The next week passed quite quickly, as I buried myself in work. As I was still experiencing the afterglow of recent international First flights, I mustered up the courage to ask my boss for a raise to fund my newly acquired addiction.
Me: “Hey boss, look I just got off some fantastic flights in international first class. Mileage running isn’t quite as lucrative as it used to be, and I don’t think I can fly coach again on a long haul flight. So how about…I don’t know…a 25 percent raise to help fund my addiction.”
Boss: “Of course. That’s not a problem at all.”
If only it were so easy… At lunch that day, one of my co-workers proudly mentioned he saved a of bunch money redeeming some of his AAdvantage miles too. Upon further prodding, he had redeemed 25,000 miles for an AAnytime Award. On a domestic flight. From El Paso to Dallas. A sub 500 mile flight. All to save $150 dollars. To quote him, “I got to use those miles sometimes, right.” I nearly burst into tears. Man, I would have bought you that ticket if you would be willing to… Never mind. @AmericanAir, if you’re reading this, I would never make an offer like that. After all, I am an AAngel of an AAdvantage member.
To me, that was nearly as bad when another coworker told me her family flies paid EK F all the time, but didn’t have Skywards accounts. But I digress. As the week progressed, I was itching to get back on a plane. There’s just something incredibly exciting about someone ordering me to fasten my seatbelt and make sure my seat back and tray table are in the upright and locked position. TMI?
Anyways, back to your regularly scheduled TR.
I’ve been to Southern California every year since 2009, with the highlight being my 6 week assignment in Irvine in 2010, and I’ve grown rather fond of it. So when my parents offered me a chance to join them for a weekend in So Cal, I jumped on it. Of course with any great deal, there’s a catch: I had to fly Southwest. Yes, that Southwest, reviled by many a FTer. Here’s your FT first: name another TR with CX F, SQ F, AND WN. Exactly. There are none!
Why must it be on Southwest? To make a long story, I blame it on my dad. He started flying them back in 2000, for his weekly New Orleans to Houston runs. Ironically, after we moved to Houston in 2006, he’s been making the exact opposite trip on a regular basis. In the old credit based program, he earned 8-10 round trips each year, on average. We’ve redeemed more than 100 awards, between family and friends, over an 11 year period. Heck, I flew Southwest for more than 5 years before I’ve ever purchased a revenue ticket. But this gravy train ended once the second points based reiteration of Southwest’s Rapid Rewards was rolled out in early 2011. After the conversion to the new system, Southwest still allowed holders to use the old awards up to two years after they’re issued.
After burning 15 awards for travel in 2011 and 2012, we had one stray award left, which would get me to So Cal. As the standard award seats are now capacity control, I had to book early to take advantage of award space. I was going to fly into San Diego, to meet my family, and then we were going to drive up to LA to meet up with my cousin, who just got married. Thus, I would be flying home from LAX.
I woke up at 5:30AM on the day of departure. As I had packed the night before, I was out the door in less than half an hour. Southwest operates out of Love Field in Dallas, which is located near downtown. I live out by DFW, so it took a little over 30 minutes to make it there. Parking was easy and cheap at Best Parking ($6 per day for covered parking). The shuttle bus pulled up to my spot as soon I got my bag out of my car, and I was on my way to the terminal. The bus was halfway to the terminal, when I realized I had made a terrible mistake: I forgot to check in the day before.
I like to say that Southwest is one of the more pleasant US domestic experiences, if you know how the system works. For those of you unfamiliar with the Southwest system, their boarding process places passengers in boarding groups A, B, and C. Within the groups, passengers are ordered numerically, up to 60 in each boarding group. So if had the boarding number A1, you would be the first person to board after the pre-boards. A1 through A15 are reserved for Business Select (WN’s premium passengers). Next up are elites (A-List and A-List Preferred), followed by passengers who purchased Early Bird Check In (checks you in automatically to ensure you have a good boarding position). The remaining boarding positions are allocated by the order passengers check in, i.e. the earlier you check in, the better. I knew the system, but it just completely slipped my mind. It’s been a few months since I’ve flown WN, and the last couple times I bought a Business Select ticket, so I didn’t need to check in ahead of time.
There was already a long line at the check in counters when I arrived, around 6:45. A priority lane was available for Business Select passengers and elites, though I wasn’t eligible to use it. There was a dragon guarding the line, but it was still pointless as the check in agents ignored the priority lane and called people up from the regular line. Though the regular line was long, it moved quickly due WN’s efficient process. I made it to the counter in 15 minutes, despite the long line. The counter isn’t quite the check in counter in the traditional sense. There are two kiosks at each “counter position”. You just punch in your Rapid Rewards number or PNR, just answer if you need to check bags, and it spits out your boarding passes. All the agents have to do are direct the lines, check IDs, tag bags, and provide assistance if needed. This makes for a very efficient process.
