Review of Qantas flight Brisbane → Melbourne in Business

Hello Flight-Report #Avgeeks. After a brief but enjoyable visit to Cairns it was time to make the slow and multi-stop trip back to the US, the wrong way of course. Originally this trip had almost a week in Australia, Cairns and Brisbane being the choice cities. My return home was on Singapore and ANA in first class using a no longer available 125K point redemption, which was a grand steal. When I booked it a year out there was rumor the new A380 would fly the SYD-SIN route. Singapore flies 2 A380s between these cities. BOTH were available when I booked it. But I picked the wrong one, and by the time I realized it, the new A380 was not available.

So for months that gnawed at me. Then SQ started publishing routes for their new B787-10. Reward Flying wanted to fly that plane. And I found Malaysia A350 too. And I found a waitlist on the new SQ A380. And I found space on Cathay's A350-1K. So I blew up the trip and ultimately had tickets on all these aircrafts.

Proud of my accomplishment I became tired just looking at the travel I was facing.

So I blew it up again. However all these aircraft are booked for travel in the next few months, as well as some others (hint: QR Qsuites, QR A350-1K, SQ URL) And the good news is CX swapped out the A350-1K on my flight and MH had an aircraft swap as well.

And in the end I lucked into QF's 787 plus an incredible dose of first class to return home.

KLM ORD-AMS B747-400 Business Class - click to view
KLM AMS-CDG B737 Business Class - no report
Qatar CDG-DOH B777-300 Business Class / Qatar CDC Lounge - click to view
Qatar DOH-SYD A380 First Class / DOH Al Safwa First Class lounge = click to view
Qantas SYD-CNS 737-800 Business Class - click to view
Virgin Austrailia CNS-BNE 737-800 Business Class - click to view

Qantas BNE-MEL B787-9 Business Class - this report

Qantas MEL-SYD A300-2 Business Class / MEL 2nd day open Business Class Lounge - to come
Singapore Airlines SYD-SIN Suites Class / SYD Krisflyer First Class Lounge - to come
Singapore Airlines SIN-PEK First Class / SIN Private Room - to come
Lufthansa PEK-MUC First Class - to come
Lufthansa MUC-FRA A321 Business Class / MUC First Class Lounge - to come
Singapore Airlines FRA-JFK Suites Class - to come
JetBlue JFK-ORD E190 Economy Class - no report



After all the changes to the itinerary, when the dust settled I had a day in Brisbane before flying to Sydney for the journey back home. Okay, it’s a beautiful town so as they say, no worries. Then a month or two before my day in Brisbane, Qantas decided they’d fly their new 787-9 between Brisbane and Melbourne (no doubt for crew training) and opened up most of the cabin for reward redemptions as well. There were 2 flights, morning and or late afternoon. With no need to go to Melbourne, but a desire to see the inside of this plane, I choose the early one.

QF609 departed at 7AM. It was a 5 minute walk from the Brisbane ibis where I stayed to the domestic terminal before the sun was up.



At this time on a Saturday morning security was a breeze. Once airside, at the gate across from security sat QF609.



With plenty of time I decided to check out the Qantas lounge in BNE. Unlike US domestic policy, when you fly business class in Australia you have lounge access privileges.



Fairly typical and certainly empty at this time of the morning, I had other plans.



Priority Pass has two restaurants on the domestic side of BNE airport. Last year I had an incredible meal at Graze witch is at the far end of the Qantas concourse. For nostalgic purposes:



The other Priority Pass is Bar Roma. It’s in the main concourse that connects Qantas and Virgin Australia.


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Not in the mood for a full breakfast but unwilling to pass on a deal I ordered a coconut toast and coffee which was far below the Priorty Pass maximum of 36AUD. The young lady insisted I get something else. I loaded up on extra bottles of water.



Boarding commenced on time.



The finish of the Vantage XL pods looks smart inside this cabin.



My seat 3A along with the Bar Roma coffee I spilled. I think the fabric finish, as opposed to the faux leather on domestic A330s, looks better and is certainly more comfortable.



2A is an aisle hugging seat. You get less privacy with these, but more storage and a bigger side table.



You don’t have this cubicle with true window seats.



I prefer the window and there is a decent privacy partition with these seats that you don’t get with the aisle huggers.



Alternate rows with center seats apart from each other suffer from aisle exposure.



Center seats together have more privacy and are great for couples.



A view from 3A.



Can change even on a short flight.



This 787-9 has a generous 42 business class seats in two cabins. The front cabin has 30 seats while Seatguru marks only 4 green. These are window seats. Row one isn’t marked green probably because of the galley, but they’re a reasonable distance away so I don’t think the galley causes much disturbance.

The min-cabin is a compelling choice. However being over the wing you will get some engine noise. While the 787 is VERY quiet on take-off, I find is louder than the Airbus A350 at cruise altitude.



This is the reason row 5 window isn’t green. The window is misaligned, or actually you only get one instead of two. It’s a shame the designers didn’t arrange the cabin to place an aisle hugging seat here.



The crew gets a decent size galley.



And a peak up front.



Air nozzles!



There are no storage bins above the center seats in rows 1 and 2 to accommodate for the crew rest bunks.



Stock Boeing lavatories with a shaving mirror.


Time to go. My favorite photo of the trip.



Turns out it was a good choice taking this flight as Brisbane was facing a blustery rainy day.



The five shades of Boeing’s tinted windows. Looks like they’ve solved the issue of light entering with the darkest tint. It was black.



There is no floor storage under the ottoman.



The foot area is probably what I’d call adequate.



A few more features of the seat, including a nice sized meal tray as well as plenty of easily accessible power outlets.


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Qantas served breakfast on this flight.


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Finally the IFE which was upgraded from the A330 monitor. Content was good and clarity was fine without the windows tinted completely black.



The aircraft did not have wifi.

One of the major positives with an aircraft like the 787 is how high it can cruise. Granted not much fuel was needed for this flight, but how often to you fly at 43K feet?



For information on redemption prices for this flight as well as reward flying ratings, click this link