Turns out the Emirates A380 doesn’t guarantee bliss

Blood curdling screams and foul stench! Yes, this is life on one of the world’s fanciest airline’s state-of-the-art planes.

The A380 may be the world’s largest passenger plane, and Emirates one of the world’s best airlines, but that does not guarantee a luxury experience. For all the technology and size, your flight still comes with one thing common to all flights, passengers. If you’re unlucky, some of passengers are small, but surprisingly loud, and others, well, let’s just say not everyone’s as fond of deodorant as they should be.

It would be fair to say that we had high expectations when we decided to fly to Dubai with Emirates. I mean, we knew we weren’t going to be up in a private suite or even in business class with access to the in-flight bar, but we thought it would be pretty fancy.

Things started well. There is no question the A380 is an impressive plane. It dwarfs everything else at the airport and you could get a workout in running laps up and down the aisles. It also has a very nice entertainment system with lots of good movie options and cameras to look out the plane, many safety exits, and a cup holder that keeps your drink level in turbulence.

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In the end, though, it's not all that different from most airlines. Despite the size of the plane it doesn't feel any bigger once you're seated. The seats may have been wider, we weren't sure, but where it counts, legroom, there was nothing extra. Sadly, we failed in our efforts to get the emergency exit row so my legs definitely felt all 13 hours of the flight.

The real kicker though? The 3 year old sitting a few seats away. I'm not a parent, so I won't claim to know better. So, for the parents reading this, is it fair to say that taking an already loud, abnoxious and whiny kid and feeding them mousse chock-full of sugar and covered with chocolate at 11pm, two hours into an overnight flight, seems like a bad idea? Given that he finally quieted down and went to sleep… about 1 hour before we landed in Dubai suggests I might be right.

So, our Emirates flying experience wasn't the dream we had imagined, but there were three good things.

1) My lamb biryani was surprisingly good;
2) a very nice flight attendant gave Katy ear plugs so she slept about 7 hours, a new personal record for an inflight sleep; and, most importantly,
3) we landed in Dubai to start a new adventure.

Another positive thing about landing in Dubai, it's very easy to get a taxi. So, we're off. Let me know if you have any particular questions about Dubai or Oman and I'll try and answer them here.