Why would anyone choose to sit on a flight in economy for 14 hours, only to board another flight for another 6 hours? They say that the journey is part of the experience – well maybe not in the case of 20 hours in Economy (cattle) class.
Australians love to travel, however whether you are going to North America or Europe, there is really no way of avoiding an epic flight or 2.
The 6-hour flight is okay, a few movies and you are there, so it’s the 14-hour flight that is the tough one. It’s difficult to believe that you could possibly be stuck on this flying tube for that long! But there are currently so many people travelling these long distances – so the journey must be worth it and it can be done! And I am one of the many who can’t just sleep for 9 hours on board.
I was contemplating this article on a long-haul flight from Dubai to Brisbane, a Boeing 777 with a flight time of around 14 hours.
Here is how I survived…..
Like any large or long-term goal, the best way to achieve it is to break it down into smaller, more palatable or manageable parts – in this case I used 3 distinct stages:
Stage 1 – the first 4 hours
By the time you board, settle in and select a movie the crew is likely to serve a meal of some sort – for us, even though we boarded in Dubai at 2:30am, within 2 hours the crew had already started to work on Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST) – so they served us breakfast. This was a bit strange as none of us had been to bed yet.
Let’s say that this stage takes the first 4 hours away by the time you watch some movies or TV shows – so it knocks the edge off, but still 10 hours to go…..
Stage 2 – The Twilight Zone
This is the toughest part for me – 4-5 hours in a semi-conscious state. This is the part where, if someone asks me after the flight if I slept at all – I can never give them a definitive response.
You turn the TV off or dim the brightness down low. You try to find a comfortable spot for the provided pillow, possibly by folding forward the flaps of the seat rest and jamming the pillow in there. You pull up the blanket and recline the seat just enough for comfort without p***ing off the person behind you. Ahh…its so cosy (just try to convince yourself). And that’s about the best you can do. Ideally you will drift off into a semi-sleep mode and wake up in 4-5 hours time. So when you ‘wake’ up, hopefully you turn on the flight tracker and you have made some progress.
It was sometime towards the end of this stage that the crew served lunch. I had to ask them which meal this was – and as for the drinks – is it a time for coffee, a coke or a beer?
Stage 3 – The Final Frontier
Okay – you are not exactly on final approach yet – there could still be 6 hours left – and a six-hour flight is still a long time. But, ideally the twilight zone has taken you past the halfway mark!
Thinking glass half-full, 6 hours left means a couple of movies and maybe some TV episodes, the last of the meal services (in our case dinner) and about an hour of descending through the clouds in to land.
You may start to get your second wind here. Whether it be you are getting near to your holiday destination or back home, you can finally start to look forward to walking on terra firma again. You start to remember all of the incredible experiences that you had on your trip and look forward to seeing everyone at home again.
Somehow, it feels like an achievement even though you were just sitting there!
It’s 14-20 hours of flying, but still only 20 hours.
I did it and it was worth it!
