Flight reports have become something of a joke. Rather than offering a short, sharp assessment of the elements that make or break a journey, they have evolved into lengthy, often tedious stories illustrated with endless photographs of meals. I see them regularly in publications such as The Age. You sometimes wonder whether they have been written for travellers or to impress the airline’s public relations department. My advice is to start at the bottom: if you see the words “the writer travelled as a guest of the airline,” a few warning bells should ring.
