mikoneill
Jan 21, 09, 4:33 pm
Hi,
Just returned from my honeymoon in India which included flights MAN-LHR-BOM-COK:TRV-BLR-LHR. BA covered the UK and international flights (in F), while Jet Airways covered the Indian domestics in Y. This was made possible following advice from FT on earning enough points and 241s...
MAN - LHR. Sunday night flight. Sampled a glass of champagne and a few sandwiches in the lounge before taking the slightly delayed departure to LHR. Arrived on time at T5 to an airbridge, so was on the way home in no time.
LHR-BOM (F). Seats 1A/K bagged the day before, and only one other passenger in the cabin. Arrived in good time at LHR to sample CCR for breakfast and the cabanas. My wife also took advantage of the manicure service. Flight was boarded with plenty of time, but we had to wait about an hour for the deicer to be applied. Purser spilled a class of champagne, just missing Mrs mikoneill, but no damage done! Mr 2A tried to convince me that we should swap seats... Sitting in 1A/K is really an amazing treat, and feels like you are in a private jet; I really like the fact you can see fowards as well as sideways. The F seat is really very comfy, with huge amounts of personal space. After take off we took lunch, which was soup, followed by a lamb-shank for me. The meat was not that great, but better than I'd usually get. Wine was great though. Settled down to watch a movie; I was very disappointed by the quality of the screens, the resolution, vividness and brightness made it difficult to see the movie; it surely would not be too difficult and expensive to replace these in the F cabin? Movie was followed by a snooze for a few hours, finally having afternoon cream-tea and scones ahead of landing. All-in a great flight, and a fantastic was to start the rest of our lives (provided expectations of travel class have not been set!). Purser held back the masses in J (Hi J config) so the F passengers could get off first
BOM-COK (Y Jet Airways). Short hop down to Kerala. Nice modern 737-800, with AVOD at every seat (yes, in economy domestic, and it worked). Screen much better quality than in BA F. Tasty, hot “non-veg” snack, with desert.
Few days driving around Kerala, visiting Munnar and staying on a house boat before heading down to the beach near Trivandrum.
TRV-BLR (Y Jet Airways). Short, slow hop on ATR. Another tasty snack. New BLR airport seems very smart and modern. Long journey ~60mins into town for a short sleep. Imagine the Trident hotel under construction at BLR will do very well from people travelling on the early BA flight.
BLR-LHR (BA F). Welcomed before checkin by someone handing out F hand-luggage tags (needed for security). Only five seats taken when I had checked seating plan, though 1A taken, so we had 1/2K. However, checkin lady said that 1A was free, so we were 1A/K. There was a problem with the ticketing of the redemption ticket that took about 5 mins to sort out. I think this has been mentioned on some of the forums. Lounge at BLR is third party, but given how small the international departures are is it probably gets used by one airline at a time. Separate areas for F and J. On boarding the F cabin was much fully than expected, and I think there had been a number of op-ups as the FA announced that the flight was very full. Asked if there was a copy of Economist on-board and the FA searched the whole aircraft for me with no joy. We went straight to sleep after take off, and opted to take breakfast at 7am (ish) UK time, about 5hrs into the flight. When we woke up the AVOD wasn't working, and it took a good couple of hours and several resets to get it going; from what I could establish it hadn't really been working for most of the flight. Breakfast was a bit average, and they had run out of ketchup?! AVOD settled down and I watched “Eagle-eye”, not something to watch anywhere other than when bored onboard. Passenger in 2K spent the whole flight snoring, much to everyone's annoyance/amusement. FA kept me topped up with champagne, and found some snacks from the club larder to keep me happy before lunch. We took lunch over Poland, smoke salmon start, lobster tails and something chocolaty. Accompanied by some glasses of Voigner. Flight arrived 30mins ahead of schedule and we went straight onto a walkway on T5B. FA held back J passengers to let F off first, and managed to get T5A shuttle to ourselves. Bags took ~40mins to start coming out from arrival, by at least priority tagged bags came off first (well after crew bags). All in a great experience, though not sure if I will ever cope with turning right on long-haul again. The F seat is really very comfortable, and the service excellent.
