6) BA 209 LHR-MIA - full house this time
Boarding had already began and it was a bit of a scrum but I quickly made my way through and before I knew it I was back in one of my favorite spots of the world - the nose of a 747! It took no time at all for someone to bring me some more champagne along with PJs (ok BA already up on LH at this stage!) and amenity kit. So far cabin was looking about half full or so and I managed to get a few snaps of the surroundings while it was quiet:
infamous 1A. many a celeb butt has sat on this seat
1a and 2a
cabin view (this was actually taken on my way out of the plane at the end of the flight)
I had of course been hoping to try New First, and had followed the tracking thread and seen my flight was around a 50/50 chance but those odds looked bad when the latest update showed about 4 days solid of the flight running NF (meaning I was likely to hit the next patch of OF). But none the less I was happy as the product is still in my view excellent and I could tell from the get go it was a good crew. The purser came over and introduced himself and actually unprompted apologized profusely for the old product and said they were in the process of converting everything. I was just glad it was someone clearly enthusiastic and proud of their work.
I was curious if 1A would end up being taken, as it sure was close. Meanwhile the rest of the cabin was filling up, and soon enough we had a full house. A middle aged lady took seat in 1A and I suspected she was non-revenue and I am pretty certain this was the case (the biggest evidence being when the FA was taking meal choices I heard her "whispering" that they would let her choose from whatever is left). Not that it bothered me in the least bit quite the opposite in fact just an observation. But looking around I saw the cabin was completely full, all 14 F seats occupied. A stark contrast to my previous empty cabin on LH!
After a bit of taxing round and about T5 and enjoying the spectacle of dozens of BA planes we were up and on our way to Miami.
After take off champagne was quickly delivered again. They were serving Laurent Perrier Grande Siecle. This is one of the most fabulous champagnes in the world IMHO and smoother and more refined than the offerings of DP or Krug. It is a fascinating tri-vintage product and very unique. It was making me a very happy camper:
I started to look at the menu, and had a bit of a laugh that it was again chicken or beef style done posh
It took quite a long time for my order to be taken, I am going to say a good hour after take-off, but as I say a full cabin so can understand they were busy. The biggest disappointment of Old F is the crappy IFE, and I was initially pleased to see a card offering the iPad service. My own laptop was battery dead so I hadn't been able to load anything up on it as backup, so I asked about getting an iPad and the FA said yes all enthusiastically but then came back maybe 10 minutes later to say they weren't available and were only on 777s. That's fine and dandy but a bit odd then to carry the cards? Ah whatever, give me some Grande Siecle and I won't complain
Eventually my food service began and glad this time they knew which side to put the knife and fork
I went with the scallop and pork "thing" to start with and it tasted about as good as it looked"
and given the lack of a more interesting option I went with the beef for main. It tasted ok, but er, there ain't much of it:
At this point I had switched from the Grande Siecle to the Bordeaux, which was an obscure 5th growth but pretty decent.
I guess they were just being nice with the small portions in leaving lots of room for desert. Which I gladly made use of. The sundae was it has to be said fabulous and went some way for making up for the lackluster main
with desert I switched to the Sauternes on offer, which was absolutely fabulous. Despite the full house I appeared to be the only one drinking the desert wine, and the half bottle did not take too long to polish off!
After polishing off the sundae I was also brought a nice box of chocolates, and I managed to devour many of these to enjoy the Sautrernes with:
After all of that I was feeling pretty stuffed, and so went to change into the PJ's and managed to sleep for a few hours. I have to say the old F product is a very comfortable bed. The FA made up the bed as I changed and it made for a very comfortable sleep and a good chance to catch up on some sleep after a hectic week and a lot of champagne
Before too long though it was time to come back down to Earth both literally and figuratively. We were offered afternoon tea with sandwiches which I thoroughly enjoyed while listening to some Radio 4 comedy. Some real "getting back to British roots" moment there! Shortly after we made the descendant and in no time were on the ground in Miami and my F experience for now was over.