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Australia, a country in the southern hemisphere is another great destination for me to explore. Currently, Jetstar, an Australian low cost carrier is offering cheap airfare for flying Kuala Lumpur – Sydney sector. Comparing to other full service airlines, Jetstar promotion is so enticing to be considered. If I take the offer to fly with Jetstar , there will be two other cities apart from Sydney which I can include into my traveling itinerary.

One of city in Australia which I’ll be looking to go is Brisbane. Located 982km from Sydney, it should take me about 11 hours to be there if I choose to drive. The Australian tourism board has done a good job in promoting Gold Coast because that is the only attraction which I have had in my mind when discussing about Australia. But, there are many other attractions in Brisbane. Brisbane City itself is a livery city with so many activities to do. Enjoy shoppings by strolling along a kilometer shopper’s paradise of Queens Street Mall or exploring Australian culture by visiting live theatre, galleries, museums or historical sites. At night, I can hop into any bars, nightclubs or live music venues to enjoy Brisbane City’s nightlife. Hotel in Brisbane will take the most from my budget because I really need to spend many days in Brisbane with so many places and activities to be enjoyed.

Another place to head to from Sydney will be Melbourne which is 873km apart. Victoria is the only place in Australia to experience snow which is available at the range of mountains on the border of New South Wales and Victoria. As I am coming from a tropical climate country, an experience like this is something not to be missed. But I would prefer to be involved more in hotter climate which Australia has abundant of them. Hotel in Melbourne should have a lot of informations on the snowy activities if I am there to experience the snow.

Before going back, I should take a brief visit around Sydney because Sydney has many touristic locations which related to nature. I can try glass floored aerial gondola in the Blue Mountains, kayaking at Nelson Bay, cruising the Hawkesbury River on a houseboat or exploring reptiles at the famous Australian Reptile Park. Hotel in Sydney should have promotions package for their guests to discover Sydney. I will check on this once I am there in Sydney. This Australian trip will be my highest priority destination next year.so, I will be praying for a very good year end bonus for this year.

Global Reduced Rewards, a promotion by Emirates for their Skywards members to redeem air tickets for 50% reduced skywards airmiles. As many as 45 destinations globally has been enlisted for this Global Reduced Awards including:

1. Dubai to Bahrain, Doha, Muscat,Kuwait, Sanaa, Alexandria, Beirut, Damascus, Khartoum,    Karachi, Seychelles, Tripoli, Nairobi, Thiruvananthapuram, Bangalore, Cochin, Kolkata, Newcastle, Birmingham,    Manchester, Glasgow, London (Gatwick), London (Heathrow), Frankfurt, Munich, Dusseldorf, Moscow, Paris, Vienna, Venice, Zurich, Lagos, Casablanca, Johannesburg, Hong Kong, Beijing, Nagoya, Perth, New York, Sao Paolo.
2. Auckland & Sydney/Brisbane
3. Hong Kong & Bangkok
4. Jakarta & Kuala Lumpur/Singapore
5. New York & Hamburg

Reward tickets redemption must be made ONLINE in between 23rd July 2007 – 11th October 2007 and travel must commence between 11th September 2007 – 11th October 2007. This promotion is great for skywards members and really encourage members to redeem their air miles. As a skywards member myself, I am really excited and contemplating to redeem my air miles but the traveling period could not be better. The compulsory traveling period is coincide with Ramadan month where I would rather spend my time at home. But for those who has nothing to do with Ramadan, redeem your rewards air tickets now.

Good news for travelers who travel route Kuala Lumpur – Sydney because come September, Jetstar will start flying this route and cheaper airlines ticket will definitely be available for travelers comparing to sky high ticket prices by full service airline. Jetstar announced yesterday that they will start flying Kuala Lumpur – Sydney sector in September 2007 thrice weekly on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. In relation to the announcement, Jetstar is offering cheap airline tickets at RM88 one way for booking made at their website for traveling in February and September.This does not include taxes and surcharges which come to a total of RM409.50. For October and November, price will start from RM488 excluding taxes and surcharges. For comparison, return economy airfare for the same sector by Malaysia Airlines is RM2734.80.

Jetstar is also offering 36 business class seats at RM1488 one way excluding taxes. This is weird because I thought low cost concept will only offer one class which is economy. Also, eventhough Jetstar claimed themself as a low cost carrier, they have opted for KLIA instead of Low Cost Carriers Terminal because according to them, the landing and parking charges at KLIA is too insignificant comparing to LCCT. After I have done some research, now I do understand why Jetstar is behaving like that. Jetstar is actually an airline fully owned by Qantas but managed separately. Maybe their management mentality has not reduced their cost as yet. But as long as cheaper airfare being offerred by Jetstar, travelers will have nothing to complaint.

As this project, Bismut.net  is catered mostly for my personal needs and act as a place for me to write on travel information, I did not expect to receive many visitors. Last night, when I check the statistic from sitemeter, I noticed that there is an increase of visitors by 100 percents comparing to a few weeks before.

The sitemeter was installed on 9/07/07 and the statistic for first week  is not so impressive but has improve by almost 100 percent starting from 16/07/07. Almost 95 percent of Bismut.net visitors are coming from Google search. Now, I have to learn how to woo visitors from Yahoo. More work has to be done…

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