DL = Delta
BQ = Virgin Express
MAN = Manchester (England) Int'l Airport
BOS = Boston/Logan Int'l Airport
JFK = New York/Kennedy Int'l Airport
LHR = London/Heathrow Int'l Airport
BRU = Brussels/National (aka Zaventem) Airport
CPH = Copenhagen (aka Kastrup) Airport
It all started when we went to purchase our tickets. We were ready to book them, when something came up at work, so we put off buying them. A week later we went back and were going back & forth on what sort of tickets to buy. We'd never flown business class Internationally before. We were also going back & forth on a destination - London would be nice, but Delta (airline of choice, the silver handcuffs & all :-) no longer flew Boston to London, or at least, stopped on 31 August, and we preferred to go in September.
I had won two tickets from Virgin Express from any destination to any destination (that they served). So we toyed with the idea of flying to somewhere on the Continent and flying from there to London on the BQ (Virgin Express) tickets. Problem is, tickets to the continent were almost universally more expensive. $600-700 round trip. At the same time, we looked into flying to Manchester, England. The price was about $500 in coach. We figured why not just get an "M" class fare and then use our upgrade certificates to fly business class. "M" class fares to the continent were a good $1000, but to Manchester, about $800 or thereabouts.
Work had been going badly, so we decided to splurge and buy the "M" class fare to Manchester, and book a seperate trip with the BQ tickets to the continent.
Buying the tickets was an experience. We went down to the City Ticket Office (Federal St, Boston). We took with us some MCOs that we had from a previous re-ticket to apply to the cost, and the upgrades. It took quite a while for the whole ticketing process - about 30 minutes - because of the MCOs and upgrades and securing seats and the like. We also wanted to know if the business class lounge at JFK was non-smoking or not, and the nice agent called down and found out for us - the answer was yes.
The next task was finding & booking a hotel in Denmark. We read guidebooks, but we kept coming back to a hotel we'd seen on the web, Hotel Maritime. I sent email to them and they wrote back telling me that yes, they have non-smoking rooms, and they accept VISA (my two big questions). Then I asked about rates - and I was quoted some 100 DKr above their listed rates on their webpage. One of the guidebooks I had read specifically mentioned this hotel as having rates "open to negotiation". Upon learning this, I wrote back to the hotel (via email) and asked about a cheaper rate, and they did come down to 625 Dkr/night.
After that, I had to worry about car rental in England. Our insurance company (USAA) used to give a hefty discount with Alamo, but doesn't do that any longer - and only gives moderate discounts with Avis & Hertz. Neither Avis nor Hertz were anywhere near reasonable (600 USD for 11 days in a tiny automatic - eep). I did some research and found several companies to be cheaper, including the one we eventually booked with, Kenning (Town & Country was actually cheaper, but we chose Kenning for reasons not worth going into here).
Our Virgin Express flight was due to depart Heathrow at 8am on 16 September, meaning we had to be there before 7am for checking ... I did not relish the choice of driving 90 miles and having to deal with car rental return. It would have meant having to get up by 4:30am - not an option I appreciated. We decided to look for a B&B near Heathrow instead.
None of the B&Bs were actually that close, and all of them presumed that we would have our own car (at the time we were going to return the car on the night of 15 September, so we wouldn't have to deal with parking it while we went around London during that day). Also, the B&Bs included breakfast, but none of them started serving until 6:30 or 7:00am - and we were hoping to be out of there by 6am.
Instead we looked at hotels. There were two cheap ones: Hotel Ibis, and Travel Inn. Travel Inn was booked for the night we wanted to stay there, and Hotel Ibis was sufficiently questionable to make us wonder if we should rethink our London strategy.
