Air Canada flying daily to Australia
Air Canada has launched a daily non-stop service from Vancouver to Sydney, Australia -- the only direct daily service between Canada and Australia.
The inaugural Toronto-Vancouver-Sydney flight on the airline's new flagship Boeing 777 was scheduled to take off from Vancouver International Airport just before midnight Friday.
The new non-stop routing from Vancouver will take about 15 hours southbound and 14 hours northbound, shaving more than three hours off the previous one-stop routing via Honolulu.
A new Boeing 777-200LR will fly the route starting in February, providing a significant increase in the amount of cargo that can be transported between Canada and Australia.
Travel between the two countries continues to grow, with about 200,000 Australians visiting Canada last year and 110,000 Canadians travelling to Australia.
Tourism BC figures show 177,000 Australians came to Canada during the first nine months of this year -- up 8.5 per cent from last year.
Travel to the southern hemisphere from Vancouver has become easier recently as Air New Zealand last month launched a new year-round, non-stop service from Vancouver to Auckland.
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/business/story.html?id=b0c8a5ab-0adc-4cec-b9f6-a3cf22c390e9