WearyBizTrvlr

I wasn’t really planning to do a trip report for a fairly standard transatlantic crossing, but the experience turns out to have been some exceptional, making it worthy of some comment. This is also my first trip report, so it'll be a bit rough around the edges.

It all started with a long phone call to BA to try to book my flight. For various reasons I needed to book an open-jaw flying from AMS to PHL and back again from IAH. As the BA telephone agent said, that’s obviously far too complicated for a computer. So I ended up booking the flight by phone, getting a ticket in World Traveler Plus, and upgrading it with miles to Club World. AMS tends to be one of the cheaper points to start such journeys, allowing me to make frequent private trips to the US in the relative comfort of Club World.

12 Feb 2005, BA 423, AMS-LHR, seat 2A

To catch the early 11:15am flight to PHL, I needed to head out on the first LHR flight of the day, which departs at 7:20am. Since this would require getting up at a most uncomfortable hour, being some nocturnal by nature, I decided not to go to sleep at all. I got to the airport at 6:20, and threaded my way to the BA check-in desk. The old oneworld check-in area on the right of Terminal 1 has been closed off for some time now, so BA too has had to move to the main floor. This is a definite step back in comfort and convenience as one tends to get caught in the general melee that characterizes this part of the airport. Some of the check-in desks end up in an unseemly scrum, and it’s especially LH and SK that suffer from this, as they abut a wall.

BA has taken the approach of trying to get as many people as possible to use the self-service check kiosks, and to this end the barriers have been constructed in a way that all but makes it impossible to reach the check-in counters without passing the watchful eye of a gaggle of BA staff. Their main job is to direct travelers to use the self-service check-in machines, and to assist them if a problem should arise. I’m not sure this is faster or more efficient than using the old-fashioned check-in desk, but one would assume that there’s a modicum of method to the madness.

As I had checked in almost 24 hours earlier online, I was allowed to go straight to the bag drop-off. I was also handed my boarding card for the LHR-PHL sector, which I had not been allowed to print following online check-in. The boarding pass showed sequence number 001 for both flights.

Once again I was thankful for my Privium card, which allows me to use the iris-scanning machines to pass through border control and security check at AMS. The line for the old-fashioned version was beginning to grow substantially, even at this early hour. Having this fast track makes a big difference if you travel a lot through Schiphol. It’s not just that there’s never a line and you’re through in a breeze, but more importantly, it takes the uncertainty out of the timing. Sometimes the normal line is pretty short too, and the total savings may be only five minutes or so. But that’s not something you can rely on in your planning. Having the certainty of a quick border crossing shaves easily 20 minutes off of every trip. As I fly on average twice a week through AMS, this is pretty damn significant.

Cumulative lack of sleep was beginning to take its toll, and by the time I straggled to the lounge, I was having a bit of trouble staying awake. The desk was unguarded, so I proceeded to the farther part of the lounge. As it was largely deserted, the lounge warden soon enough discovered my presence and asked me for my boarding pass. She took it back to the desk for processing. Minutes passed. My main concern was not to fall asleep and run the risk of missing my flight. The early Gatwick flight was announced. More minutes passed. Finally the lounge warden brought back my boarding pass with her apologies that it had taken so long. Soon thereafter the flight was called.

Boarding was at gate D16, which is not too long a walk from the lounge. There’s another round of security checks at the gate, and most of the passengers at the gate had passed through this already. I ambled straight to the actual boarding desk at the front to wait there for another few minutes until they started to allow us onto the plane. Thus I ended up the first on the plane. As usual, the flight attendant at the door checked my boarding pass to ensure I was on the right flight. Not all airlines do this, but I suppose it makes sense. I crammed my carry-on into the overhead bin, handed my coat to the f/a and heaved myself into seat 2A. Row 1 had not been available at OLCI, but the cabin did not fill up. Both 1A and 1B were taken, as was 2B next to me. The right-hand side was entirely deserted, and in the three rows of Club Europe behind me there weren’t too many people either.