In the middle of this decision-making-process, my sister flew Prague -> London (Heathrow) -> Boston. While in London/Heathrow, I asked her to pick up some discount accomodationg flyers. She did this, and brought us back a flyer from Expotel Hotel Reservations at Heathrow. We gave them a ring and they quoted us a rate of 90 GBP/night at the Radisson Hotel Edwardian, right near the airport. This was less than half of their quoted rate (200GBP), and the hotel has a five star rating with an indoor pool (a plus for me, as I love to swim). We booked it - it ended up being about 30GBP more per night than the Hotel Ibis, but we felt the difference in cost was worth the questionability of the Hotel Ibis (we didn't know if they had non-smoking rooms, it had been described as "seedy" by some, etc).
In the days leading up to the trip, my husband and I went on our jet lag diet as usual, and shifted our rising and sleeping periods by 30 minutes per day. We also cut out caffeine. This had the effect of making us very tired for the flight. It only partially worked, though, as adrenaline was a factor!
Our initial leg was BOS-JFK, and the aircraft was N668DN, a 757-232. We were seated in first class (which we got because we were flying trans-Atlantic in business class). Pushback was 1528 (scheduled for 1515), arrived JFK 1625 (scheduled 1620). We arrived at JFK Terminal 2 (the old Terminal "1A"), and made a beeline for the business class lounge in that terminal. It was very nice! We relaxed for a while and ate a pseudo dinner of ham/cheese/tomato sandwiches, cheese, crackers, and cookies. There was an open bar but we didn't partake.
We then decided we should go over to Terminal 3 (Worldport) before too many people arrived [and took the best seats at the business class lounge there!]. The business class lounge there was much fuller, and had little food (what they had was very picked over). They kept bringing out trays of food which would disappear. Later, after the passengers left for the first wave of red eyes (~6pm), things got less nuts and the food stuck around longer.
All in all I think the lounge in Terminal 2 was better than the Worldport - but that just may have been because we left before it got really busy, and we had seats way in the back where it was pretty quiet. Terminal 2 had more & recent magazines and lots of free newspapers. Most magazines in the Worldport were of the "Golf" variety and those that weren't seemed to be old.
We observed 4x-AXH (El Al) labelled only "CARGO" taxi by. Was this the Operation Solomon plane?
Our plane pulled in while we were sitting in the business class lounge, N767DA, L1011-500, built in 1981, ex C-GAGI (Air Canada). Ironic that N767DA is a Tristar!
Boarding was 7:30, so we went down a little bit early to settle in. We boarded and were immediately offered drinks while the FAs stowed our jackets. We were offered "champagne? mimosa? something else?" - I had ginger ale. We then had plenty of time to fuss with the C class seats and figure out what each control did (it's not really obvious!).
We pushed back late due to late connecting bags (not ours! - we had a four hour layover!). We ended up taking off 1 hour 10 minutes late. The line for takeoff was VERY long (ahh, Kennedy at Rush Hour!). We got some kind of priority to skip to the head of the line (slot shuffling?) but then ATC held us up due to weather.
My husband asked the FA if he could use his GPS on board (see GPS Trip Report). The FA checked and the pilots said that he could, but that the flight crew didn't think he'd be able to get any satellites locked. After takeoff he started the GPS and ran it all night - he had plenty of satellites locked (we had a seat on the righthand side of the plane so he had a southern view).
I will now describe the dinner options from the menu:
Appetizer:
Entrees:
Dessert (choose one or both):
The "Express Classics" ("Fully complete and available upon request, this choice can be prepared for you in minutes") meal was a shrimp pizza. My husband had it and said it was wonderful. It was served like the first class domestic meal - all on one tray (pizza, salad, dessert).
We did get a video watchman but abandoned watching it, choosing to sleep instead.
Business class was *completely* full, including one (seatless) infant. F class only had ONE (!) person in it.
The seats were pretty comfortable, except for one thing. The leg rest didn't extend QUITE far enough (I'm 5'8"). We had blankets and pillows, both of which were nice (usually the in-flight blankets make me itch). The seats were comfortable enough for us to get a couple of hours sleep each (thanks to the eyeshades, mainly). Not bad, all told.
We both had the cold breakfast (cereal, fruit, yoghurt) and it was yummy. I also had an (offered) hot scone. The other option for breakfast was quiche (specifically "Roasted Red Bell Pepper and Swiss Cheese Quiche").
