Yes, The Mole is on location in Europe…truly amazing and discover the very best way to get there.

The traditional kangaroo route to Europe from Australia or New Zealand via an Asian ports including Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore and Bangkok, has been the manner in which most Aussies and Kiwis have traditionally flown to Europe, with many having to backtrack into Europe to say Madrid, Athens or Rome, simply because the traditional carriers did not fly from Australia to those destinations and also simply because the national carriers of a heap of European countries that used to fly into Australia no longer do so – I am sure we remember, them , including Swissair, Austrian, Sabena, Lufthansa, Alitalia, etc, etc.  [Pictured above: an Emirates A340-500]

Virgin Atlantic and British Airways are the last European carriers to fly to Australia and they both fly to the nightmare airport of Europe – London’s Heathrow Airport!!

When The Mole was considering the most effective way to now fly to Europe, in particular to Manchester in the UK and then having taken the Eurostar and TGV from London to Marseilles, wanting to fly back from Venice, what we might call the new kangaroo carriers jumped off the page and in particular, reportedly the fastest growing airline in the world, Dubai based Emirates.

The reason is that Emirates now flies to over 100 destinations in 62 countries around the world, including in Europe, destinations such as, Manchester, Birmingham, Newcastle and Glasgow and of course London Heathrow in the UK, Paris and Nice in France, Rome, Milan and Venice in Italy, Athens in Greece, Istanbul in Turkey, Larnaca in Cyprus, Malta, Zurich in Switzerland, Vienna in Austria, Munich, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf and Hamburg in Germany and finally Moscow – an amazing selection of destinations offering Aussies and Kiwis the most eclectic mix of gateways from which to launch their European travels. [Pictured above: Emirates brand spanking new A380]

The most amazing thing about the history of this airline, that most peopel know relatively little about is that it only flew its first routes out of Dubai on 25th October 1985, with just two aircraft, a leased Boeing 737 and Airbus 300 B4, with today Emirates very keen to point out that the airline was established on an investment of $US10million from the Dubai Government and since then it has not received another penny of subsidies or grants, being self-sustaining, independent and highly profitable.  

Another misconception about Emirates is that Dubai’s economy is dependent on oil revenues, but that is thing of the past, with Dubai’s oil having practically run out, now accounting for only 6% of Dubai’s GDP.

Emirates also operates under Dubai’s open skies and accordingly open competition policy currently competing with more than 115 airlines flying in and out of Emirates’ home base of Dubai with no Government protection of any kind for Emirates. 

The Emirates Group which includes a mass of other operations including hotels and resorts, catering, etc, announced an amazing and record net profit of US$ 942 million for the financial year which ended 31st March 2007, a 28.8% increase in profits on the previous year.

Emirates currently has 113 aircraft with nearly 800 Emirates flights departing Dubai each week.  They also reprtedly have 245 new aircraft on order and by 2013 anticipate carrying some 35 million passengers.

So, what was the flight from Sydney to Dubai and on to Manchester with Emirates like and would I recommend it?

The Sydney to Dubai section took 15 hrs on an A340 500 making the longer sector of the flight the first and also overnight, which I liked, followed by the 8 hrs to Manchester, also overnight, arriving mid morning in Manchester. 

[Pictured right: Emirates First Class section – FYI, that’s not The Mole!]

Traditionally on the kangaroo route the short sector is first and then the long sector, which always seemed to mess me up, but hey that might just be me!

I found that this way around was very refreshing and less tiring, a meal and good snooze straight away after leaving Sydney in the evening, a quick stopover in Dubai and then a shorter leg into Manchester.  Pretty good I thought, with little jet lag and straight into the Mole on location work in Chester and Cheshire.

The economy seats on the A430 were very comfortable, although like all airlines in economy today there is rather a domino effect with once someone ahead of you reclines their seat everyone else seems to have to do it.  I think that is more a symptom of the Airbus rather than Emirates as that does not seem to be so much of an issue on the Boeing 777 we flew on from Dubai to Manchester, which I think offered more room.

The food was excellent and the ICE entertainment system unbelievable with over 600 channels of high quality video, movies and sound to choose from. 

The crew were superb and consistent, a gripe I have with other airlines and I was surprised to see how multilingual and international they were, including a number of Aussies and Kiwis, Brits, South Africans, Spaniards, Thai, etc, etc. 

[Pictured right: Emirates happy, smiling crew] – now isn’t that a lesson for others we will not mention…and it was consistent on every Emirates flight we went on!]

Nothing was too much trouble for them and all calls were answered very promptly indeed with regular water runs and bottles of water available at any time.

The transfer in Dubai was a smooth as silk and very quick indeed, although the airport in Dubai is rather crowded and under pressure while they await the imminent opening of the new terminal.

So no gripes at all with Emirates, in fact full marks for a great flight to the UK and also saving me having to go through Heathrow!  Would I recommend flying Emirates?  Yes, I most definitely would.

Through no fault of Emirates, the arrival in Manchester was disappointing, the aircraft being parked on a remote bay when there were plenty of aero bridges available.  I was told the reason that the airport authorities do not use them at the weekend is that they do not have the staff on to man them!   

Also, while as you might expect, it was raining in Manchester, to make matters worse, the handling company only sent two very small buses to carry all the passengers off a fully laden Boeing 777, so there was a long wait to get off the aircraft, which the Emirates staff weren’t too happy about either!

And to make it even worse the queue for the non EC immigration was massive and that took over an hour – so if you have an EU passport I suggest you use it!

Picking up the Vroom Vroom Vroom rental car was a very simple exercise and we were soon on our way in a fabulous Volvo XC 70 Cross Country, the perfect car to tackle the highways and byways of Britain, but all about that in another The Mole on location in Europe article, plus also watch out for more articles over the next month on Emirates and Emirates Hotels and Resort and of course the Mole on location in Europe and Dubai.

An on location in Europe report by the Mole