Just returned from my honeymoon in India which included flights MAN-LHR-BOM-COK:TRV-BLR-LHR. BA covered the UK and international flights (in F), while Jet Airways covered the Indian domestics in Y. This was made possible following advice from FT on earning enough points and 241s...
MAN - LHR. Sunday night flight. Sampled a glass of champagne and a few sandwiches in the lounge before taking the slightly delayed departure to LHR. Arrived on time at T5 to an airbridge, so was on the way home in no time.
LHR-BOM (F). Seats 1A/K bagged the day before, and only one other passenger in the cabin. Arrived in good time at LHR to sample CCR for breakfast and the cabanas. My wife also took advantage of the manicure service. Flight was boarded with plenty of time, but we had to wait about an hour for the deicer to be applied. Purser spilled a class of champagne, just missing Mrs mikoneill, but no damage done! Mr 2A tried to convince me that we should swap seats... Sitting in 1A/K is really an amazing treat, and feels like you are in a private jet; I really like the fact you can see fowards as well as sideways. The F seat is really very comfy, with huge amounts of personal space. After take off we took lunch, which was soup, followed by a lamb-shank for me. The meat was not that great, but better than I'd usually get. Wine was great though. Settled down to watch a movie; I was very disappointed by the quality of the screens, the resolution, vividness and brightness made it difficult to see the movie; it surely would not be too difficult and expensive to replace these in the F cabin? Movie was followed by a snooze for a few hours, finally having afternoon cream-tea and scones ahead of landing. All-in a great flight, and a fantastic was to start the rest of our lives (provided expectations of travel class have not been set!). Purser held back the masses in J (Hi J config) so the F passengers could get off first
BOM-COK (Y Jet Airways). Short hop down to Kerala. Nice modern 737-800, with AVOD at every seat (yes, in economy domestic, and it worked). Screen much better quality than in BA F. Tasty, hot “non-veg” snack, with desert.
Few days driving around Kerala, visiting Munnar and staying on a house boat before heading down to the beach near Trivandrum.
TRV-BLR (Y Jet Airways). Short, slow hop on ATR. Another tasty snack. New BLR airport seems very smart and modern. Long journey ~60mins into town for a short sleep. Imagine the Trident hotel under construction at BLR will do very well from people travelling on the early BA flight.
BLR-LHR (BA F). Welcomed before checkin by someone handing out F hand-luggage tags (needed for security). Only five seats taken when I had checked seating plan, though 1A taken, so we had 1/2K. However, checkin lady said that 1A was free, so we were 1A/K. There was a problem with the ticketing of the redemption ticket that took about 5 mins to sort out. I think this has been mentioned on some of the forums. Lounge at BLR is third party, but given how small the international departures are is it probably gets used by one airline at a time. Separate areas for F and J. On boarding the F cabin was much fully than expected, and I think there had been a number of op-ups as the FA announced that the flight was very full. Asked if there was a copy of Economist on-board and the FA searched the whole aircraft for me with no joy. We went straight to sleep after take off, and opted to take breakfast at 7am (ish) UK time, about 5hrs into the flight. When we woke up the AVOD wasn't working, and it took a good couple of hours and several resets to get it going; from what I could establish it hadn't really been working for most of the flight. Breakfast was a bit average, and they had run out of ketchup?! AVOD settled down and I watched “Eagle-eye”, not something to watch anywhere other than when bored onboard. Passenger in 2K spent the whole flight snoring, much to everyone's annoyance/amusement. FA kept me topped up with champagne, and found some snacks from the club larder to keep me happy before lunch. We took lunch over Poland, smoke salmon start, lobster tails and something chocolaty. Accompanied by some glasses of Voigner. Flight arrived 30mins ahead of schedule and we went straight onto a walkway on T5B. FA held back J passengers to let F off first, and managed to get T5A shuttle to ourselves. Bags took ~40mins to start coming out from arrival, by at least priority tagged bags came off first (well after crew bags). All in a great experience, though not sure if I will ever cope with turning right on long-haul again. The F seat is really very comfortable, and the service excellent.