What was your first flight?

[Han]

Loving the thread and the stories!

My family used to love the vibes at Surfers Paradise way back some 20-15 years ago (and the theme parks). My parents would save up and bring us all from Malaysia once a couple of years. Funny enough, I don't remember any of my MH flights to Brisbane. I do remember being amazed at KLIA when it just opened, with its aerotrain and 'jungle'.

Interestingly, the first flight I remember was my first Australian domestic and first flight with QF from Brisbane as a 10yr old. While boarding, I stared at the logo on the tail and thought wow, Australia's airplanes even have a logo of it's kangaroo!. I also remembered how friendly the air stewardess was, and how excited we were when we all got a kids activity pack each, which included a pack of playing cards. Safe to say, us kids were occupied playing blackjack on the plane

 

[oobi doobi]

My and my wife’s first flight from memory, was a honeymoon gift from my parents for a trip to Singapore In 1973. An added bonus was to meet up with my brother based there in the Australian army. The plane was a Qantas Boeing 707 and started my wanderlust to this day.

ps. We are still married and travelling back to Singapore in Nov.

cheers

 

[mrsterryn]

Circa 1965ish. I think I had been put on the plane by mum and dad to go from Canberra to have holidays with my grandparents in Sydney. My most memorable part of that was I got a cute red litle plastic basket full of treats .
I think it was school holidays and mum and dad didn't have anyone to mind me . Dad was in the navy and mum must have had a job. It was a long time between drinks for the next one.

 

[Beano]

My first RPT jet flight was in 1977, a TAA B727 from CBR to MEL.

My biggest impression was being pushed back into seat by the acceleration during the takeoff roll.

I was in my first year of tertiary studies and had been on holidays with my family but had to get back early for start of term.

2000+ flights later, here I am.

My first experience of flying was similar with the push back in my seat on take-off. It was 1980 and a BAC 1-11 from Edinburgh to London Heathrow for a job interview which I didn't get. 6 months later same again but got the job. Smoking permitted but don't recall much issue then. Later on first international flight made sure I was well away from the smoking zone.

 

[Beano]

First flight was in 1977 or 1978. No memory of it as I was 3 at the time. We were flying from Melbourne to London via India

First real memory of a flight was flying to Germany with Lufthansa in 1989 back when smoking was still allowed on planes. Pretty yuck travelling in a lot of smoke!

And Lufthansa had smoking in left and right seats across the aisle so there was no escaping the smoke. Most airlines had front and back separation.

 

[danintas]

My first flight was in1965 as a 6 year old travelling from Launceston to Whitemark on Flinders Island (LST-FLS). The plane was an Ansett Fokker Friendship and I remember insisting that my dad ask the hostess where the parachutes were kept, and was horrified to learn that there weren't any!

 

[AisleSeat]

Pretty sure it was 1986, though I can't remember exactly if it was CPT-JNB-LHR or CPT-JNB-HKG on a SAA 747.

 

[Chief Wiggum]

From Kingscote, Kangaroo Island to Adelaide. When I was a wee tacker back in... probably 1980/81'ish.
I would have been 6-7 yo and have vague memories of what must have been a tiny little plane but it seemed like a rocket ship to me.
It was the end of a family holiday with another family we always went on holidays with.
We got the ship over to KI from Port Adelaide to ????. And it was a big ship/car ferry back then. No fastcat ferry like now from Cape Jervis. Took "the day" for the end-to-end trip.
At the end of the holiday the Mums decided "we're not doing the ship again" so they made the Dads take the cars back on the ship to Port Adelaide.
And they took us kids on our first-ever plane ride.
Wonderful adventure from simpler times.
Thanks Mum... and Dad

My first trip on a proper "big" jet plane was 1-2 years later from Adelaide to Auckland with the same other family.
Now THAT was like nothing else I had ever experienced.
The size of the aircraft. How it felt huge and small all at the same time.
I still remember the feeling of "what's happening.... ?!?! " when the engines ramped up for take off and we were pushed back in our seats.
And how quickly the ground disappeared and what a strange feeling that was.
We sat a few rows back from the smoking section and that wasn't fun.
No idea what aircraft it was back then or even the airline. Presume Qantas.
Thanks Mum... and Dad

 

[Beano]

You have to remember these early flights used turbojets, not turbofans, so the experiences, e.g noise, would have been different, not that I recall.

 

[wheelsup]

I was born in Brisbane and my first flight was the trip to Darwin as a babe in arms with my mother, to rejoin my father who was working there. It was 1951 and I guess the aircraft was a DC-3. The flight landed at a series of small towns along the way to refuel and take on or set down passengers. At Longreach, all the passengers and crew were taken by taxi into town for lunch at a hotel. I think the flight took all day to reach Darwin.

Flying then was a rarity, so many of my relatives - grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins - came to the old Brisbane Aerodrome, to see our very early morning departure. We arrived safely in Darwin.

I flew only occasionally until my first trip to Europe in 1979, via Singapore and Bahrain to LHR, in a Qantas B747. Such excitement! And my love of flying and travel has continued ever since.