The flight itself was a perfectly average BA Club Europe experience on the short hop over. As there were so few of us up front, service was quick, friendly and efficient. The standard BA breakfast was offered with a choice of assorted warm breadware, cold drinks, coffee or tea. The hot breakfast was also the usually inedible sludge, which consists of gently fried gorilla vomit, sausages stuffed with lizard entrails and a ghastly substrate which I have never been able to identify. This is one of the more frustrating parts of the BA experience. I’ve never gotten used to British-style breakfasts, and much prefer something sweet and warm, like the wonderful apple pie that Austrian serves for instance. Having a choice would be good. Breakfast is one of those meals that airlines should be able to do well, without having to make as many concessions to quality as in the other meals. In any case, service wrapped up pretty quickly, and the pilot announced the inevitable delay in landing. As we circled over London, I whiled away the time by dozing and picking out landmarks such as City Airport and our office in Canary Wharf.

After a quarter of an hour of swooping lower with every turn, we finally aligned with hopefully the right runway at LHR and started our final descent. There was a bit of a further delay in taxiing to the gate at T4, but nothing too serious. I don’t remember exactly which gate we arrived at, but the abiding memory is that it took many, many turns through the jetway to arrive at the main terminal building. I started off on the trek to find my way one level up to the departure level.

Tedious Twiddling of Thumbs at Terminal Four

The line at security was short, but seemed to be having some problems with utterly bewildered elderly passengers trying to figure how to navigate the obstacle course. Staff were actually helpful, but the total lack of any English skills on the passengers’ part was not helping matters. I took a right and started heading for the Lounge Pavilion, stopping at the World of Whiskeys for a quick survey. No purchases this time, but on the way back matters would be different. I was admitted to the First lounge solely on the basis of my boarding pass, which accurately reflected my Gold status; this is as it should be, but there have been reports of the lounge dragons demanding to see physical proof of the Gold card.

With almost two and a half hours before my onward flight to PHL, I first nibbled on some additional breakfasty items in the lounge, before deciding to take a shower in an effort to stay awake. The wait for showers, I was told, was about an hour, but there was ample time to fit one in. I whiled away the time by reading some newspapers, and trying to find a spot where the annoying blare of the television was not too obtrusive. The wait for the shower turned out to be 45 minutes rather than the predicted hour.

Suitably refreshed and not in imminent danger of falling asleep anymore, I leafed through some newspapers for a bit longer before heading off to gate 10 to board my flight to PHL.

Boarding

Amazingly, there were two lines for boarding at gate 10, one for World Traveler and World Traveler Plus, the other for First and Club World. If I read the sign correctly, the premier boarding line was not available to Silvers, Golds or their oneworld equivalents. The fact that there were two distinguishable lines I found remarkable, as on many previous BA long-hauls boarding quickly degenerated into a massive scrum. So much for British queuing.

It had been a while since I had come into close contact with Murphy’s Law, and I suppose I was overdue to have a dollop of said Law applied. While the Club and First line was much shorter than the economy line, there seemed to be a problem with the passenger at the head. Much fussing ensued, and after watching the economy line move forward for several minutes, the gate staff finally shunted the problem pax into a seat so as not to hold the line up any further.

After this, things moved along quite nicely. When I got to the gate staff, a gentleman took my passport, and scrutinized my picture, looking alternately at me and the photograph. Being satisfied the person and passport were compatible, the lady at check-in tapped something into the computer, looked up, and said, “A new boarding pass for this gentleman, please.”

This is where I started to get worried. She smiled at me and said, “We’ve assigned a new seat for you.” Being a good FTer, I had researched my options on the 777 to find the best seat in Club, and I had decided on 11J to allow for a quick escape in order to beat the lines at immigration. So while I maintained a smile, I was starting to formulate questions and objections to the forcible reassignment. Then she gave me my boarding pass. I looked at the seat, and it said 2A.

