V-Flyer

The return

We had planned to stay in the Venetian and the Flamingo. This turned out to be the Palazzo, the Flamingo and Mandalay Bay. Basically, I knew Id have to pay a little extra at the Venetian for a Bella room and, as a Strip View was only $10 extra, I plumped for that too. However, the strip view turned out to be mainly the pools, the fashion show mall and two large cranes! A quick phone call later we were in the Palazzo with a much better view and concierge room access. We moved on to the Flamingo after 3 days. The room, although tired, was clean and comfortable. Unfortunately, due to the Flamingo designating one of its pools Over 21s only, the main pool area was incredibly crowded and the pool completely unheated. There was no way the kids would enjoy their pool time. After a quick search through the offers on Fatwallet I moved us to Mandalay BayLazy River, Wave pool and Beach and water you could stay in!

Even so, we still had a great time in Vegas and we'll be back in August!

So to coming home. I checked in as soon as OLCI opened. There were only about 7 seats available to move to should I have wanted. Where had the 40% (minus exit seats etc.) gone? Fortunately, we had been allocated row 23, in the economy mini-cabin again, so that was fine.

Later, I made a quick check on VS43 and saw it had taken off on time, good. A short cab ride to the airport and straight into an empty PE queue to find the flight was 2 hours delayed. I had checked too early and, probably a delay to flightstats updating, meant I had missed the fact the VS43 had had to return to the stand with a water leakage problem.

I did ask about a mile upgrade again, but apparently PE was oversold, never mind.

With some time to kill, but not really enough time to go back to the strip, we found a shady area outside and sat down to have a picnic with our friends from home that we had met up with in Vegas who were returning on the same flight as us. In the cool bag were the leftovers from our stay including, Pringles, chocolate, red wine and a few can of still chilled lager. A strange, but quite pleasant end, to our week in Vegas.

Picnic over, we made our way airside. There was no security queue so we went straight through the all body scanner they use at McCarran. I got told off for forgetting to take my wallet out of my back pocket.

Departures was empty so passengers spread themselves across a number of gates. Food choice is limited to burger king/pizza hut etc. so we topped the kids and ourselves up with some chicken nuggets and fries as any airline food was still 2 or 3 hours away.

McCarran airport has free wi-fi so I surfed a bit whilst waiting to board, catching up on football scores and priming the wife with the weather back home.

Boarding commenced on (revised) time and was a bit more disorganised than on the way out. It also had to be suspended at one point due to a Mexicana jet deplaning (is that a word?) and using the shared walkway. However, it wasnt too long before we boarded G-VXLG Ruby Tuesday and made our way to our seats. The economy mini cabin having 4 rows on this plane, as it was a config 2 layout (no crew room and WC).

We were soon pushing back and began a long taxi to take off and bank north to the west of the strip. There was no drinks round on the flight, it was straight to the meal service. This time the kids could only eat a bit of their meal, saying it didnt taste very nice. I couldnt really make out what it was because everything looked the same shape and colour. They thought it was chicken. We still had a couple of sandwiches that we had made in case anyone got hungry so that helped a bit.

My wife and I both opted for the beef stroganoff. Big mistake! This was by far the worst airline food I have ever tried to eat. The beef was tough and inedible, coated in a dark grey tasteless sauce, the lyonaisse(?) potatoes were barely cooked and in a sauce that almost made me retch. The dessert was OK but nothing special and even the cheese was a triumph of texture over taste. Thank God, they couldnt muck up the can of Stella! I saw my wife grimace and put down her fork, her conclusions similar to mine.

We mentioned the quality of the meals to the crew. They noted the complaint and apologised (Not their fault, I know), saying we were not alone in our criticism.

We all settled down to films, the family choosing Marley and Me, which they enjoyed although they were all in tears at the end if it. I chose The day the Earth stood still. Hmmm, it was OK, but I did think the plot premise a little too contrived and the ending disappointing. After the films the kids got themselves comfortable and dropped off to sleep, my wife dozed off to something and I had a few plays on Millionaire before attempting to get some sleep. The best I really manage is what I call a deep daydream, dozing really. I was aware of a couple of quite soft drink runs and an occasional baby cry, but all in all a quiet night.

Breakfast was an egg and cheese muffin. It tasted a little better than it smelled, but I could still only manage half. The kids didnt fancy it both saying they felt unwell. They are not prone to air-sickness; however they were looking pale so we asked for sick bags just in case. Half way through our descent Victoria was ill. She settled down as we made it to the gate just in time for James to be ill. I dont think it was the airline food, which was our immediate thought, as they were both OK by the time we were walking down to immigration. I think it was more the lack of food and body clock out of sync.

The queue at immigration wasnt too long and the bags were up quite quickly so we were soon on the bus on the way to Long term parking. A kind M25 later and we were home within the hour.

So a good flight, crew good, IFE trouble free.

..But, the food! We have written to Virgin about the meal. Maybe it was a one off? I dont know. I hope so, as something like that could well make you consider another carrier.

Thanks for the TR.

quote:Originally posted by Slipperman
Where had the 40% (minus exit seats etc.) gone?


It works more the other way to be honest with 60% of the seats being available for pre-selection rather than 40% becoming available at OLCI stage. If there are a lot of families who have not got pre-allocated seats then they will only release a few of the 40% (or maybe none) for people to move to, so that they can seat them together as best as possible.

Neil

Glad you and the family had a good time in Vegas.

It seems to be the trend again with VS and their catering!

Dominic

Thanks for the TR! Shame about the food.