This is a Trip Report from the Premium Economy cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
After a fairly quick check-in time, we were assigned our seats (hang on, Ill just dig out my boarding pass). To my amazement, I discovered that we would be on G-VWIN and looked forward to being able to try out the new configuration which I will come to later. So following this welcome turn of events, we headed over to security and found the line to be relatively short in spite of the chaos raging downstairs. It only took about 20 minutes to get through both the x-ray and passport control. However, we did have a bit of trouble with some guy who wanted to get past us because he said hed be late for his flight, even though his left after ours.
Realising that time was slipping away from us and not wanting to have everyone stare at you because youre the last on the flight; we decided to hurry up and quickened our pace to gate 35. What is it with VS having the furthest away gates??! Anyway, once we got there, we found that we neednt have gone so fast as there was still a queue snaking round the corner as well as the usual queue down the jetbridge.
We finally managed to reach the aircraft which still seemed pretty new and made our way to our seats to find a family already in them. Went off to find CC (with our minds ever hopeful of an upgrade as PE was full) who then went to get FSM. He completely ignored us and went straight to the other family who escorted them down the plane and into UCS! Our jaws almost dropped as we watched the two restless, noisy, disruptive kids (you know the type) following him up to the pointy end. (maybe we should try to be early next time instead of following normal manners and not trying to disturb the rest of the plane)!
Well this kind of ruined the first part of the flight not that we were expecting an upgrade, but losing out on one to people like that is (as Im sure many of you know) to say that least annoying.
As this had taken up the best part of 15 minutes, it was now time to depart and we werent even offered any in-flight drinks. We did, however, learn that this crew had been taken off the Tokyo flight and most of the crew were extremely kind and courteous even periodically tidying the WCs.
The one good thing about remaining in our assigned seats is that we were able to sample the new config. and as we were at the back of PE, this was a great opportunity. Take-off was next and was fairly uneventful with a quick taxi time and no turbulence in the ascent. Following this was the drinks service I ordered a coke and about 20 minutes came the food. Sorry, I cant remember all the choices, but I know I had the pasta, which came with more pasta, a roll, crackers, some sort of cheese and profiteroles. I suppose it was OK, nothing special, but that was to be expected.
I found the lumbar support to be particularly useful and it meant that, unlike the older premium seats, you dont become all hunched over. (Has this always been a feature of the -600 seats?) As there was only a bulkhead behind me, I was able to recline the seat without disturbing anyone behind me, which I always feel bad about doing unless they are asleep.
I didnt manage to catch any sleep, although this was out of choice rather than not being able to. As preiffer said in a post yesterday, you just feel you have to watch it! We eventually landed after I got through a couple of movies and a sizeable chunk of the comedy section and got to the gate without any real delay. Unfortunately, another flight had just got in as well, so immigration was busy even before we arrived. Upper Class was let off first followed by PE/Y so we had at least half a plane plus 40 UC pax, the rest of PE and the quick ones from Y as well in front of us. After a relatively quick flight with no other delays, it was probably to be expected that this would happen. It took about an hour and a half in all to get through immigration, baggage reclaim and customs, although since immigration had taken so long, it meant that our bags were already there.
I often find that a good flight can almost be ruined by long queues on arrival and that when you think the time is 3 or 4am, the last thing you want to do is queue for an hour.
We then found ourselves a taxi and about 30 minutes later arrived in a half-asleep, bleary-eyed stupor, at the Helmsley which was mediocre, but as we were only staying the night, this was alright.
The next day we had breakfast at Raffles and than wondered around NY a bit more before heading back to JFK for our flight to LA on JetBlue (more on that in Part 2 coming up).
Overall our flight on VS was very good and once again it was the little things that made it special. For example, the FA serving my aisle in PE always remembered my choice of drink and came round several times with more drinks. Also, having dedicated FAs in PE made a big difference to the level of service and meant that any requests were filled almost immediately.
Now to the new configuration: Having the extra rows certainly made the PE cabin feel a lot more substantial and not unlike an afterthought as it does on the -300s. Also, having your own WCs is much better than having to trek back through the cabin to find others. It meant that the pax to WC ration is almost the same as UC and just boosted the PE experience that little bit which made it feel all the more worthwhile. On the -300s, I sometimes whether it would have been better to save the money and just travel in Y, particularly on shorter sectors such as this to JFK. However, with me being on the aisle and in the last row, it meant that I was directly opposite to the toilet and had I wanted to, would certainly not have aided sleep. Perhaps VS should market the extra rows as a non-snooze zone?
Hope you enjoyed the TR!
Cheers,
VS045
