For a lot of travellers the thought of a long distance flight is a necessary evil to get through in order to experience the exotic lands that await at the end. Twenty hours of cramped hell. We don’t care what the reviews say, unless you select a premium seating option, even economy on Singapore Airlines is tight especially as Steve is 6’2″! A great way to break up such a long journey and what most people tend to do (it’s also cheaper) is stopover for a few hours/days.

You can choose to spend as long as you like in these places. If the stopover destination is somewhere you want to go to on you on your trip then you might as well look at accommodation but beware this can add cost to your flight.

From Heathrow to Auckland we had the option of stopping over in Singapore (other common stopovers include Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur) and we jumped at the opportunity to explore and stretch our legs after fourteen hours in economy. We chose flights that let us turn up in Singapore for breakfast and leave after dinner. This gave us plenty of time to get a small taste of a fascinating city and whet our taste for Asia before returning there for longer later in our travels.

You can adapt your itinerary to include a longer stopover easily enough when booking your flights.

The only downside is we could have easily stayed longer. We returned to the airport refreshed (if slightly exhausted from the humidity) with the fresh air pushing out the recycled oxygen from the aircraft.

Sometimes it’s easy to overlook the effect of being in a steel box for a day with inches to move. Your skin can become dry as you dehydrate and when you arrive at the final destination your jet lag might just be worse.

If your only plan was to spend a few months in Australia then perhaps a day out in Hong Kong might kindle the flames of adventure and your plans will change.

Have you stopped over somewhere exciting and unique? Let us know. We’d love to hear about it!