PART 2 … The Return Journey

14 Sep 16
IAD-LHR, 1830–0650
BA216, A380, Club World seats 53A/B

We left the hotel at 1305, and at 1355 I dropped Wife at Departures [with our luggage] and returned the vee-hickle to Avis. Back at Departures at 1415, I waited for the BA desks to open … they had signs on the desks saying “Open at 1530”, but comments on FT recently said it was 1430. As you would expect, FT was correct!! Positioning ourselves at the front of the empty First queue [sorry, line] we only had to wait a few minutes before the Agents emerged from wherever they keep Agents … and having checked in on-line earlier our bags were taken and BPs issued for the 2 homebound sectors. What a charmless Agent she was - hardly a word, no eye contact, never a smile. Oh, well, we all have bad day, I guess.

Down the escalators to TSA and Security, where they have rearranged things slightly since I was last at IAD. Still the ‘Priority’ line for passport/BP checks, and then the complete lottery of which screening lane you choose to use. No TSA Pre✓ for us this time … shoes and belts off, electronics in the tray too, and empty your pockets before the Nude-O-Scope. Now I didn’t hear that quite clearly enough: I thought that meant things like wallets and metal objects. I discovered it means everything including handkerchiefs, passport, BP, comb. OK, I’ll know better next time. The TSA staff were as miserable and vague as ever - how did they expect my wife, facing sideways in the scanner, to see the Agent away to her left out of her line of sight waving a limp hand to tell her to come out? Shouting at my wife eventually resolved the communications problem. Grrrr.

The BA Lounge at IAD is, as many of you will know, very pleasant. A nice range of mini-wraps and things like that, and an excellent Vegetable Minestrone soup. Some very tasty wines on offer [self-pour, or served at the Bar] and Champagne available on request.





A great place for ‘People-Watching”.



At T-45 we headed for Gate B-44, where G-XLEC was waiting for us, and Priority Boarding commenced almost immediately. The A380 boarding at IAD seems very well run, with numerous signs showing where to wait depending on seat number [and indeed deck]. We saw little of that, being amongst the first to board! Push-back was at 1825, and the first drinks run was at 1930 … immediately followed by the meal carts. Clearly there was a degree of urgency to allow people to get to sleep, but I had hardly drunk half of my V&T before I had to make space for the meal tray!



Ummm … no starter, just a salad? Apparently they do this to minimise meal time and maximise sleep time. Well, it’s over 7 hours, so not exactly a short flight, and an 1830 departure is hardly screaming “bed-time”. Oh, well, go with the flow. I ignored the “Grass Course”, supposedly enhanced by the presence of 4 green beans and a bit of chopped beetroot, and waited for the delivery of the Braised Beef - which was actually rather tasty and moist, as was the Tedeschi Capitel Nicalaḷ 2014, Valpolicella Superiore DOC. Italian wines both ways - how very British





The cheesecake was OK, in an anodyne sort of way, and the Cheese plate was fine.



To my annoyance, I just could not get any sleep, despite the nice quiet cabin. Everywhere I moved I was bumping some part of me against something hard and uncomfortable, and the pillow was [as always] barely adequate for head support even with the seat tilted up slightly. I really don’t get on with the CW seat, I’m afraid. If I could sleep flat on my back, it might be different, but I can’t sleep in that position.

Oh, well, Breakfast ... in the dark, of course! A couple of pastries, a yoghurt and a black coffee fitted the bill nicely: the pastries were actually surprisingly nice.



After a very short holding loop, we arrived at LHR on 09L at 0620. No delays at the Border, with most of the e-passport machines seemingly working, and we were at reclaim at 0700. I’m not sure that we waited very long for our bags, because at 0730 we were on the NE Bus to LGW [booked on the 0820, but no problem thanks to the Flex tickets] and to our surprise were able to grab 1J/K

15 Sep 16
LGW-JER, 1210-1315
BA2772, A319, Club Europe seats 2A/C

Ahh, Gatwick. What a mess they have made of you over the years! I can remember when it was all quite neat and tidy, but now it’s all building works and temporary bollards and hoardings everywhere. The coach dropped us off way before the North terminal, so we started walking … to the Terminal, then up 2 floors to the ‘outside space’, then to the far left end of the Terminal for BA bag-drop [First obviously quick and efficient, thank you], then back to the far right end of the Terminal for the new Security [Premium Gatwick very quick and efficient, thank you], then back again through the shops to the far left of the Terminal for the Lounge. After that I’d had enough of walking through Gatwick for one day! However, the new 'Premium Gatwick' Security lanes were a great improvement, and it worked very well - only marred by the usual inability of people to stack their empty trays, which inevitably led to the conveyor belt coming to a halt [we stacked about a dozen before moving on].

We settled down in the ‘Clubrooms” lounge at around 0900 to wait for the last sector. A pleasant enough environment, I guess, although the food offering [which wasn’t offered] was fairly minimal. Roll on the new BA Lounge[s] in the South Terminal. The best part was that it was quiet and comfortable. And after a couple of hours of wishing we were actually in bed, and asleep, we wandered the last few yards to Gate 55F for the last sector.

The only amusement was the 'suit' with his black briefcase proudly adorned with the old-style BAEC Bronze luggage tag [the one with the white swoosh] … I wondered if he’d actually slipped down to Blue since then Boarding was vaguely well organised, and we collapsed into our usual seats. At this point, a different ’suit’ in 1K decides he needs to get into the aisle to greet and chat to the occupant of 3K, thereby largely blocking the aisle for the 100 passengers in Y who are trying, with their luggage, to get to their seats. He continues chatting for a good 2-3 minutes, completely oblivious to [or not caring about] the inconvenience he was causing. Eventually, his personal social needs satisfied, he waded through the throng against the flow back to his seat.

The usual high-speed delivery of Lunch started soon after we were airborne. With 8 rows of CE and 29 pax [the CC told me], the CSD joined the other 2 CC in distributing trays and beverages. A rather decent “Salmon on skewers over couscous”, which probably has a posh name. But soon we were home again - with a rather long, floating, landing followed by stern braking and a lot of reverse thrust!

Another trip done, TPs and Avios all seemed to credit promptly. That leaves us on 1,180 TPs each, and with a 700 TP trip booked for March renewal of BAEC Gold/OW Emerald for another year is assured