This is a Trip Report from the Premium Economy cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
Did olci T-24 , seq 11/12 and was also given the requested seats 17h/k.
Arrived at Gatwick at dead on 10am, and made our way over to bag drop, upon getting closer we decided to just go to PE check in anyway as it was empty, and there was a bit if a queue for bag drop...anyway, bags disposed of, we then went to VH cust service, to pick up lounge invites. A quick dash over to Whsmiths for a few magazines for inflight reading , and we made our way upto "Premium Gatwick" priority security. Was thru that within seconds literally (was surprised they dont even ask for your passport now, just boarding pass)....anyway...we then made our way to the virgin clubhouse, and felt a right numpty when I was turned away!! Silly me didn't realise there was 2 different lounges at Gatwick...the clubhouse and the v-room, and of course I had v-room invites (its my 1st time using a lounge, cut me some slack!!) Lmao... Red faced I then made my way to the other side of departures and upto the v-room.
V-room: This was actually very good. Was only about 30 or so people spread out in the room, and was very quiet. Staff were very helpful and the areas were kept very clean and tidy. Breakfast was on the small side, but the fact you could just grab another made up for that, I just opted for the breakky and a bacon baguette thing, a couple of coffees and a Danish and I was comfortably full. View out the window was good, right at the end of the runway, watching all the planes take off and land...soon 1130 came and a dash to duty free was called for before we went to departure gate 13.
Arrived at gate just before 12,which was already half full of passengers. Sat down and before we knew it boarding started at 1210...special assistance and UC went 1st , and then PE.
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Usual fizzy plonk/OJ served upon seating...only 1 mind....not even a sniff of a 2nd being offered..which I have had on both previous flights to MCO in the past, but I wassnt too bothered,I just wanted to get airborne.
Ruby Tuesday was our plane for today, and wat seemed like an eternity we eventually pushed back at 1305ish. Take off about 1315.
Captain introduced himself just before push back with the " we have an exceptional crew on today shpeel" as previously stated on another thread. FSM then jumped on, said her bit as quick as poss, safety vid came on, and off we went.
CC were efficient but I think smiles must have been for UC passengers only.
Wassnt long before menus handed out and lunch was served..being near the back of PE downstairs the mother was told she couldn't have the chicken was all gone, so we both had to settle for the beef stroganoff, which was Luke warm at very best and farely bland. The starter of the king prawns and mixed bean salad in a citrus dressing was...well...horrible...if you like rock hard plain baked bean things,then ur love it, I ate the 2 single king prawns and the rest was duely left. For pud we were given a slice of Belgian white choc cake with raspberries....sounds nice doesn't it!...how wrong we were....tasteless sponge with tasteless icing on with some red dried things on top, which I presume is meant to be dried raspberry or something...this too was left after a couple of small mouthfulls. Good thing I had a big brekky!
Cup of tea, and then relaxed to watch a film... Oz the great and powerful or something to that effect...got about an hour and half into it and stopped it. Then watched Alan Carr chatty man, I must admit it did make me laugh a lot, which I got a few strange looks for...not that I cared.
After that I wacked on a couple of albums (SHM and D.Guetta) which was very much enjoyed.
Skinny milk lolly thing was offered at about half way thru the journey.
Couple of hours later,the dreaded cheese and pickle finger sandwich made an appearance,along with the banana cupcake,which i thought was actually rather nice,soon after we were getting ready to land,and at roughly 16:50 we touched down (cant remember the exact time tbh).
This was the moment i had been gearing up for the whole journey, i had already pre warned the mother that as soon as the belt signs were off, then it was going to be a free for all to get off the plane 1st..luckily being sat in 17 h/k,we managed to get off about 10th.
What happened next truely shocked me.After walking the maze of corridors after leaving the plane,we finally got to the point where u can see the immigration in front of you,i looked, and looked again....it was completely and utterly empty!! RESULT!!! and to make it even better they actually had about 10 officers sat there ready to check us. We sailed staight thru,without having to queue or wait at all. Waited about 5 mins for luggage to arrive,and was on the shuttle upto the main terminal by 17:20. Its a shame that after that it all went abit wrong as we had to wait for 3 other couples to egt on the transfer bus we were on..in the end,we waited almost an hour for the last couple....so we left them there lol.
To summarise briefly, the flight itself was smooth,non eventful..the cabin crew were good,effecient,but could do with cheering up.
The new IFE is fantastic..all ive ever had before was nova,so this was an huge upgrade in that respect...good job on that front VA.
Food was dreadful at best.
Right, its now time to buy myself a new wardrobe full of clothes/trainers/stuff,before we head down to st.petes next week for 2 weeks of (hopeful) Sun,Sand and Sea!
Needsomesun was also on this flight,and ive not checked or read the forums to see if he has posted a TR at the time of posting this,but i will be interested to see what his experiences were like.
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