Antarctica.. and more.. lots more....

Hello everyone. Something very different tonight. Mostly about stamps so maybe not that different.

I am in the process of designing some flight covers to be carried on a Qantas domestic flight from Sydney to Sydney. Boring eh!! Well maybe not. The flight is the longest domestic flight in the world, at 14 hours…. Now that could be boring…. But this flight leaves Sydney.. flies down to Antarctic and around a few places there ( sorry I don’t yet have the details) and back to Sydney. Still boring ?? Well I am going to get the flight covers carried on the flight and signed by the pilots and crew… Well I think I am.. and we all know how great is the power of positive thinking.

Anyway.. I am only going to make about 20 covers and thought I would take advance orders… stamps are even to be selected.. I will be using these on some covers and some Australian Antarctic explorers on others.. if I can get them..

everything is a bit premature but these things have to be thought up and planned don’t they.

So, would you like to place an advance order.. the price details are even to be decided so you can place a reservation with no commitment to buy.. but it means if you do decide when you see the final cover and price you can say yes and the cover(s) are there for you… if you say no.. then no problem .

Prices are likely to be US $25 a cover with all crew Signatures.. I honestly don’t think there will be more than 20 covers.. after all I don’t want to impose on the crew too much do I. If I do covers with no crew signatures these will probably be US $10. But I have not yet decided.. if you pre order I will do some.. The prices will be post and packing etc included.. so you can see these are not expensive.. yet very collectable – well they will be quite unique, unless someone reads this and decides to do the same.

A story for you Back in 1979 an Air New Zealand flight did this route on 28 Nov. 1979. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_New_Zealand_Flight_901 for details. I should add before you read this - if you want to – it Is not very pleasant in my mind, but it is what happened, and I believe because of this no flights today fly under 10000 feet.

There were some souvenir covers being carried by passengers on that flight, and I am told that a few of them have sold for lots of money (in the thousands of dollars). There is a group that specializes in crash covers.. as you may know… and there is a journal - La Catastrophe - , the journal of the Wreck & Crash Mail Society. Have a look at http://wreckandcrash.org. you might find this very interesting. So much more to stamp collecting isn’t there.

Finally, and I cannot hold back on this.. I talked about cinderellas.. there is one supposed A380 flight cover currently with a bid of $34.33 on it on some large auction site ( there are other from same seller Imight add) . It is nothing more than an envelope with a picture and imitation stamp and made up hand frank and a few words. I am selling genuine covers, postally franked at airport post offices , carried on the actual A380 flights for US$40.. most sold, a few left.. if you are buying these cinderellas I hope you know what you are paying for… it really saddens me to see people paying for this material…. The description says postal tribute… surely that implies some use of the postal system in some way or other.. there is as much postal about this envelope as there is of my covers above being postally carried… and I wont be claiming they are postally carried either unless I getthe post office to do cancellations...…. Oh.. and if you want the real doozy.. a flight cover of the Singapore Sydney flight with a picture of the landing in Sydney… that is only one.. there are more like that.. like people, wake up out there.. and oh how I wish I could ask the bidder if he or she knows what they are bidding on. I just hope they are happy… the seller is certainly very happy ..laughing all the way to the Bank, well that is my opinion and I am sticking to it.

Email me at cddstamps@gmail.com Best wishes.. enjoy your stamps.. Michael