Sydney to London on the A380

So, that A380. Marvellously quiet. Take offs and landings were very gentle and, in the dark, it was difficult to tell if you‘d actually landed or not.

The only dampener to the flight was that the Bloke and I were not alocated to be sat together. We seemed to be the only couple on the plane not sat together! Are Qantas trying to tell us something?!!!

It was irritating - on check-in the woman told us that it was because we’d checked in later than everyone else. This was at three hours before take-off! We managed to get shuffled around so we were at least sitting the same area with the Bloke sat behind me and me on an exit-row. In the middle lot of seating. I was talking to the couple beside me and they checked in one hour after us and still managed to get seated together. Hmmmm.

My theory behind the seating arrangements is that we don’t have as many frequent flyer points as others, therefore are the lowest priority when it comes to seating. The stewards on the flight said that because the airbus has a 2-3-2 seating configuration in premium economy in a small cabin of about 30 seats, it is difficult to seat couples.

On the second leg of the journey, Singapore to London, we arranged with another passenger to swap seats and we ended up sat together in a window and aisle seat. So humans triumph over technology yet again!

Premium economy is well worth the money. Everyone’s friendly because no one is squashed. It’s very civilised. And the interior, despite us being located behind the engines is whisper quiet. You're also one of the first to board the plane and check in is done via the business counter, so no long queues.

We managed to get 5 hours on-and-off sleep on the Singapore to London leg, so that's helped with the jetlag somewhat.