Sunday, October 14, 2018 – I arrived at Canberra airport and bid farewell to my family as I was dropped off at the departures wing, laden with a light assortment of luggage and ready for a long journey.  The destination: Dallas, Texas in the United States, kicking off the first week of a series of weeks of training in the US as part of the Raytheon Certified Architects Program (CAP).  With the exception of some web based content, and an exemption from the second week (I’m already TOGAF certified) all of the training is instructor-led out of Richmond, Texas.  I’ll have two more trips early next year.  I am travelling with two colleagues from work, Will (Brisbane) and Peter (also from Canberra).

Per company policy regarding long flights, I was booked Business class from Sydney to Dallas direct (a 15.5 hour direct flight) and would be travelling via the now rather dated Airbus A380 – by comparison to the newer Boeing 787 Dreamliner.  Regardless, despite the nature of this site and all my years travelling, I’ve never actually flown business class before!  There was the time Toni and I upgraded to Business class between Shanghai and Amsterdam, but that’s a long and disappointing story with a long rant directed at KLM for sitting on processing the appropriate refund for weeks.

The A380 is the world’s largest passenger airliner with a wingspan of 80 meters and length of 73 meters.  A double decker with business class occupying most of the upper deck, it’s a small town in terms of compliment with well over 300 passengers catered for, plus crew.  The Qantas configuration has the Skybed for business, and they stack fairly economically into the appropriate class cabin.

The big feature is full 180’ recline to a flat position, making sleep almost too easy.  There’s also a built-in massage feature, a bottle compartment and a flip out light.  The seat can be manually adjusted to many positions, and the frame features a pop up LCD screen for entertainment, and a fold out table for meals.  There’s plenty of space between the foot support and the Skybed in front, and reasonably ample storage.  I was unfortunately seated in the shittiest seat, adjacent to the bathroom in 22B which wasn’t as bad as I expected, but I did endure nasty smells for the balance of the outbound flight.  I was also incredibly hot, with sweats, which I was unable to attribute to anything specific (return flight makes me think it was environmental).

Now, with regard to business class seat selection – there’s some factors that impact where you get allocated, and it doesn’t happen at the time of check in.

1. Tickets are seat (roughly) allocated when they are purchased
2. Some seats are withheld for planning purposes/etc
3. Seat preference (per #1) is decided by Frequent Flier membership tier (i.e. from platinum down)
4. Within 24h of a flight, seat changes fall under “airport control” which means changes can’t be made online or over the phone (I assume this is for Intl only, as I have changed seats through the app on domestic flights plenty of times up to boarding time)
5. So basically, I had a crap seat by default because I booked a bit late (2 weeks prior) and was bronze membership at the time
6. Only the airport can change it (usually if there’s no shows, late check ins etc.)
7. Lesson = membership has its benefits, or, buy tickets early

As the Dallas flight was full (for Business), no seat change was possible.

The meals were exceptionally better than the Economy class meals, and access to the Business lounge was useful, but not particularly overwhelming.  I feel Qantas could have put a little bit more effort into making the lounge a bit more attractive, but it still beats the hell out of Economy options (none).  I managed to get about 6 hours sleep, broken by watching a film for two hours in between. 

I was provided a change of clothes for sleeping purposes, this meant I arrived in Dallas dressed in passable attire, although at the time I wasn’t sure whether to assign blame for the constant heat I was feeling to them or not (no issue on return trip).

The in-flight system featured a pretty cool external camera, although it was black for most of the trip, except a couple of hours from landing.

One criticism I have, is that they kept the cabin dark until about an hour or so from landing (at midday) in Dallas.   I had woken at 8 AM Dallas time, to avoid jet lag, and the cabin being in night mode for such a duration made it challenging.

Dallas, Texas

Dallas Forth Worth – according to this website, DFW is the 12th largest airport in the world (airports I’ve visited are listed in bold): 

As you can see from the names in bold, I’ve visited more than half of the world’s largest airports.  Dallas Forth Worth seemed to be a lot larger than most of the others I’ve visited.  Customs was quite straightforward, and baggage collection was a breeze – so professional and efficient – so myself and my two colleagues were on hour way to the hire car collection before long.

We drove to the hotel (Hyatt Regency North Dallas) navigating the tricky and confusing concrete confection known as freeways with Apple Maps failing (so I had to install Google Maps once we made it to the hotel).  Peter decided to stay at the hotel, so Will and I got an Uber to AT&T stadium to use the General Admission electronic tickets I’d booked earlier in the week to watch the Dallas Cowboys take on the Jacksonville Jaguars.

The stadium is a modern day marvel; it is located within a sort of entertainment precinct, sharing an area with the nearby Texas Rangers baseball park and a Six Flags amusement park in Arlington, Texas.  After passing security screening, we made our way to the front concourse with a mass of other football fans.  It took a while to get orientated as the stadium is massive.  We couldn’t get a good vantage point for the first or second quarters of the game, but after Will found on tap beer, we were at least sorted on that front.  By halftime we managed to get a standing location right above the endzone, after having scaled four storeys of increasingly worrying distance from viewpoint to the field.  We were at the very top at once point where we found a manner of sponsorship layouts and even stacked Ford cars on display.

As we entered the fourth quarter, with the Cowboys comfortably ahead, we walked the remainder of the concourse level (blocked at halfway by our ticket type), and walked past numerous concession stands, the Cowboys Pro Shop and thousands of fans making an early exit.  The noise from the crowd was deafening at times, something not registered when watching games by TV.  There was also a mini zeppelin hovering over the crowd taking footage.  The jumbotrons in the centre of the stadium are insanely huge, I have no reference for scale.

When we left the stadium, it was still light and not raining but to avoid the crowds, we walked a mile or so to a sports bar called Humperdinks Brewpub for dinner and drinks and to let the crowd dissipate.  We met two guys from Kansas City on the way, and they told us of their stadium tour the day before.  The sports bar/restaurant was opposite the six flags rollercoaster park, and in a rather convenient location.  I ordered a rib eye steak and beer as Will and I attacked our first dinner in Texas.  When we were ready to leave, it was dark and raining quite heavily.  The Uber we booked was a no show and there was some issue in getting a new fare with Will’s phone at 1% battery.

Luckily, we managed a second Uber, with a driver from Rwanda.  He got us back to Richardson safely, and I had enough time to Skype back to Australia before saying good night and getting into my first bit of rest in many, many hours…  Day one of training was to kick off the nest day.