2A? Isn’t that up front? I mean, Front, as in First? She pointed to the F on the boarding pass. Any objections quickly dissolved at this point, and I thanked her profusely and walked with a spring in my step to the aircraft.

Whence my good fortune? I really don’t know. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, I was on an upgraded World Traveler Plus ticket, so I figured I’d be the last in line to get a further op-up. I had been checking availability for the flight, and all economy fare classes had been zeroed for some time. Then about a day or two before the flight, the J8 D8 I8 also changed to zeroes, while F was stuck at 3 or so. So it appears the flight was overbooked in Y, which led to cascading up-ops from Y to W to J to F. I was the beneficiary of that last batch. I have two hypotheses to account for this: one is simply blind luck. The Great BA Random Number Generator picked me as a Gold to be the lucky one. Could be. The other hypothesis is that I was the first Gold to check-in, and since I had been on the AMS-LHR flight before, they had a reasonable certainty that I would in fact show up. That may have swung the difference.

I did have a vestigial worry though. For some reason, I’d never gotten the e-mail confirmation for my booking, so I didn’t know how much I’d really paid other than the phone operator’s assurance. And when I checked my BAEC account a few hours before leaving home, the 25,000 miles for the upgrade had not been deducted yet (the flight itself showed up immediately after booking on my account). Not one to accept good luck blithely and miss out on an opportunity to worry, I figured that perhaps I had been accidentally booked on a full-fare J instead of an upgraded T. This would make more sense in terms of an op-up. However, I was far too tired to worry well, and besides, there was nothing I could do. So I decided to enjoy the flight, which I certainly did.

BA 67, LHR-PHL, Seat 2A

Upon arrival in the aircraft, the stub of my boarding pass was once again subjected to examination, and I happily took a left turn where I had expected to have to make a right. I was greeted by the flight attendants in First, who immediately asked me what I’d like to drink. I went for a Woodford Reserve, straight, as a nice complement to the macadamia nuts which were waiting for me in china bowl. Having hung my coat, the f/a came back with a generous helping of the Woodford Reserve.

This was my first time in BA F, so I took some time to acquaint myself with the surroundings. The seat itself was far bigger and better than the Club World seat, and most importantly, it offered substantially more privacy. Given the angled arrangement of seats, you had to crane your neck to see other passengers. I’d feel much more comfortable working on a laptop here than in Club World (or even worse, other airlines’ business class), where it sometimes takes a conscious effort not to look at others’ laptop screens. To my surprise, there was very little in the way of storage bins. The large flat area between the seat and the fuselage served as the storage area for sundry items, including menus and the famous BAg. The latter is essentially a nicer version of the standard amenity kit. The items are roughly the same, but it’s just a notch better in terms of quality.

There were some details that detracted from the ambience in F, especially the unnerving habit of bits of the seats of falling off. When I brushed against the cover of the seat in front of me, it came off, not having been properly secured to begin with. I just jammed it back, but it again fell off during take-off, leaving me with an interesting view of the mechanics of the seat controls. I couldn’t quite reach them, but I almost could have surprised the passenger in 1A with some seat adjustments. Also during take-off the overhead bin over 1E opened, though nothing fell out. A flight attendant rushed back to fix both of these things. Later on, a side panel in my seat came loose. Somebody’s got a screw loose there.

The menus were distributed before take-off, and small forms to fill out for the movie selection. BA F has video-on-demand, in the sense that you fill out the form, then demand that the videotape be brought to you. This is sadly all too consistent with the antediluvian IFE that BA offers in its other cabins too. Please also note that I hereby voice the obligatory outrage and disappointment at the headsets; many airlines have better headsets in C than the rather pathetic ones BA hands out in F.

The film selection was better than the one in Club World, although I forgot to copy it down for this report. I settled as my first choice on the original version of The Manchurian Candidate, a film I had been wanting to see for a long time but somehow had never gotten around to. I’m a bit behind as it is on my films, but there are more long-hauls coming, so I should stay reasonably current. I do miss SQ’s KrisWorld at times like these. Interestingly, the form with the film selection was not collected automatically; I had to hand it to the f/a while I prodded at my appetizer. Not a big deal, just a tiny detail.

