Review of Air New Zealand flight from Auckland to Queenstown in Economy

Introduction

Hello and welcome to the 2nd flight review in this series taking us down to beautiful New Zealand. After a short stay in Auckland, we continued on to the amazing South Island, where we would spend most of the week. 

In this review we'll cover Air New Zealand's domestic flight experience. Tickets were reserved on the Air New Zealand app, which I found to be pretty functional and easy to use. Despite very little airline competition on domestic routes, with Air New Zealand and Jetstar forming a sort of duopoly, I found the prices to be reasonable coming is at around $150 round-trip per person for the basic option with seat assignments and a 7 Kg carry-on bag. 

Air New Zealand only offer Economy on domestic services so there was no Business class option. 

Routing

Flights in this series

Pre-flight & Check-in

As we'd checked in on the Air New Zealand app 24h ahead and only had carry-on, we only arrived at the airport about an hour before the flight. The Auckland domestic terminal is rather small with only about 8 or 9 gates and no Priority Pass lounges, so there was no point in arriving too early. There are two restaurants that accept Priority Pass; however, they are both landside. 

Security was a breeze as there is no need to take any items out of cabin baggage and there were only a few people in the queue. It only took a few minutes to get through–it would have been even faster except that I unknowingly had a prohibited item in my bag! I'd brought a larger external power bank on this trip as we'd be travelling around the South Island in a camper van. Well, it turned out that my power bank was a bit over the authorised limit of 100Wh (or around 27,000mAh), so it was confiscated. Luckily I had another smaller power bank that was fine to go. I'd travelled several times with the larger one within the U.S. and never had an issue so I assumed it was a regulation specific to New Zealand, but it's actually a general worldwide rule. So word of warning, make sure your power banks are below 100Wh or 27,000mAh when flying!

Airside is quite small and a bit cramped if several flights are leaving around the same time. 

Another aircraft was pushing back from our gate as we arrived. 

A few minutes later, our plane arrived. I don't love getting up so early while on holiday, but look at those amazing sunrise colours!

Our aircraft taking us down to Queenstown is a 9 year old A320. Love the ANZ livery!

Boarding

Boarding began right on time. A notification popped up literally as they made the announcement beginning the boarding process. 

Boarding wasn't organised by either rows or zones–after priority boarding for Elites, all others were invited to queue up. 

Air New Zealand board and deplane from both the forward and aft doors to speed things up so passengers seated in rows 16-29 were led down to the tarmac level to board through the rear stairs.

Ah, there's nothing like the smell of jet fuel in the morning ✈️

Tarmac views with these beautiful sunrise colours–AvGeek heaven!

Air New Zealand's domestic fleet has very similar cabins to British Airways narrowbodies with the same Collins Aerospace Pinnacle seat model, though more basic without adjustable headrests or in-seat power. 

I love that Air New Zealand have a ton of detailed information on in-flight amenities and cabin layouts on their website. A very AvGeek-friendly airline!

It's the only airline I can think of that will give you precise seat pitch information down to the row and seat! 

Our seats in row 20 had a 78cm / 31" seat pitch, which is very decent for a short-haul configuration by today's standards (Note that some rows have 30" pitch and it is easily identifiable on these seat maps). In comparison, most European full service carriers have denser cabins with 29-30" seat pitch in Economy on short-haul configured narrowbodies–some even have 28" pitch, which was traditionally Low-cost carrier territory…alas, no more!

I could even cross my legs, which I can't even do in British Airways Club Europe (short-haul Business class)!

Seat pocket contents, include the safety card–the A320D designation is for the A320 in Domestic configuration

And there's an inflight magazine! Quite rare in this post-pandemic world. 

More fun AvGeek content

Lots of good information, including fleet details and route maps.

Not used to sitting this far back on a plane anymore 😅

The Flight

Doors were closed right on time and the safety video played on overhead drop-down screens during taxi to the departure runway. 

Off we go!

Scenic climb out of AKL

While there's no traditional IFE (seatback or streaming), there are fun trivia questions on the overhead monitors throughout the flight. 

There's also some informational content. 

A small snack is served shortly after takeoff with a choice of coffee, tea, or water. It's interesting that Air New Zealand don't offer a buy-on-board service at all. There should be enough time on the longer domestic flights over 1.5h, like this one. Since we hadn't eaten that morning, I would have likely bought something if there were an option. 

You don't really need IFE when you have such incredible landscapes out the window!

Cabin crew offered candies as we began the descent, thanking each passenger for choosing Air New Zealand along the way–a very nice touch!

The "Remarkables" Mountain range truly is remarkable. 

Lake Wakatipu in view on final descent 

Queenstown is in a very mountainous area nestled in the Southern Alps. We had to weave through valleys and around mountains on landing. The landscapes are just so impressive. 

We landed on time and arrived at the parking stand on schedule. 

The back half of the aircraft deplaned from the rear door. 

Welcome to Queenstown and the amazingly beautiful South Island!

We headed outside to catch the shuttle to get our camper van for the week and start our South Island adventure!