This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
Chauffer arrived to pick me up in a timely fashion.
As expected, the lounge at ANU was medicore at best. Doesn't rank on my mental list of 'Best third party VS lounges', but it did have an outdoor area... which is a rarity, so there is that.
Boarding took far too long after being called. 45 minute delay after being called from the lounge, which was not good.
Travelling on a refurbed A330 again... G-VSXY, Beauty Queen. Sat in 10A which I was quite happy with as it was a night flight, although the loud child and equally needey mother sat in 8A and 9A - not so much. They literally had the crew doing everything for them, which was disturbing. I think I enjoyed the tranquility of my outbound flight a little too much! It was much fuller this time too... 264 onboard (with some shuffling pre-boarding I'd guess with all the passenger calls to the gate), 10 crew and 2 pilots, one Captain and one female first officer.
Both the outbound and inbound flights had onboard mobile & wifi service, although I did not use them. They've been fine on previous occasions, but I had no need for them this time.
Climb out of ANU was standard, out on the 07 runway. Not much to see as it was dark already.
I was quite pleased with the food offering... the Red Pepper & Tomato soup was lovely, albeit not quite hot enough for my tastes. Steak was juicy and flavoursome, and the Peacan butter cake dessert was tasty too.
Plenty of sleepsuits to go around, only managed a few hours sleep before being awoken for breakfast 90 minutes outside of Gatwick.
After having a few different cooked breakfasts onboard a few different airlines, I have come to the conclusion that you just cant cook a good English breakfast on a plane. As I expected, it wasn't tasty at all. If only Gatwick had an arrivals lounge for breakfast!
Arrival into Gatwick was smooth, with little waiting, straight in on the 08R runway.
Baggage was quick, mine was off 3rd I think. Due to an accident on the M25 earlier, Tristar jigged the booking a little meaning I was waiting in arrivals 7 minutes (first world problems) for the driver to appear, but once he did he was a lovely chap and got me home in decent time.
Overall a good trip. I will definitely return! A330 new config out of Gatwick certainly beats BAs 777-200 that trails the VS service usually.
Commander B, out.
Fly's a little too much.