Air Asia to Darwin - starting October

[ronb]

This is good news.

(7/17/2010) The Indonesia arm of AirAisa (IAA) have announced their intention to operate direct flights between Denpasar and Darwin commencing October 2010. The service connecting Bali to Australia's northwest will take up routes recently abandoned by the Indonesian national flag carrier Garuda Indonesia.

As reported in Bisnis.com, the President Director of IAA, Dharmadi, said the new service would operate four times a week using Airbus A320 aircraft with a capacity of 180 passengers.

See the full report at http://www.balidiscovery.com/message...ge.asp?Id=6160

I just picked a date (Aug 20) and checked prices of JetStar to Darwin (US$189), then JetStar to Perth (US$209) - yet Perth is twice as far. Why the difference - I think it is simply Air Asia. I checked Air Asia to Perth on Aug 20 - Rp1,019,000 (about US$113).

So with a bit of luck, Air Asia to Darwin could be under US$100. Darwin can do visas, has reasonable shopping, let's you take a campervan out of town to great national Parks - so an interesting option. (Of course, living expenses are a bit more than in KL or Singapore.)