Virgin adds/increases Cairns, Darwin, Townsville routes.

12am has got to better than 6am, unless you're a backpacker or in your 20's. I'm not sure what others do when arriving at 12am, but I am happy to go to a cheap hotel near the airport to sleep and proceed at a more civilised hour to the hotel where I ultimately want to stay. I guess though in Australia check-in times (10 am checkouts and 3pm checkins) make that more difficult than in Asia where they can be more like 12pm/2pm and even then more fluid.
even for a 12am arrival, rather than catch a cab to cheap airport hotel, maybe have ordinary sleep as cheap hotel beds may not be comfy. Then cab it to next hotel. Also many hotels allow 11am or even midday checkout if you ask nicely. I've always found this the case.

Easier IMO to just go direct to hotel of choice, saves extra cabs & finding your PJ's & toiletries at 1am then to pack'em again in morning.

6am flight arrival is just a shamozzle though, yep have to bein your 20's for that one.
 
  • Sydney-Darwin, with seasonal daily flights from July 14
  • Sydney-Townsville, with three flights a week from July 27
Looks like these have been postponed to August 9 and 10 respectively?
 
Last edited:
Our PER - CNS flight in September has thankfully been brought forward to the 1:45pm departure instead of the 5:45pm flight.

Hope Qld & WA is all good with COVID travel between the states by then.

Looking forward to VA service again, always a pleasure flying them even though it’s only ever going to be 737’s for quite some time.

Route now show on the websites map.
 

Attachments

  • 3D7A04F4-F2DF-4FA3-9A4C-7FDCF1C3D7E4.jpeg
    3D7A04F4-F2DF-4FA3-9A4C-7FDCF1C3D7E4.jpeg
    92.5 KB · Views: 18
  • Perth-Cairns, offering up to four weekly flights from July 26
  • Adelaide-Cairns, with up to four flights a week from August 10
Looks like these have been postponed to August 28 and 19 respectively?
 
Adelaide - Darwin and Adelaide - Launceston announced today as new routes opening soon.

Interesting they’ve elected Launceston over Hobart - potentially because Deathstar operates to Hobart?
 
Adelaide - Darwin and Adelaide - Launceston announced today as new routes opening soon.

Interesting they’ve elected Launceston over Hobart - potentially because Deathstar operates to Hobart?
I think there's going to be a lot of "Anywhere not MEL-SYD-BNE" to "Anywhere not MEL-SYD-BNE" flights announced by all airlines in the near future. They will all be looking for states with open borders or at least states that have open borders to a few other states to get some revenue.

This whole pandemic is providing an excellent example of the benefit of having diversification of crew bases as well, if for example you went for the economy of scale argument and had all your crew based in say MEL then you would have been stuffed for most of 2020, and now in 2021 if you have a crew base in say SYD you are not looking too good right now. I wouldn't be surprised to see airlines dispersing their crews around the country more widely as a result of this pandemic...
 
Doing BNE-MKY return (200 SC) and BNE-ADL (240 SC), both day returns with overnighter in home town and 4 hours in the nice new Adelaide lounge for $1110.00 all up no discount code as using travel bank.
 
Adelaide - Darwin and Adelaide - Launceston announced today as new routes opening soon.

Interesting they’ve elected Launceston over Hobart - potentially because Deathstar operates to Hobart?
It seems they’ve defiantly evaluated their proposition & gone for afternoon flights Darwin - Adelaide route compared to QF & JQ morning services.
Taking use of the new Adelaide lounge with a few more routes is a good opportunity.
 
  • Perth-Cairns, offering up to four weekly flights from July 26
  • Adelaide-Cairns, with up to four flights a week from August 10
  • Melbourne-Townsville, being three flights per week from August 17
Looks like this has been postponed to September 2 at the earliest...
 
Last edited:
Turn business expenses into Business Class! Process $10,000 through pay.com.au to score 20,000 bonus PayRewards Points and join 30k+ savvy business owners enjoying these benefits:

- Pay suppliers who don’t take Amex
- Max out credit card rewards—even on government payments
- Earn & Transfer PayRewards Points to 8+ top airline & hotel partners

AFF Supporters can remove this and all advertisements

Become an AFF member!

Join Australian Frequent Flyer (AFF) for free and unlock insider tips, exclusive deals, and global meetups with 65,000+ frequent flyers.

AFF members can also access our Frequent Flyer Training courses, and upgrade to Fast-track your way to expert traveller status and unlock even more exclusive discounts!

AFF forum abbreviations

Wondering about Y, J or any of the other abbreviations used on our forum?

Check out our guide to common AFF acronyms & abbreviations.
Back
Top