PART 3 - The journey home
At this stage I seem to have stopped bothering to make notes for the TR, so I shall have to try working from memory and a few photos. This will be quite a challenge
Thursday 14 Jan. Oh, what an
awful early start to proceedings. The reliable Roberts bus transfer is scheduled for 0505
Whatever, no option, it's their planned schedules, so just get on with it. The bus arrived at the appointed time +/- one minute, and picked up pax at a couple more hotels before running us all to the airport, dropping each of us off at the appropriate Departures zone. HNL is an easy airport to navigate, with the oddity of an agricultural screening belt before you get to bag-drop. Cases checked through HNL-LAX-LHR-DUB … I have developed a bit of confidence in AA’s baggage management after our SAV trip last Sep, so we relaxed and, armed with a fresh set of BPs with the liberal over-print of ‘PRIORITY’ etc, we breezed through Security and found the bleak Sakura lounge again. A coffee and a couple of mini-pastries kept us going until it was time to board.
Sector 6: AA270, A32B, First seats 2A/C, 0800 HNL-LAX 1542
Nothing special, really. Just another 5+ hours droning across the Pacific, with a decent breakfast and a few more time-zones to cross. This time we arrived at LAX T4, which seemed very familiar by now! A kerbside cigarette or two braced us for re-entering the world of commercial flying via TSA Pre✓ again. I wonder what it is that qualifies us for this luxury? Class of travel, OWE status, or just being ‘suitable people’? The TSA website doesn’t seem to clarify that aspect! Not complaining … we just headed for the AA Flagship Lounge to waste a couple of hours with a glass or three of wine and another breakfast/lunch/dinner snack. And then it’s the bit we’ve been looking forward to … prime Business seats on the AA 77W
Sector 7: AA138, B77W, Business seats 3J/4J, 1900 LAX-LHR 1330
Oh, this is VERY nice! I mean the highlight of the air travelling bit of this holiday. Rows 1 & 2 are First, behind a curtain when airborne. Then Rows 3 & 4 in a mini-cabin, in a very nice 1-2-1 arrangement … so we each have a window, and aisle access. And what a seat! Never mind BA’s l/h Business/Club World seat; this is IMO even better than my distant memory of BA’s First seat. There’s storage spaces everywhere … under the footrest, in a cupboard by the wide shelf, another one underneath the shelf and yet another sneaky one [for shoes?] under the left side armrest. No wonder some people leave things on aircraft! Absolutely super ^
Curiously [or not] the socket for the lovely Bose headsets is on the inside of that little cupboard, behind the seat controls.
Away we go, then; I’m ready to really enjoy this. Usual PDB and drinks orders taken, meal pre-selected on-line. But … sadly the food offering was something of a disappointment, and certainly didn’t match the hard product on this occasion.
The accompanying ’strawberry and blue cheese salad’ was, to my surprise, quite nice. But the Portobello Mushroom starter was pretty innocuous - I didn’t finish it. As for the “Pepper and Olive Tapenade Crusted Halibut” … you can see where I stopped bothering with it. The fish was dry and largely tasteless, the pot of something resembling piccalilli added nothing to the experience, some red-skin potatoes … and, in true American style, no vegetables!! Do they think they are lethal, or cause obscure diseases? Overall, a fairly disappointing meal.
On the positive side, the seat/bed was both spacious and very comfortable and [unusually] we both slept soundly for about 5 hours until it was time for our breakfast of “Quiche Lorraine with fire roasted turkey sausage and paprika potatoes” - which was nice!
Oh, well, you can’t win them all … but I rate a decent seat more highly than airline food, and AA beat BA hands down on this sector.
Friday 15 Jan At around 1330 we docked at LHR Terminal 3, another new experience for us. With plenty of time in hand, we braved the “Flight Connections” route to Terminal 5. OK, I know from FT and the BA Dashboard that there are many different ways of skinning this particular cat, but I thought it right that we should try the basic process … follow the Purple signs. I guess a longgggg walk after an overnight TATL is a ‘good thing’, but it seemed rather excessive! However, we passed through the assorted processes, including the scenic bus tour of airside LHR, without any difficulty or delay. It’s just a bloody awful arrangement involving long walks - I’m grateful I’m still fully functional; I have no idea what it must be like for those with mobility issues.