The plane landed 40 minutes or so late, and my husband and I were the 10th (or so) off of the plane. We were, however, the first to immigration. My EU passport and I were through in minutes, but it took hubby 30 minutes as two 747s arrived just before us - and they were SQ and CX, two airlines with foreign nationals who Her Majesty's Government immigration screen more carefully. My husband had the typical check ("why are you here?" "I'm visiting my wife's Grandmother" "is she British?" "yes" "well that's alright then!")
By the time he cleared through, I had already picked up our (one) bag, and put it on a cart along with two of the carryons. HMG Customs was non-existant, as usual. We went to WH Smiths and bought a Ribena (only 50p, last time at Gatwick it cost us 90p!). We used the change to ring the car rental agency. They met us within minutes of the phonecall.
We rented a car from Kenning. They were off airport - about 10 minutes away. The staff was friendly, and they showed us to our "P" reg Corsa (aside for Yanks: cars in the UK have the first [or last, for older ones] letter that signifies the year of manufacture. August 1997-July 1998 is "R", August 1996-July 1997 was "P", so our car was less than a year old) minutes after we arrived. We drove off down the M6, then hit the traditional traffic at Spaghetti Junction. We switched drivers often, taking advantage of the M6's frequent s ervice areas (much more frequent than the M40!). Total trip time to Gran's was about 1 hour 45 minutes, due to stopping in traffic.
September 15, Monday, we made our way down the M40 to London. We were due to return the car late Monday, but chose to go down to London early so we could go into town and go book shopping. We went M40-A404-M4-Kenning (on the A30) rather than go M40-M25-M4. We filled the car up with petrol (Kenning was next door to a BP, convenient!) and returned it. Then we took the shuttle to terminal 1 so we could reconfirm our flight and pay our departure taxes (which worked out to GBP 11 each).
Then we checked 1 bag at left luggage and went off to the Tube. On our way to the Tube we saw a sign for spectator's area - interesting, last I heard it was closed. We missed a sign somewhere and ended up in Terminal 2 (which is undergoing extensive renovation and is a pit), but a nice lady at the Information Desk gave us directions.
While in T2 we both hit the toilets, and while waiting outside the toilets we saw brochures describing the eating options at Terminal 2. We resolved to pick up one of these flyers when we returned to Terminal 1, because we knew we'd have to eat breakfast at the airport the next day.
The spectator's area is up ALOT of steps but boy, it was worth it! It beat the pants off of the one at Gatwick - for one thing, it was free. For another, they had an aviation hobby shop which *hadn't* been closed down (unlike LGW). The shop was Ian Allen (a transport publisher in England) and had a very good selection of books. As we did not wish to carry them with us to CPH and back, we resolved to return on Friday when we were due back from CPH.
The spectators area was up even MORE steps from the shop, but once there we found it was indeed worth it. We viewed numerous 747s, and 767s, plus a couple of 777s and a "pointy thing" or two.
We nipped into London and back (if you call "nip" a 45 min ride :-) mainly to go to book and record shops. The Tube ride was fun, however.
We returned to Heathrow and picked up one of the flyers for eateries at Terminal 1. Immediately we liked the look of one of the places, called "Noon's", an Indian restaurant on the upper level. We checked the menu out, and the breakfast choices looked very good and exotic. We figured it had to be better than Burger King! After scouting Noon's, we went down to the Arrivals level and got the shuttle bus (GBP 3.50 each return, ouch!) to our Hotel, Radisson Hotel Edwardian. It is a gorgeous hotel and our room was very nicely appointed (even with a towel heating rack!). The room was almost American in size (a "King" sized bed, which turned out to be two single bed bases with a King sized mattress over them both :-).
We were due to meet a friend of my husband's for dinner but he couldn't make it. We chose to eat at the hotel rather than go venturing very far (mostly because we didn't know at that point he couldn't make it and wanted to leave him a message telling us where to find him).