With my bag checked (at no extra charge!) and boarding passes in hand, I made my way to long security line. I looked longingly toward the guarded priority security entrance, which I wasn’t eligible to use that day, on my way to the peon line. Man, it’s been a while since I’ve flown without some sort of priority privileges. But I can deal with this… I think.
A minute or two after getting in line for security, I got a text message from Southwest notifying me of a 45 minute delay. This would shrink my Albuquerque layover down to 40 minutes, but it was still doable. In my opinion, TSA at Dallas Love Field are among the worse I’ve ever encountered. They’re generally rude, inflexible, and arrogant. The ID checker I drew that day was no exception to the rule. As I got to the front of the line, she screamed, “Next”. I greeted her with a "Morning". The agent grunted in reply, stared at me for a minute, glanced at my ID, scribbled something on my boarding pass and sent me on my way to stand in the long line for the imaging/x ray machine. The line was slow because of the many families traveling were unable to figure out what they needed to take out/off before going through the machines. Of course, the screaming agents really don’t help. It was another 10 minutes before I finally cleared security.
After I got dressed, I made a beeline for the lounge… Lounge? Oh man, I’m really hallucinating now. We don’t need no stinking lounge here at Southwest. Instead, we get a plethora of fine dining options in the terminal, so you can choose what you want to eat. Feeling pretty hungry after not eating the night before, I headed to the Chili’s located across from Gate 4, which happened to be my departure gate. I ended paying $17 for way too salty bacon, egg, and cheese breakfast tacos, accompanied by tasteless hash browns, with a choice of freshly mixed Minute Maid apple juice or orange juice. This little breakfast almost made me long for the stale muffins at the Admirals Club. Just as I finished picking through my food, I got another text from Southwest. Uh oh, this can’t be good.
As it turns out, it wasn’t. My flight was now delayed for 1.5 hours, causing me to misconnect. Though I’ve flown WN many times, I’ve never experienced a major IRROPS before. From what I’ve heard here on FT, this could get interesting. I quickly paid my bill and hurried over to my gate, where a couple of people were already in line. There were several agents working the gate, so I was called up by a friendly agent in a few minutes. After explaining the situation to her, she rebooked me with no questions asked. She even called down to the rampers to make sure my bag got rerouted to my new flight. This took all of 5 minutes and I was on my way to my new gate, after thanking her. So far, so good.
I was rebooked on the 8:40AM direct flight to San Diego, with a stop in San Antonio. One positive that came out of this situation was that I ended up with a B6 boarding pass, since the first segment was lightly loaded. I arrived at the gate just as they began preboarding. Afterwards, the A group boarded and the B group was called to line up. I found my spot in line, and the B1-30 group was called to board a few moments later. I handed my boarding pass to the friendly gate agent, who wished me a good day. And I was off.
WN 934
Dallas Love Field (DAL)-San Antonio (SAT)
Depart: 8:40 AM
Arrive: 9:30 AM
Aircraft: Boeing 737-700 (N774SW)
Seat: Economy 4A
After a quick walk down the jet bridge, I was greeted by a friendly flight attendant as I turned right into a very familiar cabin. The all economy cabin was clean, bright, and adorned with attractive blue and tan leather seats. One of the unique features, if you want to call it that, of Southwest is open seating, i.e. seats are not assigned ahead of time and you sit where you want. Hence, why it’s critical to make sure you do check in early: to ensure a good seat. While many on FT loath this, it actually makes things easier on agents in case of rebooking as well as streamline boarding process, as people aren’t looking for a particular seat.
There was another passenger seated in aisle seat when I arrived. He willingly got up to let me through when I arrived. I kept my carry on with me, as I intended to do some work. I find Southwest’s seats to be very comfortable. They’re well-padded and the leather seating surfaces are of surprisingly good quality. As an added bonus, seat pitch is 32 inches, a little more than the 30-31 inches offered by other major carriers. It doesn’t seem like much but it does wonders in terms of comfort. However, this advantage will soon be eliminated, since Southwest is enhancing seats, with one inch less pitch, as part of their new “Evolve” interior.
