A new airline catering specifically for British backpackers travelling to Australia will launch next year, complete with an in-flight pub, karaoke and singing competitions.
The low-cost airline, BackpackersXpress, will operate three times a week between Manchester and Melbourne, via Delhi and Bangkok, allowing travellers to break their journey in India and Thailand.
Its two 747 jumbo jets will have their engines painted to resemble giant cans of Fosters and Victoria Bitter beer. The planes' tail fins will be adorned with giant yellow smiley faces - the symbol of the acid-fuelled dance party scene which swept Britain in the late 1980s.
Raucous behaviour will not just be tolerated but positively encouraged when the airline starts flying in June, and noise complaints from non-backpacker passengers will be ignored. There will be just one class of ticket - economy - with seats in the first-and business-class sections making way for a mile-high pub.
'Everyone is welcome to fly with us but if they are not backpackers we will warn them that the flights will be noisier and a lot more fun than anything they have expected before,' said Glenn Millen, the Brisbane-based entrepreneur behind the idea.
He dismissed suggestions that he was courting disaster by matching backpackers, booze and air travel. 'If things get out of hand then the bar will be closed. But in my experience backpackers coming to Australia just want to have fun and don't normally get into a lot of trouble. They are rarely involved in punch-ups,' Mr Millen said.