Next morning we were up EARLY and at LHR for 0645. Check in was quick and perfunctory, at the SABENA/Virgin Express counter, then to the Virgin Express ticket office for our (hand written!) boarding card from BRU - CPH. After that, we quickly went upstairs to Noon's for breakfast, and boy did we enjoy it! I had a meal whose name I can't recall that was essentially scrambled eggs with tomatoes, onions, spices, and coriander, and toast. My husband had a meal he can't remember the name of either, but was spiced potatoes in an Indian version of a tortilla (flatter and thinner than Naan bread). We both had orange juice to drink. We were utterly in heaven over the meal - it was just fabulous.
Our first leg, LHR-BRU, was supposed to be OO-VEB, but at the last minute we got bussed out to a hardstand. SN/BQ 568. The airplane ended up being ship "CH", emergency card said "Air Foyle", it was under "G" registration, and was a 737-200 (a card in the landing area had an apology from Richard Branson saying that due to high traffic BQ had to lease some planes with smaller luggage bins [probably the 737-200s] and he was sorry some bags might not fit properly).
The plane pushed back late due to "air traffic" problems, and were very late into BRU. We had only 25 minutes to make the connection and we arrived on a hardstand and had to be bussed to the terminal! A nice BQ agent walked us from the plane to the bus, to the transfer area, through security (again!) and to gate B31.
The irony was, we got to gate B31 for departure to CPH and we were bussed there, too! Why not just bus us from one plane to another? The first plane the bus pulled up to, we got out, up the stairs, and the FA informed us that the plane was bound for Stansted (! - I didn't even know BQ operated to Stansted!).
Landing at CPH was a bit rough and a bit late. Kastrup seemed nice - not that we saw much of it. We dashed through & to arrivals. Hubby got a passport stamp, I didn't.
[I will post more about my CPH trip in rec.travel.europe and on my trip reports webpage].
For the return trip we got to CPH very early. We shopped interminably at the copious duty free, then had our only non-Danish meal (Pizza Hut). The one Danish restaurant past passport control featured herring, something that neither my husband or I were fond of. Pizza Hut was surprisingly good. I had Fiesta Pizza (beef, jalapenos, tomatoes, mexican sauce, cheese), hubby had a pseudo Hawaiian pizza - no ham (chicken instead), but yes pineapple.
CPH-BRU was on-time (the only BQ leg we had which was!) and FULL.
On the last leg, BRU-LHR, the inbound plane from Milan was delayed due to "technical problems". Uneducated passengers abound - most of them treated the 30 minute delay as a complete disaster - unlike what it really is (a reality of air travel). The SN/BQ gate staff was apologetic - "this happens to all of the airlines" - a completely true statement. Bigger airlines can cope with delays better than smaller ones can. BQ is still a small airline, perhaps 15 737s in all.
[aside: there was a passenger who had booked himself on two seperate tickets, BRU-LHR, and then LHR-JFK. He only had about 100 minutes in LHR (not what I'd consider comfortable, considering he had to depart from Terminal 4, after arriving at Terminal 1). BQ/SN did go the distance to help him, though, even letting him walk during the taxi to the gate at LHR so he could retrieve his bags (a big FAA no-no, but this was Europe :-). They were going to make some kind of arrangement to let him go airside at LHR. I hope he made it, but I never found out].
OO-LTU pulled up from Barcelona than Milan. No biggy (I don't care as long as SOME plane arrives :-). It arrived at 1625 (ontime for the Barcelona flight, but the LHR flight was due to depart 1630 - obviously this would not happen). Boarding began about 25 minutes later. BQ may model themselves on Herb but they sure don't have his 10 minute turnarounds! I'm sure the inefficient Euro ground handlers don't help as far as *that* is concerned!
1700 (scheduled departure) came and went. While we were sitting waiting for pushback, some man (potential passenger?) came on board and started shouting. The lead FA tossed him off (good for her!). Boarding was weird. The gate staff DID say "economy passengers only after row 10" but at least half a dozen people didn't hear or didn't pay attention. We pushed back around 1725 - arrival was estimated at 1730 - slots permitting!
