Today marked the return of Virgin Blue on the Canberra-Sydney air route. It has been two and a half years since Virgin Blue last flew between the two cities.

The first flight from Canberra took off on a rainy morning at 6.25 am. A keen airline buff Peter, from Canberra, said he enjoyed his flight on one of the new Embraer jets which Virgin Blue will be using on the route. Peter was so keen he booked on the re-launch flight and then flew straight back to Canberra on the next available flight. Peter said the Embraer jet was a lot more pleasant to fly on compared to the Dash 8 used by Qantas.

Virgin Blue have eight direct flights a day from Canberra to Sydney and also eight from Sydney to Canberra. Looking at the Virgin Blue website as I write there are flights available from $69 available tomorrow. If you are thinking of a weekend getaway to Canberra from Sydney there are even some seats available on Friday afternoon at this low fare.

I welcome the commencement of the new service as I must say I have not enjoyed flying on the Qantas Dash 8 planes. Also the price competition has been sorely missed as Qantas has had a recent mononpoly on this route.

I must admit that recently instead of taking a flight to Sydney from Canberra when going overseas my family and I have jumped in a hire car. The Qantas fares have just been too high to make it cheap enough to fly.