Day 1 -- Australia and Singapore Trip

06/29/2018 Friday

Itinerary:

• Flight to Hamilton Island, Australia

We booked the late Friday night flight so that we don't waste any day for our vacation. Right after work, we left for the airport and had dinner there before taking the flight. With the 14 hours flight and time difference, we will be arriving in Australia 2 days later on July 1 (Sunday).

It's our first time taking Qantas Airline and the first segment of the flight is to Sydney with a connecting flight from Sydney to Hamilton Island which is in the Great Barrier Reef.

Our experience with Qantas Airline is ok, the plane is a little old and seats were tight. We also paid extra so that we can pre-select seats. I am not sure if it's worth the money to pre-select seats but I just didn't want to run into issues where I had to sit away from my husband. It cost $60 extra per person round trip for the pre-select seats.

We also pre-ordered our meal but it looks like they didn't know about it, so we just picked the meal on the spot.

After a nearly 14 hours flight, we finally reached Sydney. We had to take a shuttle to transfer from the international terminal to domestic terminal. It's good to always have at least 2-3 hours connecting time in case the first flight is delayed.

It was early morning around 6am when we reached Sydney, so after checking in our luggage again for the domestic flight to Hamilton Island, we had breakfast and exchanged some money.

Soon after breakfast, we started boarding for the flight to Hamilton Island.