FR553 MAN-DUB 8 JUN 13 (ECONOMY)

Having done something similar a few years before, me and a friend looked at the option of doing a day trip by plane somewhere for the day and an idle moment last month brought about the idea of going to Dublin. Having ruled out Aer Lingus as too expensive at about £150 one way, I stumbled across return flights on Ryanair for £40 and a quick text message turned into a firm booking within 20 minutes once he had booked the day off work.

I must admit I'm not the biggest fan of Ryanair and don't think highly of Michael O'Leary, however one thing I will give them credit for is the availability of cheap flights and (in the case of MAN-DUB) decent frequencies and times to make possible a day trip for less than a return train ticket to London. And as the time in the air is a little over 30 minutes it's tolerable.

With the flight due to leave at 0740 and having checked in online with just a bag as hand luggage, we arrived at about 0630 and proceeded straight to security (there was no point in getting there earlier). As there's little flights out at that time out of Terminal 3 at Manchester there was no queue so within 5 minutes we was airside with little to do besides buy a coffee, watch the various aircraft take off and wait for boarding. Once that started we elected to board late on so we was one of the last to board but ended up in the middle of the plane just in front of a hen party.

Push back was on time and the taxi included seeing Thomson's Boeing 787 G-TUIA take off on a training flight and VS A330 G-VSXY land from MCO on VS076. We took off and the onboard service commenced quickly, including the customary Ryanair revenue-boosting ancillary sales of e-cigarettes and scratchcards. The time in the air was decent enough, no turbulence thanks to fantastic weather but the endless announcements from the cabin crew on the tannoy and the merry hen party was starting to get annoying.

Not long after reaching cruise above North Wales it was time to descend into Dublin. The landing was fairly hard which caught the hen party off guard a bit before cheers from them when the horn to start the "You've arrived on yet another on time flight" jingle was played followed by a round of applause from them. Arrival onto stand was 10 minutes early and we quickly disembarked ready for a day exploring Dublin and sampling several pints of Guinness!

I approached this flight not expecting much apart from going from A to B cheaply, safely and on time, which Ryanair achieved on all counts. Overall it was nothing special but nothing disastrous either (apart from the annoying hen party, but at least it was a short flight), and if you want to get to Ireland cheaply and quickly they serve that purpose rather well, so for that purpose I won't stop using Ryanair for that reason.

[honey lamb]

As someone who is occasionally confined to the mercies of Ryanair, I must agree with your description of your flight to DUB. There are a few destinations for which a day return (or at least an overnight with hand luggage) makes Ryanair bearable. Quite frankly, the flight itself is fine once you block out the intense marketing but things like the one bag policy which makes us ladies stuff our handbags into our carry-ons until boarding is a pain and don't mention duty-free!

A couple of years ago my sister accompanied me on a VS flight in UC to JNB. Her connecting flight was on Ryanair to LTN. I can't begin to tell you of the hoops we went through to ensure she had adequate luggage allowance for her three week trip.