Returning to the food, the menu was as follows:

Lunch
Starters

Loch Fyne smoked salmon with caviar and dill crème fraiche

Goat cheese and butternut squash terrine with red onion marmalade

Leek and potato soup with crème fraiche

Fresh salad leaves with your choice of dressing

Main

Grilled fillet of beef, béarnaise sauce, Anna potatoes, turned carrots and asparagus

Lobster fish caked with a light shellfish sauce, stir-fried spinach and vegetables

Green herbed chicken tikka with cumin and pine-kernel potatoes, creamy black lentils and basil naan

Salad of lemon pepper breast of chicken with basil dressing

Snacks

Bacon rolls served with tomato ketchup

Leek and potato soup with crème fraiche and a side salad

Fresh pasta with your choice of cherry tomato and basil sauce or spinach and Parmesan cheese sauce

Duchy of Cornwall biscuits

A selection of cheese and fruit

Dessert and Cheese

Balsamic strawberry and Mascarpone cheesecake

Ice cream profiteroles with warm chocolate sauce

Cheese plate featuring –

Camembert – A classic French cow’s-milk cheese from the Normandy region, Camembert features a creamy texture with a full flavour

Hereford Hop – A tender, sweet and buttery semi-hard cheese complemented by a bitter aroma and flavour

Fourme d’Ambert – A lightly pressed, creamy white cheese marbled with dark blue-green veining.

Unpasteurised cheesemay pose a health risk to certain groups of people including pregnant women, the elderly, the very young and those whose systems may be immunocompromised.

A basket of fresh fruit

Your choice of
Espresso, cappuccino, coffee, decaffeinated coffee, tea or herbal tea


Afternoon Tea

Sandwiches

A selection of sandwiches featuring lemon and dill poached salmon, mature Cheddar cheese with chutney, gammon ham with tomato and mustard and chicken with sun-blushed tomato and crème fraiche.

Patisserie

Ginger banana cake, raspberry and coconut quenelle and chocolate éclair
Warm fruit scones with clotted cream and strawberry preserve

Beverages

Champagne

Alfred Gratien Cuvee Paradis

White Wines

Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru Chenevottes 2001, Joseph Drouhin
Or
Puligny-Montrachet 2001, Joseph Drouhin

Steenberg Sauvignon Blanc 2004, Constantia

Calera Central Coast Chardonnay 2000

Red Wines

Domaine de Chevalier 1995, Grand Cru Classe, Graves

Chivite Coleccion 125 Reserve 1997, Navarra

Baileyanna Pinot Noir 2001, Edna Valley

Dessert Wines

Opitz Goldackerl Tockenbeerenauslese 2002, Austria

Warre’s 1988 Colheita Port


I am a difficult eater. I always find something to eat in a restaurant (as long as it’s not vegetarian), but as cuisine gets fancier, I become increasingly despondent. The best meals I’ve ever had were at top-notch restaurants (Citronelle in DC stands out), so when I find things on the menu at these places, it’s really, really good. Otherwise, I’m perfectly happy with grilled dead animal.

Of the appetizers, the only choice was the salmon, and I asked the attendant to go easy on the caviar. I really don’t like that stuff. She mentioned there’s hardly any on the plate anyway, and this turned out to be true. The salmon was excellent though with a sprinkle of lemon juice, and it was served in nice thick slices. It went well with the wine.

Speaking of wine, there’s not much room for choice there either. Life’s too short to drink white wine, and this means I had to try all reds on the flight, even the French. I was reminded again why I’m not too keen on Pinot Noirs, but even that wine wasn’t bad by any means. I kept the wine coming in various varieties during the meal.