Nice one @rginoz I was born in Brisbane too, but my first flight was from Darwin to Auckland via Sydney, around 1960, domestic leg with BOAC in a 707, then to AKL with TEAL. Felt pretty special boarding an international flight in DRW in the middle of the night, and getting the airline branded carry bags and junior flyer packs from both, and being allowed up the front to visit the pilots (Dad was in the DCA)

 

[OATEK]

My first flight was Sydney to Hobart in 1955, when dad took up a new job at the EZ Company. My first 'solo" flight was Hobart to Sydney and later on to Port Macquarie in 1958 as an 8 yo and unaccompanied. Hostesses (as they were known back then) looked after me. I don't recall all the details, but the 1958 flights involved Vickers Viscounts and DC3s, and at some time toing and froing Hobart-Sydney I also had some Lockheed Electra flights. Most Sydney - Hobart flights I took back in mid-fifties had a stop and often change of aircraft in Melbourne (MEB).

I can also add to this a visit to the coughpit, but during the flight (MEB-HBA). Mum's cousin was a pilot (I remember him as captain McRobbie) and when he saw her name on the passenger list we were invited up front for a look see.

 

[Spanner50]

As a new trainee tech in BNE with Dept of Civil Aviation in 1968, the entire group of us had never flown in an aircraft. To explain the main nav aids and concepts, we were taken up on a small 6 or 8 seat prop aircraft to see the pretty crude ILS. Truely amazing at the time. About a year later, I wangled my way onto, I think, a DC3, specially fitted out for Nav Aid testing. We did a couple of hours of Touch and Go landings and the excitement soon wore off. In 1975 I did my first international flight. An Aus Union of Students chartered Qantas 747 Sydney to KL. Some processing issue occurred in KL so the whole plane load of us did a sitdown protest in the airport - you couldn’t do that today!!!! Eventually we were on our next leg to Copenhagen on a Maresk chartered flight; tightest economy legroom ever.

 

[jukebox333]

December 1976, as a 9 year old, on an Air New Zealand DC10 SYD-CHC.

I remember being taken totally by surprise at the crazed angle the cabin shifted to as we rotated - despite seeing planes take off dozens of times, I guess young me had never translated seeing that to what it must look and feel like *inside* the cabin. As a curious footnote, almost 50 years on, I now do exactly that when I watch surfers, or skiers performing aerial tricks... I try and imagine what those maneuvers look like from their POV - and am in awe at how they can do it.

 

[Exkiap]

My first flight was in 1970 or 71, from London to Munich (iirc - I remember seeing many police with machine guns at the airport, increased security because of some attack?) There were hardly any passengers, I remember that. No video or music entertainment at all, either.

I remember that the in-flight snacks were actually just stored in a little compartment in each seat-back. I filched a couple of extra ones. I also remember falling asleep, and woke up upon landing with an horrendous pain in my ears because I hadn't equalised pressure.

I'm pretty sure that I didn't fly again until 1980, and that was from London to New York.

My first air adventure was as a 6 year old flying with my 10 yo sister Mount Magnet to Perth WA in an Avro Anson! what an adventure............

 

[bcworld]

Around about 1983...GLA - GRO...on a brand new British Airways (or some bucket and spade subsidiary) 757.

 

[Forg]

December 1976, as a 9 year old, on an Air New Zealand DC10 SYD-CHC.

I remember being taken totally by surprise at the crazed angle the cabin shifted to as we rotated - despite seeing planes take off dozens of times, I guess young me had never translated see that to what it must look and feel like *inside* the cabin.

You prolly thought you'd feel it inside the cabin, rather than everything being perfectly smooth & down still feeling like "down" while the outside world tilted at a whacky angle.

 

[rginoz]

Nice one @rginoz I was born in Brisbane too, but my first flight was from Darwin to Auckland via Sydney, around 1960, domestic leg with BOAC in a 707, then to AKL with TEAL. Felt pretty special boarding an international flight in DRW in the middle of the night, and getting the airline branded carry bags and junior flyer packs from both, and being allowed up the front to visit the pilots (Dad was in the DCA)

My Dad was with DCA too. People didn't go to Darwin by choice in the early 50s - they got sent there. Flying and Darwin have changed a lot since then, but I much prefer flying!

 

[Maca44]

My first flight was a school excursion in about 1958 on a DC-3, but was only a 3 hour flight from Williamtown (Newcastle) and back. I will never forget how much the plane shook when revving up to take off, and just lucky I was wearing my brown school shorts.

other memorable flights were a few years later when the travel bug hit; I always asked for the no-smoking section of the plane, but I suspect because of my age was usually seated in the row immediately before the smokers. It really made for an uncomfortable flights, and when the majority lit up, looked like a haze in the cabin.

 

[drron]

The first flight I remember would be an AFF classic in as much a great demonstration of why fly direct when you can connect. It was all on TAA in 1969. As soon as I finished my final exams I was off. The route = SYD-BNE-POM-LAE (the closed airport) -Rab-BUA-HIR.
I was on a student fare which was ridiculously cheap and I could upgrade to First Class for $10 a sector SYD-BNE-POM. Now being born on the same day as David Boon I figured I could easily consume $10s worth of beer. I was right.

It was an Electra SYD-BNE and a B727 BNE-POM.
From POM to HIR it was a DC3. I did break the flight spending a few days in Rabaul but got the same DC3 on the leg to HIR. I remember it's registration as on the first sector the pilot informed us we were flying in General Montgomery's aircraft. It was VH-SBW. It still exists sitting on a pole at POM. maybe @Bindibuys saw it.

 

[wombalano]

My first flight was in 1954 on a Qantas Flying Boat from Rose Bay, Sydney to Lord Howe Island. At the time there was no Runway of the Island so we had to land on the water, hence the Flying Boat. It was a very slow flying to the Island but on the return; we had a very strong tail-wind and broke the flight record.