Operated by Imperial Airways. Dating approximate. Built in 1931, scrapped in 1938. Photo from: Library of Congress

Dropping you off right next to the Ras el-Tin Palace in Alexandria. Imperial Airways journeys were not particularly fast, but certainly scenic. As a member of the British upper class you were not supposed to be in a hurry, anyway. Dating uncertain. Photo by: Ernst Ackermann / SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek

The Imperial Airways seaplane station near the Ras el-Tin Palace in Alexandria, where the Colossus once stood. Photo from: Library of Congress

Only three examples were built of the four-engined Short Kent, needed because the three-engined Calcutta could not effectively fly from Crete to Alexandria without a stop in Italian colonial territory in Tobruk. Photo by: Charles E Brown

Security restrictions imposed by Mussolini's regime meant passengers' cameras had to be sealed in a bag while Imperial Airways flights were refuelling at Brindisi. So photos of Brindisi as a Imperial AW port are rare. From contemporary reports passengers were taken ashore by boat because there was no flying boat dock. G-ABFA was the first of three Kents and was lost when it sank at Mirabella Bay, Crete on August 22, 1936. Photo from: Hudson Fysh Collection/State Library of New South Wales