Gday IFC
I’ve been in the process of temporarily moving to a country called East Timor, one of the least visited countries in the world!
I flew from Manchester to Hong Kong on a 1 year old a350, then Hong Kong to Denpasar on a 27 year old 777-300!
But for the finale I got to fly on the national airline of East Timor, Aero Dili from Denpasar to Dili!
For sure the most niche airline I’ve ever flown with!
I was eager to see what this airline is really like, after all if you’ve seen Josh Cahill’s video on this airline, it doesn’t exactly have the best reputation.
But I wanted to see what it was like, so here goes nothing…
Before my flight I got this (very bad) picture of what I believe is the only ARJ-21 operated outside of China, used by Trans Nusa. One of the best catches I’ve ever gotten for sure!
While we were holding short for takeoff a small piston engined aircraft did a flyover the runway releasing red smoke behind it! I don’t know hat it was about but it was cool to see
We took off on time from RWY09 in Bali, getting to see the beautiful sea of Bali
Now this is a souvenir, an Aero Dili water bottle! The water was handed out for free, as well as a free meal too on a flight that was less than 2 hours long! I decided not to try the meal as I had my own food. Tea and coffee was also offered after the meal
Were coming into land on RWY26 at Dili, flying over Cristo Rei on final approach
We back taxied to get to our parking stand. The runway at Dili airport is only around 6000ft long, making it the shortest runway that I’ve personally ever landed or took off from.
The aircraft I flew on was 4W-AAL, a nearly 16 year old a320-200, previously owned by Volaris and Bangkok Airways. Despite its age this plane felt pretty modern on the inside, it was clean for the most part, it even had mood lighting in it which I’ve never seen on an a320-200 before. But most importantly it had the amazing IAE engines!
So my final thoughts on Aero Dili are this: for me it’s definitely not as bad as it was made out to be by Josh Cahill, I had zero issues with checking in, the cabin crew were really friendly, the plane was in good condition for its age, and the fact you get a full meal on a flight less than 2 hours long makes it better than basically any flight within Europe.
Though the price was steep, around $200 return, which is to be expected because you’re flying into a country that basically nobody visits. And the price with Citi Link was more. (Though I didn’t pay for my ticket)
If you ever want to visit East Timor then I would say give Aero Dili a chance! So long as your passport photo doesn’t get uploaded on Facebook…