Flying triangles: the ease of the multi-trip plane ticket
Flight options abound with Emirates’ easy booking, says Stephen Scourfield.
Flying triangles opens up the world in new ways. Forget the “old days” when flying to one city and back from another felt like booking two single flights.
Booking multi destinations with Emirates doesn’t cost any more — it’s easy on its website to click “multi city”, and easy, too, to phone the Perth booking office (9324 7600), or turn up at Level 2, 181 St Georges Terrace, Perth.
And it’s not a bad game, with more than 120 destinations around the world, and all one stop from Perth. I have played it twice recently, flying ...
Perth through Dubai to Vienna, Austria. Home from Budapest in Hungary.
And I have just booked Perth through Dubai to Paris. Home from Birmingham, England.
None of us has to backtrack any more. Particularly for touring and river cruising holidays, perhaps particularly in Europe, multi-destination tickets have taken care of that.
The trip to Vienna and back from Budapest unfolds like this ... I have a two-night stopover in Dubai and catch the 10.10pm flight, scheduled for 11 hours and 10 minutes, but much shorter.
From Dubai to Vienna, in Austria, there is a scheduled flight time of five hours, 55 minutes on a Boeing 777-300ER. From Budapest, in Hungary, there’s a scheduled flight time of five hours and 30 minutes in an A330-200. On all flights, the service is very good.
The trip to Paris and home from Birmingham should unfold like this ...
While the A380 flies the night flight to Perth, I like to fly to Europe on the early flight, as a 6.05am departure gets you to Dubai at 1pm. The Paris flight leaves at 2.50pm for arrival at 8.05pm.
Hotel, bed, a good night’s sleep and at 8am the next day, I’ll be sitting in at some delightful little cafe with coffee and a croissant.
Happy days.
There are plenty of ways to get around Europe, of course. We’re just on a two-stop family trip, and we’ll be flying with Flybe, a British low-cost regional airline, between Charles De Gaulle Airport and Birmingham in one hour, 20 minutes for €181 ($263).
We are scheduled to leave Birmingham at 1.15pm and arrive in Dubai at half-past midnight, then join the Perth flight, which leaves at 2.55am and arrives at 5.35pm.
Home, snack, bed, a good night’s sleep and at 8am the next day, I’ll be sitting at my desk in the office.
Happy days.
At the time of booking, you can decide which seats you’d like allocated, and lock them in. Emirates has a lot of meal choices and you can lock those in too, at the time of booking.
And, for some of us, it’s nice to have some help with that, and know everything is just as you want it to be, all those months in the future.
Stephen Scourfield flew to Vienna and back from Budapest as a guest of Emirates.
