ND76

THURSDAY, August 25, 2011

All good things have to come to an end, it seems; so too this trip, which has brought me to five different nations for the first time, as well as familiar favorites Scotland and Switzerland. I am up early and am dressed and packed to travel by 0700. I go downstairs and enjoy the frühstuck, set out by the lady of the hotel who has the sunniest of dispositions. Upon leaving the Rittenhof, I don’t have far to walk. Before my train arrives at 0828, I get to watch the overnight sleeper train from Belgrade and Zagreb pass through on the way to Zürich. Before boarding, I validate the ticket in one of the little machines on the platform. Interestingly, the conductors on both my trains today walk by me without asking to see my ticket. My train pulls in on schedule, and after a quick stop pulls out for the non-stop ride to Zürich HB, which we reach by 0925. Before proceeding on to the airport, I take a short walk around central Zürich. Back on the train, I reach the airport by 1000. The Skyteam has at least one check-in station open, which is in row 2 of the check-in desks. I am able to check-in with a friendly agent, even though I am 3.5 hours early for my 1330 departure to CDG.

There are two lounges side by side. I went into the wrong one, the “Dnata Skyview”, and was quickly sent packing by the concierge to the lounge next door, which is the “Skyteam Lounge”. There were only a couple other passengers using the lounge when I arrived, and the lounge never got crowded, even though Delta had a flight to JFK. There were plenty of alcoholic beverages on offer, including champagne; I stuck to the Swiss beer Feldschlössen and sparkling water. The electrical outlets wouldn’t accommodate my converter; the concierge let me use one of the lounge’s converters, which worked, with my passport as collateral. The lounge was quiet and had wifi, and met my needs and expectations well.

At about 1245 I left for the bus gate for AF5103, our CityJet Avro85 flight to CDG. Security was once again a breeze, and I was in position to board the bus at about 1305. One busload was all it took on this run, and we reached our equipment, EI-RJX, the “Scattery Island”. A look at airfleets.net indicated that the original owner of this plane was none other than Mesaba Airlines, who flew it between May, 2000 and September, 2007 as N536XJ. Once again, I had seat 1A. This turned out to be the first commuter jet I had ever taken which served champagne (I didn’t note the label; Tott’s or Andre would have knocked me over). After takeoff, the flight attendant, Mari, speaks to me and offers me a beverage. She does so with an Irish brogue. I ask her what county she hails from, and she tells me, Finland. She had been living in Dublin for seven years and learned how to speak English there. Really pleasant person to have as your flight attendant. There is a full lunch service for those sitting in “business”, which consists of a sandwich plate. Our time enroute was 57 minutes.

At CDG, our flight pulled up to something I was unaware existed, a “Terminal 2G”, which services commuter flights. Here, I passed through passport control, and boarded a bus for Terminal 2E. Upon reaching terminal 2E, we parked at about the same position that we used to board the bus for the flight to EDI six days ago. We went up the same escalator, and emerged into the middle of 2E. This is the first time through CDG where I was not forced to endure security before reaching a connecting flight.

After 30 minutes or so of pleasant (if uneventful) time in the AF “salon” on the lower level of 2E, it was time to board the Air France 777-228ER, F-GSPR, making up AF26 (DL8358). AF is the original owner of this aircraft, which it acquired on October 19, 2001. Boarding started at 1550; I reached Gate 37 at 1600; and pushback was as scheduled, 1635. Champagne reached me before the door closed. This flight appeared to be packed. There were no empty seats in Affaires class so far as I could tell.

The seat modules on the 777 didn’t seem terribly much different than those on the A380; I’m sitting in row 8, the sixth of 7 rows in Affaires, and the TV screen is in the back of the shell seat in front of me. All I want to do on this flight is sleep, drink and eat (and not necessarily in that order). I doze off before our flight is in the air, and I wake up just as we are getting Ireland in our rear view mirror, when cocktail hour reaches our row.

The champagne is as listed in the menu—Lanson Black Label Brut (which Bevmo in California sells for $39.95 the bottle). It was fine, although I liked the champagne served on the A380 better. Still, there is nothing quite like drinking decent champagne at 35,000 feet.

The “amuse bouche” was two scallops with a spice marinade. The appetizer consisted of a goose foie gras terrine, a plate of four spiced shrimps with a curry sauce on the side, and a green salad featuring “vegetable batonnets” and “baby spinach” served with a vinaigrette with Indian spices.

There were four main dishes to choose from: pan seared leg of lamb filet served with a demi-glace sauce with dried fruit, bulgur wheat an sautéed green and yello zucchini; Indian style chicken in a spicy sauce with basmati rice and a sun dried tomato; grilled Hake in a scallion vinaigrette, Chinese-style sautéed vegetables, saffron basmati rice with mixed nuts; and a buckwheat pasta with chanterelle mushrooms, cream sause, sautéed mixed mushrooms with shallots, crushed tomatoes with Italian cheese. I went for the chicken, which was ample for me, although not as good as the lobster and steak on the eastbound run.

Dessert started off with the cheese plate featuring a wedge of camembert and a long thin triangle of Comte. This was followed by a trio of “mini berry crumble”, “mini lemon shortbread” and “chocolate mousse”, which my flight attendant presented to me along with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. I finished my meal with the AF house Calvados.

In addition to the champagne, AF offered three wines: a Burgundy white, Saint-Veran 2008 Joseph Drouhin; a Languedoc red, Domaine de Villemajou 2007 Gerard Bertrand (the discovery of AF sommelier Olivier Poussier); and a Bordeaux red, Haut-Medoc Chateau de Villambis 2007 Cru Bourgeois. I stuck with champagne during dinner.

Flight attendants smiled a lot and gave very good service during the relatively short time I was awake on the 8 hours we were aloft.

Three isn’t much else to tell. I put my seat into sleeping position, and I managed to snooze until our flight was about at the Susquehanna River between York and Lancaster, Pennsylvania (I missed out on the second meal service, which was OK with me). 20 minutes later we touched down at IAD, and we parked at the gate at the scheduled arrival time of 1900 EDT. I was one of the first in line at the USA citizens’ line at immigration, and got through very quickly. Baggage delivery was slow, however, and I had to wait probably 30 minutes for my rollaboard to appear, priority tag notwithstanding. Nothing exciting happened in the customs line, and I was free to catch the parking shuttle out to the car and drive home.

VERDICT: I had amazing luck with all my travel arrangements—all of them ran essentially on time. My hotels worked out well. The only bit of bad luck was losing my little kit bag with my cords in it, but I was able to replace them on the road. Saw a lot, did a lot, walked way too much. Now that I am back home, I can’t wait to go back on the road again. I am inspired by trip reports by fellow flyer-talkers about exotic places like Mongolia, Kazakhstan and west Africa. I am in mind of the final scene in “Up in the Air”, when Ryan Bingham stops in front of a giant destination board. Till next time.