Sundowner Magazine: Spring/Summer 2020

FLYING HIGH
THE NEW FLIGHT ROUTES
& OTHER AIRLINE NEWS
THAT WE’RE EXCITED ABOUT
FLYING HIGH WORDS: JAMES TREACY
Plus, points
Passengers will benefit from the next phase of British Airways’
World Traveller Plus upgrade. Each guest will enjoy a new amenity
kit. Made from recycled plastic bottles, these kits contain an eye
mask, socks, a pen, toothbrush, toothpaste, and lip balm from
Scaramouche + Fandango.
Seats to Saint Lucia
Following on from Virgin Atlantic’s decision to cease flying to
Saint Lucia, British Airways has announced it will be offering
around 600 additional seats to the island per week in June,
July and August 2020.
Test run
Qantas recently tested three data-gathering, non-stop flights from
Sydney to London, as part of the Australian airline’s ultra-long-haul
‘Project Sunrise’. The goal: regular, non-stop flights from the east
coast of Australia to London and New York. “Flying non-stop from
Melbourne or Sydney to London and New York is truly the final
frontier in aviation, so we’re determined to do all the groundwork
to get this right,” said Alan Joyce, Qantas Group CEO.
All go for Gaborone
Qatar Airways has launched a new thrice-weekly service to
Gaborone, linking London to Botswana’s capital via the airline’s
hub in Doha.
ANA goes luxe
ALL NIPPON AIRWAYS (ANA) has rolled out new First Class and
Business Class cabins for its B777-300ER aircraft. Created by famed
architect Kengo Kuma and leading British designers Acumen, its First
Class is inspired by ‘luxury Japanese hotels’. Dubbed ‘THE Suite’ and
‘THE Room’, the new cabins feature custom-made lights by Panasonic,
inspired by natural sunrise to improve comfort, and the largest
entertainment screens in the skies.
Class act
Qatar Airways continues to roll-out its award-winning Qsuite offering.
From this winter, four flights per day from Heathrow will feature Qsuite, as
well as one per day from Cape Town, Johannesburg, and Delhi. In addition,
from March, the service will be offered twice daily from Manchester.
Recognised as “the world’s best Business Class” at the 2019 Skytrax World
Airline Awards and 2019 TripAdvisor Traveller’s Choice Awards, Qsuite
was first launched in March 2017 on selected planes. The airline has since
been adding the offering to more planes and routes. Both aft- and forwardfacing,
Qsuite seats can be configured into a private but social quad –
useful for family meals, business meetings, and much more.
A&K PARTNERSHIP
TREND WATCH: THE RISE OF THE GOLDEN GAP YEAR
What springs to mind when you hear ‘gap year’? Like most, you
probably imagine fresh-faced school leavers backpacking around
far-flung corners of the world. Yet studies show an increasing
number of retirees are embarking on extended holidays –
escapes lasting anywhere from three to 12 months.
Inspired Villages, a company specialising in developing later living
communities, recently crunched the numbers of a national survey
by OnePoll, as well as data from the ONS. The figures reveal that
almost a quarter of UK retirees have either taken a gap year since
leaving work, or are interested in doing so; 23 per cent already
take five holidays or more per year.
For some potential globe-trotting trendsetters, it isn’t age holding
them back from their gap year dream. The data reveals that garden
and household maintenance is a major dissuader for 21 per cent
of those surveyed. Travel stress was also cited by 17 per cent as a
limiting factor. However, with more retirement villages providing
reassuring ‘lock up and leave’ services, and with luxury travel
companies such as A&K promising a stress-free travel experience,
those hurdles are looking a lot less daunting. Is this the dawning of
the age of the golden gap year?
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