The main course was a bit of a dilemma. I love steak, but it’s usually inedible on airplanes as it comes pre-cooked, and is then re-heated. I like my steak medium-rare at most. There have been two instances where I had good steak: once flight MH F from KUL to BKK, the other on KU from AMS to KWI. In the latter case, they had a whole roast on the tray, which was a succulent deep pink in the middle, and carved it for you. The seat was horrible, but the steak very good indeed. I really really hated KU at that point for being a dry airline… such a great steak and not a drop of wine in sight!

Back to BA though. Discussing the issue with the f/a, I was torn between the steak and the chicken tikka. I love (spicy) Indian food, and chicken tikka often ends up on my plate. However, in the end I decided to go with the steak with instructions to keep as it little cooked as possible. The f/a also indicated that we might be able to come to some alternative arrangement should the steak disappoint. It did. I mean, for airline steak, it was OK, but it was nowhere near anything that a self-respecting chef would serve on the ground. However, I didn’t really feel like going for the chicken tikka anymore either, but in retrospect, I should have. There’s always next time.

For dessert, I chose the profiteroles. These were OK, although the chocolate sauce could have been a bit more generously applied. I am often accused of being a chocoholic, but I really think that misses the mark. I can stop anytime I want to. Really. During dessert I switched to the Opitz Goldackerl dessert wine, which came perfectly chilled and was truly wonderful. I still think I prefer the Tokaji 6-puttonyos, but this was certainly respectable.

Before I forget, I should insert the inevitable and obligatory scathing remark about the lack of silverware. It’s all plastic. Sure, it’s fancy plastic, the kind that is big and firm and looks down its nose on its flimsier brethren that work in Club World, but it’s still friggin’ plastic. Its attempts at trying to be grown-up plastic just made the tableau more pathetic. Yes, I know, it’s not BA’s fault.

At this point, the Woodford Reserve, several glasses of wine and the dessert wine on top started to create interesting interactions with my sleep-deprivation. I managed to stay awake for the rest of the film, such as it was, and then I collapsed into blissful sleep.

When I awoke, the f/as were going through their pre-landing routine, which meant that I had missed afternoon tea. I was looking forward to that, but sleep had to take precedence. I managed to squeeze an espresso out of the f/as (metaphorically anyway) and shortly thereafter we were on the ground in Philadelphia. Despite a slight delay at departure, we landed a bit early.

This was my first time at PHL, so I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, but the experience was pretty painless. At immigration, there was a bit of a line already from a different flight, but thankfully the lines were short and the flight was from a European country. I once got stuck at MIA right after a flight full of Haitians, who were subjected to great scrutiny. The family in front of me turned out to have fake green cards… that took a while. Anyway, the immigration officer was friendly and efficient, and my luggage arrived within a non-ridiculous amount of time. The priority tags helped a bit, although there were plenty of non-priority bags on the carrousel too.

Exiting from the airport I was struck by how quiet and deserted it was. Even better, there was no line at the cab stand, and I was in my cab and away within 25 minutes of arriving at the gate.

All in all, an excellent trip, and wonderful value for money. The flight attendants hit the right mixture of friendliness, informality and service to make the experience very pleasant indeed. I’m sorry I missed much of the flight sleeping, but I am sure there will be a next time. The First experience is definitely better than Club World; just the sense of privacy is wonderful in itself. But I don’t think I’d pay too much of a premium out of my own pocket to fly F over C. I may end up on a AONEx RTW later this year, which is the only way I would shell out for the F experience. Either that, or I need a large increase in my income.

Anyway, there were further flights later on in my trip, these being UA F LGA-DEN, then UA F DEN-IAH and BA C IAH-LGW-AMS. I may or may not write a trip report about those, but I can assure you that if I do, it won’t be at such ridiculous length.

TahitiBoy

WearyBizTrvlr,

Ones like yours are just the type of trip reports I love. I hope you will fill us in on the rest of the itinerary just like this portion.

