TAP Portugal
TP – 262 Business Class (W)
YYZ – LIS (Toronto Pearson Terminal 1 – Lisbon International)
August 13, 2019
11:30 PM – 11:25 AM + 1 (scheduled)
Booked: Airbus 330-9 neo
Flown: Airbus 330-9 neo
The boarding zone was, like many of my other Toronto Pearson experiences, absolute chaos. There were several dozen families and those that needed extra time to board having to crawl their way across the non-existent maze.
Boarding started at about 15 minutes after the posted 10:45 PM sign on the card through a strange L shaped gate. While we waited, I got a glimpse of the new A330-9 Neo parked with the sunglasses look.
We boarded through door 2L on a single jet bridge this morning. We crossed the aisle and turned left. The business class configuration is set up in a 1-2-1 design. When I bought the tickets, I was expecting an angle flat seat on their Airbus 330-2 but we since got swapped onto the newer product.
Most of the travelling customers in business, didn’t seem to be people actually travelling on business travel. Rather, they seemed more like affluent families or seniors. It reminded me somewhat of the business class clientele on our past Iceland Air flights.
Waiting at the seat was an amenity kit, the menu for today’s flight, and a set of headphones. The amenity kit was pretty with scenes from Portugal, but not particularly useful in terms of content.
A pre-departure beverage of water, orange juice or sparkling was dropped off.
I took the opportunity to take a look at the menu. The menu itself was quite Plain Jane and was simple in its presentation.
The wine list was the interesting area of the menu, featuring Portugese wines.
We got underway on time. Surprisingly, the safety video was screened and surprisingly it was wholly in Portuguese with only English subtitles. It featured scenes of Portugal. It definitely piqued my interest for another longer visit sometime.
I fooled around with the large touch screen. The flight itself from the East Coast was a short 6 hrs 11 minutes by the time we were airborne. As with most business class flights under seven hours, it’s not much time to eat, relax and get a sleep in, let alone enjoy the product.
I figured that on such a short flight, we would either get a large breakfast or a large dinner. Without may trip reports about TAP Portugal, I didn't have a great starting point for any research. It turned out the larger service was the dinner. I took one for the team and had the green pea soup with lemon crème fraiche, grilled beef, potato puree, roasted vegetables and demi-glace sauce, plated and presented all at once. I paired this with Portuguese Quint da Alornia Tejo red wine. It was tasty but the wine was presented in very small thimble sized glasses.
The beef was surprisingly well cooked for an airplane steak… perfectly red.
After dinner, we were passing Prince Edward Island so I went to sleep. The cabin lights were dimmed but not put out completely. TAP Portgual provides a basic blanket and a light cheaper pillow that is very basic; similar to what you’d expect in economy class, only larger in size.
The Recaro seat is pleasant and new looking. It is quite firm; something that would eventually transfer into a firm sleeping experience. I slept pretty lightly for about 3.5 hours. As a side sleeper, I didn’t find the seats too comfortable since I wasn’t able to bend my legs. My feet would be stuck in the foot cavity and unless my knees were into the aisle, it was a bit difficult. As a 6ft 2 inch person, I could easily touch both ends of the foot and top of the seat lying flat. Nevertheless, it was a full flat seat and better than an angle flat on some of the older aircraft that I have flown. A 330 ml bottle of water was dropped off at the seat, closing out the dinner service.
At about 4:40 AM, or 90 minutes left from landing, I woke up for the breakfast serving. The breakfast was strictly a continental affair; egg lovers like myself would be lingering for more.
A towel service was presented.
Breakfast consisted of pastries, yoghurt along with orange juice and a coffee. The coffee was fairly average; not specialty branded or anything like that.
I checked out the washrooms and they were straightforward. There were no branded toiletries or anything along those lines.
Since I didn’t have time to get into a movie, I explored the in flight wifi offers. I didn’t get an opportunity to try it out, but they offered a variety of price points.
As always, it’s interesting to see the first glimpse of the continent when you arrive from an overseas flight. Arriving into Lisbon was a little bit different than my usual European flights which usually arrive to greener climates in France, Germany or the United Kingdom. The view from the window on the approach was quite scenic. It included a fly over of downtown Lisbon.
We eventually touched down at a non gate position, parking next to an Azul jet.
Overall, TAP Portgual, was a reasonable way to cross the Atlantic. The service was fine. It was everything you’d expect from a business class crossing. Aside from the compact footprint, I would easily fly them again on this new equipment. Add the fact that they have discounted business class fares that earn 200% EQM/RDM into Air Canada’s Aeroplan and you have a winning combination.