Service BRU-LHR was VERY quick. They tried to throw drinks at everybody - not something I would relish. Business class actually had a meal service! The crossing was a bit choppy - perhaps the pilots elected to take a more direct but rougher crossing to make up for lost time.
Our return to the states was scheduled 23 September, MAN-JFK-BOS. Departure time was 1300, but we elected to leave my Grandmother's early, hoping to miss peak traffic at Spaghetti. While driving up the M6 we elected to skip Spaghetti altogether and went "back roads" (A38 to A5), joining the M6 north again after the M54 split, and it was much quieter. We dropped the car off before 10, and were at the airport for 1010 (1100 was the recommended time, so we made good time). We checked in and went to scope the airport. Well, the Manchester authority certainly hadn't learned the lesson from BAA - there were hardly any shops (there was a pretty good sized Smiths on landside).
Since that took only minutes, we cleared through "outergration" (opposite of immigration? :-) and went to the business class lounge. Delta uses Cathay Pacific's business class lounge. Smoking was permitted (in the DL lounge there was a seperate room for it), but nobody smoked while we were there. They had nibbles to eat - some rolls and pastries as well as fruit, cheese, and crackers. Lots of liquor (whoopee). The magazines weren't so good (I actually willingly *read* "Hello!" - a tabloid full of papparazzi photographs - yes, it was THAT BAD). Hubby and I took turns scoping out the terminal area. Whoopee (again :-).
The agent in the lounge made an announcement at *1200* that boarding was called for DL flight 139, from gate 212. This was the odd part - she said 212 but the plane was at 206 (I'd scoped it earlier), and the monitors said 206 too. I even asked - she said she was right, the monitors weren't. We left the lounge, ignored her, and went to 206. Guess what - the plane was there! They were even doing *general boarding*, at 1210 (50 minutes ahead!). We were on quickly and sitting down.
I appreciated the return flight much more as I wasn't trying to sleep as much as possible. Neither hubby nor I selected the "express meal".
I will now describe the lunch choices:
Appetizer: Grilled Salmon presented with slices of Plum Tomato and Mozarella Cheese [My husband ate my salmon and his. I ate my salad and his. It worked well :-]
Salad: Seasonal Garden Greens complemented by creamy Italian Dressing and Balsamic Vinaigrette
Entrees:
Roll and Butter
Selected fresh Fruit and fine Cheese
Dessert: Irish Breeze Gateau
I got a watchman and watched a video, which was fun. C class had just one free seat, and F class had NOBODY in it (is this typical of all DL runs or perhaps just an oddity of travelling on "off" days? If this is typical, I suspect international First class is not long for this world on DL).
We passed the time by reading and doing puzzles. We were offered drinks often. After the general movie was shown, afternoon tea was served (sandwiches, fruit, gingerbread, scone, clotted cream).
We landed at JFK early - about 30 minutes. One mobile lounge pulled up at the back of the plane and all of the coach passengers got off. Business class had to *wait* 20 minutes before the lounge returned for us! Once inside the Worldport we were held up by a waiting DL staffer telling us it was "too busy" in the immigration hall (even for another 30 people?). Then he let us through. Ugh. the immigration hall WAS full. The US line flowed quickly, though, thankfully. When we got to the front we managed to pick two different lines with incompetent (passengers) in them. One who didn't even has his passport out (hello?!?!). Third time was the charm. By the time we cleared through, our bags were ready. We claimed them, cleared customs, and rechecked our bags. Then we went upstairs, cleared security (again!) and went to Terminal 2 to await our Boston flight. The lounge was busier than last time, and we didn't eat as much (just some cheese and crackers) but did partake of the bar (at least as much as some orange juice).
We boarded our last plane, N640DA, a 757-232, flight 1866 JFK-BOS. We departed late (I *heart* Kennedy) and arrived late. The two bags arrived on different carousels even though they were both tagged with "priority" labels. Oh well. We got a cab and made it home.