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Hi all,
By popular demand, I shall hereby start the trip report(s) of the A380 inaugural.
The evening before, Iangoodwin had made arrangements for a meating and so Luke, SteveTas, myself and some others gathered at the Swissotel The Stamford in Singapore to meet each other F2F for the first time over some Singapore Slings.
Had just arrived from FRA on SQ325 (delayed bec of heavy winds at FRA resulting in only 2 runways out of 3 being available) and because of the early flight the next morning we didn't make it late.
We agreed to meet the next morning in the lobby at 4.30 am in order to catch a cab to the Airport.
During the night I got 5 phonecalls from newspapers and radiostations back in my home country asking for coverage/interviews of the flight.This resulted in me only sleeping for more or less an hour...
Anyway, it was soon enough "morning" and time to head down to meet the others. Upon entering the lobby, I noticed a lot of people were cheching out as well. It proved to be members of the press who had been invited by SQ to be on the first flight.
A guy in a suit approached me, said good morning, introduced himself as the PR manager of SQ in the UK and said that I could go to the table to the left to pick up my presskit and my ticket for the flight.
I explained him that I was in fact a paying passenger (it's always funny to tell someone you "won" an auction) but that I was interested in the presskit
He told me that those unfortunately were reserved for members of the press and he wished me a pleasant flight.
Soon enough Iangoodwin showed up (Luke and SteveTas were already there) and we were about to go and call for a cab when we realized that the special SQ bus for the press was already standing outside.
I went up to the SQ chap again and asked if we could go with them. He said to check with the lady at the presskittable and so I did.
The lady was very friendly and said: "sure, hop on, guys!" (she later on even offered us some water or juice on the way to the airport).
We were soon at the airport where people had already started checking-in.
Everybody was full of enthousiasm and the press was everywhere, taking interviews, filming and taking photographs.
After we were issued our boarding passes, we were invited to stand in front of a wall full of "first to fly A380" logo's where pics were taken and our addresses checked. This should be for a special stampsheet to be sent out to our home soon.
After that, we went through immigration and to the gate holding area F31 for security check and the breakfast buffet.
The room soon filled up with people and becam quite packed in the end. Pics were taken, some speeches and cheques donated to the charities benefiting from the auction.
Soon it was time for boarding and first Suites, Business Class and PPS members were called, followed by Economy passengers in zones.
3 aerobridges were in use.
Upon boarding, everybody started taking pics and checking out the whole interior of the aircraft.
In our seat, there was a pillow, a blanket and a goodie bag (cfr pics of Derek) and in the seat pocket, there was a special version of the KrisWorld magazine (cfr my pics).
Was assigned an aisle seat (no possibility for seat requests in advace or at check-in), with a fellow passenger next to me and nobody in the window seat. The window seat didn't have a goodie bag either!
It proved that seat would remain empty and my seatmate asked me if I would like to sit by the window since he preferred sitting by the aisle anyway... Needless to say I almost jumped over him to the window seat. A great thank you to him for letting me sit by the window
By popular demand, I shall hereby start the trip report(s) of the A380 inaugural.
The evening before, Iangoodwin had made arrangements for a meating and so Luke, SteveTas, myself and some others gathered at the Swissotel The Stamford in Singapore to meet each other F2F for the first time over some Singapore Slings.
Had just arrived from FRA on SQ325 (delayed bec of heavy winds at FRA resulting in only 2 runways out of 3 being available) and because of the early flight the next morning we didn't make it late.
We agreed to meet the next morning in the lobby at 4.30 am in order to catch a cab to the Airport.
During the night I got 5 phonecalls from newspapers and radiostations back in my home country asking for coverage/interviews of the flight.This resulted in me only sleeping for more or less an hour...
Anyway, it was soon enough "morning" and time to head down to meet the others. Upon entering the lobby, I noticed a lot of people were cheching out as well. It proved to be members of the press who had been invited by SQ to be on the first flight.
A guy in a suit approached me, said good morning, introduced himself as the PR manager of SQ in the UK and said that I could go to the table to the left to pick up my presskit and my ticket for the flight.
I explained him that I was in fact a paying passenger (it's always funny to tell someone you "won" an auction) but that I was interested in the presskit
He told me that those unfortunately were reserved for members of the press and he wished me a pleasant flight.
Soon enough Iangoodwin showed up (Luke and SteveTas were already there) and we were about to go and call for a cab when we realized that the special SQ bus for the press was already standing outside.
I went up to the SQ chap again and asked if we could go with them. He said to check with the lady at the presskittable and so I did.
The lady was very friendly and said: "sure, hop on, guys!" (she later on even offered us some water or juice on the way to the airport).
We were soon at the airport where people had already started checking-in.
Everybody was full of enthousiasm and the press was everywhere, taking interviews, filming and taking photographs.
After we were issued our boarding passes, we were invited to stand in front of a wall full of "first to fly A380" logo's where pics were taken and our addresses checked. This should be for a special stampsheet to be sent out to our home soon.
After that, we went through immigration and to the gate holding area F31 for security check and the breakfast buffet.
The room soon filled up with people and becam quite packed in the end. Pics were taken, some speeches and cheques donated to the charities benefiting from the auction.
Soon it was time for boarding and first Suites, Business Class and PPS members were called, followed by Economy passengers in zones.
3 aerobridges were in use.
Upon boarding, everybody started taking pics and checking out the whole interior of the aircraft.
In our seat, there was a pillow, a blanket and a goodie bag (cfr pics of Derek) and in the seat pocket, there was a special version of the KrisWorld magazine (cfr my pics).
Was assigned an aisle seat (no possibility for seat requests in advace or at check-in), with a fellow passenger next to me and nobody in the window seat. The window seat didn't have a goodie bag either!
It proved that seat would remain empty and my seatmate asked me if I would like to sit by the window since he preferred sitting by the aisle anyway... Needless to say I almost jumped over him to the window seat. A great thank you to him for letting me sit by the window
), and a lot of envy on top of that. 
And I salute Isabelle Chu from Perth who made it as well (see SQ news release).
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