The ups and downs of flying - with Swiss Air

Every year since we began coming to the boat, we have bought our air tickets at the Flight Centre's expo, usually opting for the cheapest deal available on flights to Europe. Up until now, this has meant 2 return trips with Korean Air via Seoul, one with Emirates via Dubai and one planned with Qantas via Melbourne and Hong Kong, which didn't take place due to the Chilean volcano saga and was replaced with a Cathay Pacific fare via the same cities. Apart from the fact that we have sworn off Qantas for life (not so much due to the cancellation but their appalling service afterwards as we tried to sort out the insurance claim), we would happily travel with any of these companies again.

At this year's expo, we were very excited to see that Swiss Air were advertising return fares to Europe for $1803 – a significant saving on recent fares – only to be equally disappointed to find out that the fares only applied to stays of under 90 days. Despite discussions with airline reps and our travel agent, we still can't quite work out the logic of this fare structure but it seems to apply to many of the special fares. Even after adding on another $500 to the fare to cover our extra length of stay, Swiss Air came in at equal cheapest with Air France. C's previous experience of the latter – backed up by discussion with our travel agent - pushed the decision in favour of Swiss. Another deciding factor was that we'd fly with Air NZ to Hong Kong without having to pay Air NZ prices – and be able to collect a few extra Air Points in the process. It's almost feels like cheating the system, somehow.

The 11.59pm departure time from Auckland to Hong Kong suited us pretty well – we had time to do all our last minute laundry at home, do a final tidy up of the house and pack our bags before the lovely Graeme came to pick us up and deliver us to the airport. Once on the plane in Auckland, we both crashed, sleeping blissfully through the serving of the first meal. (I'm never sure what to call a meal that you eat in the early hours of the morning like that!). The Air NZ seats were comfortable enough to sleep in (and certainly more comfortable than Cathay's) and we were provided with a snuggly, warm blanket rather than the usual skinny variety. On waking, the in-flight entertainment choices were sufficient, if not as extensive as those offered by Cathay and Emirates. Still, there are only so many movies you can watch on one long-haul flight. Breakfast, served a couple of hours before our 7am arrival in Hong Kong, was pretty much a standard airline breakfast – baby sausages, scrambled eggs and baked beans, with fruit salad and a roll on the side – nothing spectacular but perfectly edible.

We arrived in Hong Kong feeling relatively rested and happy enough at the prospect of a full day's exploration there before another late night departure. The Tourist Information Office in the airport wasn't open because it was too early but it was easy to find and catch the shuttle train into the centre – and a bonus to find that the return ticket is included in the single fare. The shuttle took us to a station in a multi-story shopping mall – and our first challenge was to try and find our way out, which we did eventually with the help of one of the mall's concierges.

As soon as we were outside, we wanted to turn around and go back in again – the heat and humidity were overpowering! Even though we'd changed into light summer clothes at the airport, we found the atmosphere stifling. It didn't help matters that Hong Kong was also bustling and noisy and dirty – there seemed to be construction sites and road works everywhere. It is also a city dedicated to shopping and we are not particularly dedicated shoppers, especially on the outward journey of a four and a half month trip... To cut an interminably long story short, the day became one to endure rather than enjoy as far as we were concerned. There were pleasant moments, though – we found a lovely park in Kowloon and enjoyed the shady, green coolness of it. (Had we packed our swimming togs in our cabin baggage, we could have spent the day at the pool there as well but how were we to know?) We had a lovely, leisurely lunch in an air-conditioned, Vietnamese restaurant; we took a round-the-harbour boat trip and we spent a long sime sitting with one $10 beer each in a bar overlooking the harbour, marvelling at the busy-ness of it all and blissfully protected from the heat and the noise.

And if our day in Hong Kong wasn't long enough, our departure was delayed as well. We sat on the tarmac for around an hour and a half because the Chinese authorities had decided to place a limit on the number of planes per hour that could fly over its airspace. C slept blissfully through it all; J, unfortunately, did not.

But let's back-track just a little as first impressions of the Swiss Air plane are worth a mention for it was furnished in shades of 70s brown and beige. As if that wasn't enough to convey a conservative impression, the air hostesses were also wearing brown – trouser suits with waistcoats. Mmmm. We don't think that they are aiming to be leaders of fashion. The food, service and in-flight entertainment were fine but unspectacular – almost as neutral as their politics.

Despite the delay out of Hong Kong, we arrived in Zurich with just enough time to make our connection to Heathrow – and to be thankful we'd had the foresight in Hong Kong to get our boarding passes for the Zurich-London leg (something we couldn't do in NZ as they can only allocate boarding passes for the next 2 calendar days and ours went into a third). We left Zurich as scheduled at 7am and arrived in London two hours later – at 8am, giving us another full day to get through before bedtime. We were happy to just get to and then hunker down in Calvin and Brian's lovely Crouch End home... and to see them at the end of the day. By the time we did get to bed (and it wasn't late, believe me), it was a full three days since we had last been in one. Oh, the joys of long-haul flying!

PS We are happy to note that our scheduled stay in Hong Kong on the return journey is under two hours.