Eventually we found ourselves [yet again] in the Shopping Mall that masquerades as the UK’s main airport … at the far end from the BA First Lounge. Oh, well, just keep walking,until eventually we slumped in a comfy couple of seats to wait the call for the next flight. Which Gate was it? Somewhere at the North end of T5A, a low-numbered A-gate, so another nice long walk from the southern end of T5A. I’m getting very tired of LHR by now!!
Sector 8: AA6772 [aka BA826], A320, Business seats 2A/C, 1525 LHR-DUB 1650
A completely unremarkable journey, which hasn’t even lodged in my memory or on my camera, apart from the fact that the CC were absolutely superb and charming! All I know is that we arrived at DUB again, after heading in the ‘wrong direction’ for going home. We emerged from the aircraft, entered the RoI, found our cases had indeed arrived from LAX and went and waited for the shuttle bus … another night at the DUB Airport Hilton
We draped our battered bodies over the desk at Reception, admitted we had already checked in on-line someday/somewhere, and explained the reason for our semi-zombie state. The charming lass on the desk rattled her keyboard, asked if we had specifically wanted Room 104 [we said it was the only one offered on the website], rattled her keyboard again … and upgraded us to a “King Bed on the VIP Floor”. We were pleased to discover that the bed also had a room around it, and that the hot water worked! Having dumped the 2 cases, we wandered downstairs to enjoy our ‘free drink’ vouchers at the Bar.
“Red wine for her, a large Bushmills for me, please”
“Will you want ice in that, sir?”
“No, I’ll be drinking it outside, having a cigarette!”
It’s bloody freezing here … after a week or more of 27ºc, it’s now marginally 1ºc and not ideal for sitting out for long. King Bed on VIP floor beckons us … ZZZZZZ
Saturday 16 Jan. Nearly over … we want to be home now! So here we are on the 0745 shuttle back to DUB, where we’re dropped at T2. The driver explains how to get to T1 … up one floor, bear to the right and there’s a covered walkway across to T1. Thank you!
Again a painless bag-drop and security process, and off to the
daa lounge to kill an hour or so before …
Sector 9: BA845, A320, Business seats 2A/C, 1015 DUB-LHR 1145
Oh, the nice charcuterie plate, aka ‘Extended Breakfast”. When I mentioned that the CC raised his eyebrows - “Ah, you know these things!”
And here we are, back at LHR again … no wonder people get tempted to drop a sector!! We arrived some 30 minutes ahead of schedule, had the inevitable long walk to Reclaim, and had a minimal wait for the bags. Off to kerbside for a quick ciggy, and then to the National Express coach desk - can we get an earlier bus? No problem, with our flex tickets, and a few minutes later we’re heading round the M25/M23 to LGW.
With time to spare, we had the chance to have a chat with the lady on First check-in about the prospects of the move to LGW(S) being on time, and the new Lounge arrangements. And then with bags duly dropped, a quick Premium Gatwick Security, some Duty Free drink and ciggies, and off to explore the new Lounge arrangements.
I won’t bore you with that aspect; it’s well covered here >>>
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/briti...questions.html Suffice to say, we found seats on a sofa in the Library, had a couple of drinks and a snack, and waited quietly for an hour or so.
And finally ….
Sector 10: BA2774, A319, Business seats 2A/C, 1600 LGW-JER 1700
A typical X-Channel hop, with a meal I didn’t need or eat. Reclaim revealed 2 well-travelled suitcases, both intact. A taxi home … and collapse. We collected The Cat the following day, and iWife took a break before embarking on 2 days of laundry!
………………
Was it worth it? Of course it was!! We had 9 days of Pacific warmth, with the enjoyment only slightly diminished by 6 days of travelling, with 10 time-zones and a temperature range that was quite challenging on occasion! A very reasonable investment in a long-haul winter break, some new aircraft and destinations, and we survived intact! And flying AA is soooo much better than BA, in so many ways!
Benefits … psychological uplift, 1,110 TPs and BAEC Gold renewal, and the ability to say “We’ve been in Hawaii for the last week or so”. DYKWIA?