Today, I am celebrating 10 years writing for Travel Update!

Celebrating 10 years of writing for Travel Update has come around out of the blue. It feels like yesterday when I was contacted to ask if I was still interested in joining as a writer. Naturally I leapt at the opportunity and so here we are.

Over 2,000 articles later and I’m still here, writing as much as I can. My day job is fast-paced and extremely busy so I have not been writing quite as much these past couple of years, but I write as much as I can when I have the time.

Where it all started…

After being coached a little on how to work WordPress, I dipped my toe in the water to write about the British Airways Executive Club gold pack. That landed on 25 May 2016 – 10 years ago today – and started the ball rolling.

Two days later, I wrote about my Top 5 Airline Breakfast Meals, something that people still read today. I vividly remember those, as they were so good – and me, someone who dislikes breakfast on a flight!

The most popular articles each year…

The very first evergreen article I wrote was my review of British Airways World Traveller Plus. It kept doing numbers day in, day out, and over a really long period of time. I’ve always noticed that my reviews of economy or premium economy seem to do very well, probably because the market is saturated with business and first class reviews.

For 2018, the top was the news that “You can now Upgrade a British Airways flight after Check in”. Technology keeps moving and things like that are now normal these days. The following year, the most read was, “What happens when Hillary Clinton is on your flight?”. She sat right behind me on a flight from Dublin to London City and it was interesting. During the pandemic, things shifted and most popular were my aviation articles. In 2020, it was “Why did Airbus make Indian Airlines a special A320 with different landing gear?”, while in 2021 it was, “Check out this cockpit video of a Boeing 747 landing in Tokyo in gusty conditions.”. 2022 saw a popular review of an Amtrak journey I took on the Coast Starlight from Los Angeles to Seattle. We were still wearing masks then, but it was good fun! Another evergreen article topped 2023, which was, “I almost bought seats on a Ryanair flight, but realised that is silly and here’s why”. In 2024, it was “Don’t you dare fall asleep in the aisle seat!”, and the last two years have been flight reviews (finally – they are the most time consuming to write). Malaysia Airlines new A330-900 business class topped 2025 and this year so far it’s the Turkish Airlines A350-900 business class. Good times!

Overall Thoughts

Celebrating 10 years is great, and looking back is fun. I’ve flown over 300 times, all self-funded, and I think have had only one free upgrade in all of that time. For most of the period I have been oneworld Sapphire or Emerald, letting me visit some of the loveliest airline lounges in the world.

Now that I’m a free agent, I’m trying lots of new airlines, which is good fun. This year will have me seeing Etihad for the first time, along with my first flights in years on Cathay Pacific, Lufthansa and SWISS. Plenty to look forward to, and I’m sure regular readers are happy with a break from the many, many articles on British Airways Club Europe!

Thank you all for sticking with me over the years. It’s always nice to know people are reading and enjoying my random scribblings – I do appreciate it. As always, thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.

Like planes? See my “Does anyone remember” series.
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