use my head - was that an attempt to be well meaning or were you lecturing?) <BR><BR>There were a lot of problems on the flight we took. First of all, duplicate boarding passes had been issued, so even if we had checked the internet, we wouldn't have known there was a problem. Secondly, before we took off, a passenger was ill and he and his luggage had to be removed from the plane. Then there were a/c problems on the plane, so after a couple of hours we were all removed from the plane. The passengers were all told that we would be flown on to Hawaii as soon as the plane could be sent. Then we were told that we couldn't go to Hawaii because we'd have already missed our connecting flight and some of the passengers didn't have visas for the U.S. (assume they weren't Canadians). Finally we were sent off to a hotel in the middle of the night. Next day we were flown to Vancouver where we had about 6 hours to wait for our flight to Honolulu. As I said, we finally got to Sydney 24 hours late. <BR><BR>There was a large group of people in the same situation. One fellow was flying home to his mother's funeral, another was going to a wedding. There were a lot of unhappy people on that flight. Canadian Air gave us 3000 ff miles when we complained. <BR><BR>I have in fact travelled abroad fairly extensively. Your advice re using the internet is a good one, Liz, however, in 1996, I didn't own one, and I don't think that the same kind of information was so readily accessible. <BR><BR>Bottom line - I'm still dreading the flight to Australia. Note Liz - I didn't see I was dreading Australia!

liz

No Susan I didn't want that to sound like a lecture - we sometimes say "use your head" in a different way from Canadians which is hard to explain in the way it is meant to mean to others but should be taken as meaning " out-think your rivals" well that is the closest I can come up with anyway. <BR>Yes you had a horror flight which reminded me of a time I was leaving London bound for Australia at 10AM supposedly - well to start the IRA blew up the aircondition at the terminal, that made everything chaotic because there was no load speaker system, we were all transfered to all sorts of different flights and mine was one that left 10 hours late and went via Iceland - The Northwest Territories and into LA - because we were late there we were transferred to the next days flight and so on arrival in Melbourne ( I was meant to go to Sydney but there was a strike there) I had been travelling or waiting to travel for 59 hours - all with 3 little children! I learnt pretty quickly how to get myself an extra inch of space. No computers either then. <BR>I always try to go from one place to another a different way from the last time. I know that Air Pacific flies from Canada to Australia and that would make for a nice run with a stopover in Fiji for you. 9 hr or so flight from Vancouver to F and although that is boring it is not as bad as from LA - Syd if you are not able to sleep well on flights. From F to Aust. then is about 4 hours which is not really much more than lunch and a movie. Another option is LA - Tahiti - Sydney with Air NZ, I think, and again this gives you an interesting stopover. By doing this you can look forward to your stop-over and dwell less on the boring aspects of air travel. Failing this then do as I have done and resort to a very nice sparkling white and a sleeping tablet ( although the latter is not recommended by the health travel people) it has helped me out on more than one occasion.