, I have steered away from them as much as I can (other than the odd business trips). This is my first time in years to wander to the dark side, mainly due to cost, and the fact that VS doesn’t currently have any short-haul offering to the rest of Europe. We left it quite late this year to book our summer getaway, due to a number of reasons (Mr W and I both changing jobs, moving house, lots of home improvements without knowing how much spare cash we might have), so we only booked this little trip to Sicily about a month before. Not exactly a last minute booking, but as I’d much rather be booking 11 months ahead, I was out of my comfort zone with this one.
We chose Sicily because 1) we haven’t been there, 2) guaranteed hot and dry weather, 3) great seafood to be had (and was had), and 4) I LOVE noccellara olives and wanted to track them down (couldn’t find any!). Also, as we found a cheap deal on BA.com with a flight and hotel deal, where it was cheaper to book the package than to buy the flights alone
. No brainer. Woke up in the morning and checked the news. This was the first day where it was decided that all flights could be subject to security checks for electronic devices. So spent the morning working at home and charging the phones, kindle, ipod etc.
The flight is scheduled to depart at 14.40, and it takes 3 hours to get to Catania. I have no status with BA (you’ve probably guessed this already), so chose my seats at OLCI 24 hours ahead. To my surprise, there were still good seats available, and the seating plan was almost wide-open. I guess on a short-haul like this, people are more relaxed about where they sit. The next challenge was to find out what food/snack will be served on board, so that we could prepare ourselves suitably. And boy was that a challenge! After checking all possible sources, I could not find this information. BA’s website couldn’t be more vague on this matter. This is where VS website is actually better! VS:1 BA:0, not that I am keeping score
. In the end we decided to have lunch at the airport just in case no “meal” is served during the flight. Better to be too full than too hungry (this is mainly for my husband’s benefit as I am a grumpy cow when I’m hungry 
). Security was completely normal (at LGW), with no request received to turn on any of those fully charged devices. I thought that more checks might be done at boarding, but nothing. We were only expecting a spot check due to the change in policy in the morning, but I guess as it was an European flight rather than transatlantic, the risk was probably deemed low.
At the gate, the lady who did the announcement for boarding did not seem comfortable with public speaking, and nobody could hear what she was saying. Why they didn’t just pick someone who’s good at making these announcements is beyond me
. Anyway, ignoring what the lady was saying, everybody queued to board. First impression of the plane was not great. It was quite a tired-looking A320, with the leather seat covers coming apart not just at the seams. (VS:2 BA:0 comparing to my recent experience on the LR A320). Walked past the Club Europe seats, which are exactly the same as the Euro Traveller ones. That was a surprise to me.
After boarding, the lady who sat next to us had some spillage in her bag, and stopped a CC to ask for some tissues. “The toilets are over there, please feel free to use it” she was told
. VS:3 BA:0 I’d say! Soon we pushed back on time and were airborne. There was no announcement to say what will be served on the flight. VS:4 BA:0, but shortly after take off a drink and a snack (raisins and honey roasted cashews) were served. I enjoyed the snack very much but was secretly glad that I had a proper meal at lunch. What do you know? About half an hour CC came round with a trolley and started handing out “urban eat” packs. Within the pack there were 2 wraps (chicken salad wrap and a cheesey one – as some of you know that I cannot cope with cheese on a flight, so happily swapped for another chicken one with my husband), a Lily O’brien’s chocolate mousse with caramel, and a little UHT milk for the hot beverages.
The packaging was incredibly difficult to get into, and looking around I wasn’t the only one having the problem. I wasn’t really ready for another meal, but I soldiered on and mopped it all up. Not bad for plane food, especially as I wasn’t all that hungry. I needed more than the one tiny carton of UHT milk to go with my tea, though, so when I asked the CC, they had to break a new pack just to give me the milk from it. I was quite surprised that there wasn’t any spare milk on board (as I can’t imagine that I was the only one that wanted more milk for the hot drinks), though it was quite fun to watch CC struggle with the food packs, too.
Other than that, the flight was smooth and drama-free. We arrived at Sunny Catania on time, though the luggage took quite a long time. Despite all the scores mentioned above (for fun), the flight itself was fine. CC was ok, not overly friendly but not terrible either, food was aplenty, more than expected, and we got there safely and on time. Standard really, and for the value, I really can’t complain.
