From Melbourne to Madrid

Once in a while we have probably all had one of those "plane flights from hell". You all know the type. It's the type of flight that gets off to the wrong start by being delayed multiple times, while you are sitting crammed onto a metal seat on the departure lounge. It's the type of flight where you find that the only set available was in the middle of the central row, where there is not a single empty seat on the entire plane and your fellow travellers on other side immediately take sole ownership of the respective "arm rests", leaving you no option but to try to cram your elbows into your own rib cage.To make matters even worse the oaf sitting in front of immediately reclines their seat to take away the remaining 3 cm of personal space that was left to you. And when the sad looking airline lunch finally arrives, the bun promptly jumps from the tray and disappears somewhere down into the dark space under the seat in front of you, never to be seen again for the duration of the flight. The real irony is that the little bread roll was the part of the lunch that, for some reason, you had been most looking forward to.

Fortunately for the four of us that were departing on the early morning Emirates from from Melbourne to Dubai, that was not our experience at all. Apart from the fact that someone in the Emirates hierarchy had thought it was a good idea for a flight to leave at 5 am in the morning, the rest of the story was about as good as an economy flight from Melbourne to Europe can ever become.

After the long wait at the airport we entered the huge A380 right on time. Allan and I had chosen to pay a little extra for exit row seats, hoping that our knee caps would not get fractured before our Camino walks had even begun. It was worth the extra few dollars.

We both made ourselves comfortable, stretching out our legs as far as we could. It was almost heaven in a biscuit. When we looked around the vast cavern of the plane's interior, we were very surprised to see that there were empty seats everywhere. The plane was probably only 50% full, possibly even less. The story got better and better. I started to think that I had dozed off in the waiting lounge and would soon awake to the real horror. But it never happened.

There is no gilding the fact that a 14 hour flight to Dubai is always going to be a LONG time, however this was almost certainly the best long haul economy flight I have ever had. I even managed to watch a couple of movies, listen to part of a talking book and get a few moments of sleep along the way. It was also such a delight to be able to stand up and walk around the plane any time I felt like it. There was also NEVER a queue at the toilet. All flights should be like this, even the hostesses were friendly and chatty.

After a short 90 minute transit at Dubai (it was over 40C outside - but then that was probably a cold day by their standards) we were ushered into another huge A380 for the second leg from Dubai to Madrid. If the first plane was only partially full, then this one was absolutely deserted. There were only a few scattered heads poking above the seats when the announcement came to lock the doors. It never gets any better than this.

After take off the few passengers on board moved around to secure some personal space - 5 or 6 seats each would be about right. I flipped up a couple of arm rests, jammed a pile of pillows under my head and pretended that I was in business class. It worked, because I managed to quickly doze off into a restful couple of hours sleep. It was only when I awoke and discovered that the pillows had slipped out, that I realised that the back of my head had been permanently imprinted with the shape of the armrest.

The entire flight experience was so wonderful that I have now been spoilt for all future flights to Europe. We arrived at Madrid, right on time at 8 pm. The sun was just hitting the horizon and we were about to see the wonderful end of a long day.

It's always a relief when you see your own luggage on the carousal and you know that you will not have to wear the same clothes for the next six weeks. We were soon out of the airport and at the taxi stand. I had previously done my homework and knew that a genuine taxi would charge exactly 30 Euro for the trip to the centre of Madrid. This is good value when we were able to fit three people in the same taxi.

I exchanged my three words of fluent Spanish with the driver and we were soon speeding on our way through the (now dark) streets. It was the first time any of us had been to Spain, but the passing kaleidoscope of illuminated buildings looked like any one of a hundred other cities that I had been similarly sped through.

About 20 minutes later we arrived at our hotel and were checked in. My room is about 2 metres wide by 7 metres long and the sole window is tiny. But it was clean, the air conditioner worked and the bed was comfortable. Good night everyone.Read more