Flying Emirates
 

Has anyone flown with Emirates to London recently? My son has chosen to fly with them in June and I am interested in any comments whether good or bad!

I have flown Emirates from Melbourne to Rome and return and more recently to Paris and return. They are a good airline with convenient departure times from Australia. Their planes keep to schedule and the service is good. They also give you many European options from Dubai, a place worthy of a stopover. Having said that I would not suggest their seats are any more comfortable than Qantas or any other airline, unless your son is flying Business Class!

Thanks for the information DownUnder - he is certainly not flying Business - and yes the timing of the various flights had a lot to do with his decision.

I have not flown Emirates myself prue but several people I know have and they all speak highly of them. I think they are cheaper than QANTAS as well.

I just got a report back from my partner who flew Emirates Sydney to Manchester. His main point of comparison was Qantas as we are both fed up with their frequent flyer program, not to mention the current sell-out.

Anyway, he reports the flight was perfectly on time, the food was better, the service was better and the entertainment was better than Qantas. Definately a lot cheaper, and the FF program is free to join.

Susan - Thank you for the positive update on Emirates - I will pass the information on to my son - and he will say 'I told you Mum' since I was the one who was a bit leery!!! Will pass on his experiences with them after his trip.

Anyone want to buy a ticket from LGW to Perth via Dubai for a month from June to July? It's on Emirates! Haha. I ended up coming back to America, and had to book a ticket from the US to Perth, so now I have a ticket they won't refund me for, and that I can't use. I'm not giving them the consideration of cancelling if they won't give me any sort of refund!

This link will get you many comments.

www.airlinequality.com/Forum/emrts.htm

The main thing, is if you fly on their Boeing 777's, the seating is ten across instead of nine. (3x4x3) How do they do this? Narrow isle and narrow seats. But the entertainment is considered first rate.

(Tell you son to loose 100 pounds before he gets on the plane and he might not notice the narrow seats.)

Wally, Thank you for that Emirates link it was very interesting - unfortunately for him my son is quite a big man - so he may need a 2 week weight loss programme before he leaves!!

As Wally has said, on the 777 it is 3x3x3 ( when every airline I have flown on with 777 has 9 across and not 10 ), but check the aircraft, if it's an A-340 or 330 then same as others, 2x4x2 on those are fine.
Take a look at Etihad also as they are now flying ( or about to start ) to Sydney, though Emirates go into Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth and have a large number of flights. Singapore Airlines have something around 10 flights 'per day' from Singapore to Australia and go to all those Emirates have, plus also Adelaide.

Sorry typo, on 777 is 3 x 4 x 3 which equals 10 across instead of the normal 9 across on 777's.

Just for information - my son has just returned from his trip to London flying Emirates - and was very happy with all aspects of the airline - especially the return trip when he scored an Emergency Row seat.
Service and food were good and they were spot on time on each leg.

Prue, we have flown with Emirates for the past 3 trips to London, and we find them excellent, better than Thai, Malaysian, etc. Food & drinks seem to be better, staff very polite & helpful (pity some of the passengers couldn't be polite). We always thanks cabin staff as we alight, for looking after us, we get great smiles & thank you, pity a lot of other passengers couldn't do likewise.
We flew to London Gatwick last time, a bit cheaper than Heathrow, something to do with airline taxes etc. From Gatwick, you can get Gatwick Express train into London, but I opt for the normal train from Gatwick Airport to London Bridge.
If your son decides on a stop over, he will find Dubai a most interesting city, well worth a couple of days. We enjoyed Dubai. Singapore is another possible stop over, whilst they refuel.
Get your son to join "Skywards" F/Flyer program, you can do this over the internet, and then show his card prior to departure in Australia. The program has given us a few trips to New Zealand.
On our last trip to London, cabin crew told us that a female pilot was doing the landing at Gatwick. Apparently, the first Emirates female pilot.
A lot of Emirate pilots are Australian.
Its quite amazing the different languages the cabin crew can speak....one announcement by a male cabin crew member said, " We speak english, but also Australian"..it brought a few smiles to some passengers.

Tropo,
As stated in my post my son is home again - sadly, he had no time to stop over anywhere as was only going to take part in a friends wedding and was leaving his wife and baby at home - not to mention many hectares of crop still to be sown!
He did say he thought the arrival times in both London and Sydney were great as they seemed to miss the very busy periods and there were no queues at all in either airport.

Sorry Prue, when I read your question about Emirates, I immediately got excited, and just wanted to let you know that they are a good airline, so I went immediately to a reply, without reading all the replies. Your son was right about arrival times, especially in London, we arrived at Heathrow, walked straight into Customs..NO queues, no passengers from other airlines waiting in the cattle grid.