Fraser

Great report ^

I certainly echo your thoughts (along with anyone else who has to fly to the UK) on plastic cutlery. It's rubbish! Especially on the Club World shoe leather-esque steaks. It just looks so out of place amongst the leather and burr walnut

bseller

Very nice report! Thanks for sharing!! OTOH: the next time you have the opportunity for a double op-up, just remember a little trick that I learned from "mauld"....

You can have BOTH!! Last time I flew BA in F (Dec 04), they were offering both a coconut curry dish and roast rack of lamb. Both sounded great, altho the "side dishes" didn't really appeal, so I simply asked for the 2 entrees less the sides.....No problem at all..

Best wishes, Dave

First_Class_Flyer

Great trip report, I really enjoyed reading it.

djjaguar64

How shall I put it, it was an excellent read, i read every line just digested each everything line by line.........Delicious !

Seat 2A

If your reports are ridiculous in their length, mine are downright ludicrous! Honestly though, to me at least there's no such thing as a too long trip report, especially one as well written as yours. Thanks for the effort, including those tedious menu transcripts. I'll look forward to your next reports regardless of their length. ^ ^

flyclub

Great report, a pleasure to read.

However I do disagree with you about the Club Europe Breakfasts - I'm quite partial. However, the Club Europe Breakfast on GBAirways is better as they add ham as well as Bacon, and chives to the Scrambled Egg... ^

You had a nice menu in FIRST for your flight to PHL. It is interesting that you're Salmon was served with Caviar as well, as mine certainly did not when I flew to PHX last year!

Furthermore, in terms of the steak, I had a superb steak recently in Club World on my way back from MCO (though had a seat in the FIRST section rather ironically) which has rivalled most I have had recently on the ground, in the UK anyhow.

However I do sympathise with the sleeping and missing of Afternoon Tea. I did the same due to a combination of over indulgence, tiredness and the fact that the cabin was pitch black due to the crew closing all the shutters.....

Finally, I do agree the seating is more comfortable than Club World.

Tits McGhee

Ya see the little black round things on the top of the great glob of Sour Cream to the immediate right of the salmon and slightly obscured by the token shrubbery??? That's Caviar, and exactly the same as WearyBizTrvlr would have enjoyed!

Granted, we're not very generous with the old Caviar, but it's there nonetheless.

WearyBizTrvlr

Thanks everyone for all the kind comments! If I have time and feel so inclined, I might write up the rest too, but it was far less eventful. The short version is that I was unimpressed with UA F, I slept through most of IAH-LGW, and LGW-AMS was the usual short hop.

Now, on to some issues raised:

I actually knew this was possible, but I'd been snacking on too many items in the lounge before the flight, and by the time I was sufficiently disappointed with my steak I didn't feel like getting the chicken anymore. If I'd known sooner I'd be flying F, I'd have adjusted my snack schedule accordingly.

You must be British. This is something I had been meaning to mention in the report, but forgot. The Britons always seem to dig in with gusto, so BA is providing a substantial part of its target demographic with what they want. Offering a choice might be a way out, even if the croissants and rolls with jam are usually enough to quell rumblings of the stomach in the morning.

The caviar, as Tits McGhee mentioned is very limited:

It was not really a great glob even, which is just as well as I don't particularly like that either. You could have counted the individual globules of caviar in a very short time. No token shrubbery as far as I can remember though. Wouldn't've eaten that either.

Flyingfox

The "burr walnut" in the cabin is fake too, if I'm not mistaken!

Flyingfox

"token shrubbery"!
That is the funniest thing I've read all MONTH!
Good description!

Ginger K

Great report--fun to read. You cleaerly have a knack for this and I hope you'll write more.

fraisse10

Can't blame the dragons; I've recently gently descended to BA blue, but the boarding card I was printed a month after the event still showed Silver. Guess the checks are to counter this phenomenon.

Fraser

Haha of course! Or very, very fine veneer Walnut isn't that abundant and with BA's fleet of 70 or 80 longhaul aircraft (I think) it'd be even less abundant!

The point I was trying to make was that even if the walnut is fake it looks real and the leather is real. The cutlery is plastic