Boarding was completed quickly, and we pushed back from the gate a couple of minutes early. The FAs began their manual safety demo, since WN does not equip any of their planes with A/V equipment. After waiting for the planes in front of us to take off, we rocketed down runway 13R and climbed into the wild blue yonder over downtown Dallas. At that point, I completely dosed off and didn’t wake up until we were descending into San Antonio. It took me a few moments to remember where I was going after I woke up. But I finally figured it out. A FA had noticed I had woken up while she was collecting trash, and offered to get me a drink, but I declined. We landed and parked at the gate a few minutes ahead of schedule.
As I was continuing on to San Diego, I remained seated until all terminating passengers deplaned and the FAs got the through count correct. I was pretty satisfied with my seat so I decided to stay put.
Parked right next to us was N759GS, a WN 737-700 equipped with wifi, as indicated by the conspicuous “hump” near the base of its vertical stabilizer.
While I’ve flown quite a few wifi equipped WN flights in the past 2 years, none of my longer flights (over 2.5 hours) were operated by wifi equipped aircraft. This was a bit maddening, but I can still pass time with my iPod and a good book.
After just a few minutes on the ground, passengers began boarding the aircraft.
WN 934
San Antonio (SAT)-San Diego (SAN)
Depart: 10:15 AM
Arrive: 10:50 AM
Aircraft: Boeing 737-700 (N774SW)
Seat: Economy 4A
Midway through the boarding process, FAs made an announcement for passengers still boarding that the only available seats were middle seats and passengers without a seat should just take the closest available seat and “get to know your 2 new best friends”. The seat next to me remained empty right up to the point the when the cabin door was about to close. And then someone else shows up… And this someone, to put it politely, was a big guy. Now, I’m not small by any stretch of the imagination, but I fit very comfortably in an economy seat. Not to sound judgmental, but this guy obviously would not fit well at all.
You know how you approach some random girl at a bar at 1AM, and she’s obviously not interested? But yet, you press on. As you continue your approach, she avoids eye contact and concentrates really hard on that fruity little drink. Of course, I know this from observation, and not from experience. This situation was kind of like that. As soon as I saw the gentleman turn right, I immediately buried myself in a game of Angry Birds, while praying he walks pass my row. Alas, this was not meant to be. He stopped at my row, and the passenger seated in the aisle seat let him in. It was a bit of squeeze, but I can manage for sub 3 hour flight.
The boarding door closed on time and we pushed back not a minute later. We took off after landing exactly 46 minutes beforehand, which is quite impressive. FAs were up and about to prepare for the drink and snack service after we reached cruising altitude. Unless you’re on one of the new 737-800s, there are no carts on Southwest, presumably to save weight. Drink service is done the old fashioned way: via notepad and delivered from a tray. While you won’t get a full can most of the time, refills are offered liberally.
After drink orders were taken, FAs came down the aisle with baskets of peanuts and Cheese Nips. Nothing fancy, but it’s more than you get on most legacy carriers. Drinks were delivered a few minutes later.
I washed the salty snacks down with a ginger ale, and got cracking on a little work. After I got bored, my seatmate chatted me up and we talked about travel and a little economics. Space issues aside, he was a perfectly pleasant seatmate. Time passed rather quickly as we cruised above the American southwest (pun intended).
We were soon descending into beautiful San Diego, and our friendly crew was tidying up the cabin for landing. As usual, the landing runway was Runway 27. This is certainly one of my favorite approaches, right behind John Wayne airport (just up I-5 in Santa Ana) and the River Visual 19 approach into Reagan National Airport. The approach took us over I-5, flying next to the sky scrapers of downtown, and screaming over the famous parking garage. Touchdown, spoilers up, reverse thrust, hit the brakes and then we slowed down enough to make a left turn toward the terminal, 3/4 of the way down the runway. We parked at gate 5. I was off the plane a few minutes after the jet bridge was attached and headed toward baggage claim. After a 10 minute wait, bags hit the belt and I happy to see that my bag was rerouted in time. I then headed to Hertz to pick up my car and headed to meet my family at the Marriot Gas Lamp Quarter.
All in all, it was another typical performance from Southwest. The plane was clean and comfortable. Drinks and snacks were adequate. All of the staff I encountered were friendly and eager to help. My bag and I made it one piece. All things considered, this is actually better than flying some of the legacy carriers. While they certainly aren’t the greatest airline on the planet, I don’t think Southwest deserves a lot of the grief they get on FT and other forums. Though, I do understand that the lack of upgrades and truly usable points/miles are a turn off to many people (including myself), I wouldn’t hesitate to fly them on most domestic hops.