On Saturday afternoon we’d both received a Qantas notification that our flight had been delayed to 11pm (from 10:20). Just after we walked into the room we got another notification telling us the flight was now departing at 10:25. I checked the app and it actually showed 1am, but the booking on the Qantas website showed 10:25. After some ‘conversation’ we decided to go out to the airport and would be either ridiculously early, or would just make the flight.
No traffic so it took less than 20 minutes out to the airport. Al looked up at the board and it said QF74 10:25 on time departure. He started to run down the terminal to Qantas check-in. I walked and said if we miss it they can sort it out.
Not a soul checking in so we’d either missed it, or we were actually really early.
I asked the agent what time 74 was leaving. Was it 10:25 or 1am and he said both! He was right. There were two QF74s leaving San Francisco. He checked our booking and we were on the second. It was just past 9 meaning we were four hours early. I’d imagine that message from Qantas didn’t only confuse us.
Security was a shambles. The single priority lane, not that we needed it, was going nowhere but one of the officers was onto it and took people (singles and couples) out of the line and put them (us) into much shorter general queues.
We were through in under 10 minutes and sat in the very crowded Cathay Pacific lounge less than 30 minutes after arriving at the airport.
Why two flights? Friday night’s 74 had been hit by a catering truck resulting in it being cancelled. Friday’s passengers were moved onto Saturday night’s flight and Saturday’s passengers to Sunday where two planes would be ready to fly back to Sydney. Some not very happy people in that lounge.
QF74A was delayed a bit but eventually they all went off to the gate and flew off home. QF74B was not so lucky and a series of announcements pushed departure out, and out. Eventually they announced the lounge was closing and we all traipsed down to the gate where the rest of the disgruntled and very tired passengers were waiting.
At 2ish (I think) they announced boarding. The captain apologised profusely for our late departure while also letting us know we were on the repaired plane. We were pushed back from the gate at 2:45.
Then we sat on the apron and spooled the engines up. They spooled, and spooled, and spooled. Maybe they were checking to make sure the repaired cowling didn’t fly off.
We taxied and then we sat there again as the engines were gradually powered up. It was very weird.
I’m pretty sure it was after 3:15 when we finally left the ground.
People were tired so dinner service was a bit rushed. I think everyone just wanted to sleep. We tried to put sleep off for as long as possible to try to get our clocks aligned but the battle was lost very soon after dinner was cleared away.
wrong menus loaded for the flight.FA updated to let s know what we couldn't have
We both had a few solid hours of sleep. I woke, worked on photos for a bit, then got another couple of hours.
Al always orders breakfast then regrets it the moment he’s finished eating it. This time he ordered a very light breakfast of fruit and yoghurt and wanted more. Looking longingly at my nearly very good open omelette with chorizo got him just a taste of dry chorizo.
We landed at 9:50am, a little later than our scheduled 6:05.
Prior to landing the Customer Service Manager had gone through a very long list of new flights for all of us who had missed our original connections. We were flying on separate bookings, Al was points and mine was paid for, but the bookings had been linked. This might be why we found ourselves on a flight that didn’t leave Sydney until 2pm when other people were on the 12 and 1 flight. Our original flight was 8:30am.
our second and last walk down the steps
My passport is clearly stuffed. Yet again it didn’t read in the self-service machine and I had to go to a counter. The line was short so it hardly mattered.
Our bags came out close together then straight through customs and over to the domestic lounge within 30 minutes of landing.
Our trusty 744 off to get checked again after the San Francisco accident and repair
QF530 left early and landed even earlier and by 4pm we were home and I just wanted to turn around and go again.
It was an amazing holiday centred around an amazing gift of an apartment in NYC for 10 days from an amazingly generous friend. To them we say thank you, thank you.
