V-Flyer

OK.

Another trip report – my first from the UC cabin and only my second ever experience flying UC and all that this entails.

I'm going to write this in parts, this part being typed in stages on the flight. Could be a long one then...

Firstly, a brief background to the trip;

I've been Ag for a while – maybe ten years. Although it doesn't really mean much practically, as has been noted here before, I've always enjoyed the feeling that I'm part of something – not a very exclusive club, but a club nonetheless. It's a relatively small reward for being loyal – if not frequent. Perhaps there is merit for a two tier system; one for loyalty and a much more rewarding scheme for frequent flyers. This would reward, generously, those that put the most money VAA's way but also reflect the continued support of those who, when they fly, always choose Virgin. I suppose the Flying Club Miles does that to an extent but I liked being Ag and it's just about to go...
Anyway – the main point to that particular ramble was that my original plan was to grab another 4, (or maybe 6 Tier Points), in October in order to stay Ag for another year. However, the change to the qualification rules has meant that I'm unlikely to get 15 Tier Points per year so we thought we'd spend all the miles we had on a couple of G rewards and crash back to Red in style!

Plan was to go a good distance to make the most of the 100,000k. We had great advice from this site as to how to spend miles for our honeymoon trip – in to SFO and out of LAX over Christmas and New year just gone. So we thought Florida would be a decent way to spend the last of the miles.

Of course, much lurking on the site told me not to expect direct to MCO with G rewards so I thought about MIA. I know we've had advice about our immigration friends at MIA but beggars, (relatively speaking), can't be choosers!

Loads of availability for the midweek flights – I think I posted something to share the news – so easily got a couple of Gs. The other pertinent point was that we were taking the in-laws so this coincided with good econ fares – around £450 I think. The UC booking lady was really helpful – after I booked the G's I got the Mother-in-Law to call the premier line and the same agent booked the Y's for them. Really good service from the call-centre.

So, the trip began with the drive from the Westcountry in the old volvo. Went the slow way, A38, A30, A303, M3, M25 and then M4. Stopped off in Thruxton for dinner at a pub – the George I think – really good and I prefer putting money into a local village pub than a service station on a motorway.

We we're heading for the Thistle on Bath road. We prefer the Holiday In J4 M4 but it was coming in at about £125 per room which was more than we'd previously paid. The Thistle was only £75 per room so they got our money. All booked through Holiday Extras again – still appear to be the cheapest place to find rooms and/or parking and never had any problems so I, like others, recommend this site for pre flight overnight stays.

First negative experience was with the hotel; didn’t expect too much but was fairly disappointed with the smoke alarm that went off in the room at 2am! Thought it was the fire alarm and wondered how much fun it was going to be standing in the car park in my Calvins. No PJ's packed. Luckily it appeared someone had tampered with a smoke alarm in another room – it stopped pretty quickly.
Next issue – probably worse – was the lack of hot water in the morning. To be fair to Mrs Monster – she still washed her hair – hardcore! So did I but I've got considerably less, (by the day it seems!).
Anyhow, we coped with this – I suspect if I wasn't so English I would've complained. (I can imagine Americans reading this incredulously). I dunno what it is – I'm just grateful for running water really...
Did mention it at checkout – apparently a problem for everyone – including the in-laws. Was offered a free breakfast but the Clubhouse was waiting so didn't really need this. I may send them an email but mechanical failures happen I suppose...

Anyway, needless to say we were all pretty much wide awake after a 5am cold shower. We paid £10 for the overnight parking and drove to T3. I'd booked Purple Parking meet and greet again - £102 for 2 weeks via the VA site so there'll be bonus miles coming – didn’t seem too bad, especially when you consider there were 4 of us – I think the airport hoppa is about £1million so don't bother with that anymore. Wasn't too worried about the fact I was giving my car to a stranger – how much fun can someone have in an 8 year old Volvo? Perhaps, I would be of a different mind if I had something worth more than £3k...

Check-in was easy – we had checked in online the day before – SEQ 7&8 – buggered how you get 1. I was there on the dot of 24hrs. I don't think it helps that I've always got to update my new passport number but really, I can't go any quicker. Plus, I always get tense as hell trying to get 1st – I think I may give up trying and take the pressure off...

The UC check-in desk saw to both couples – it was quiet at 6.40am; friendly enough but not overly cheerful – not that I am at that time of the morning so I'll let them off.

Up the lift, through the door – the in-laws loved that! No-one at the security desk except us so straight through to Duty Free – 15 mins until clubhouse opening – perfect!

Don't know what they've done to Duty Free – couldn't find anything and the tills were down so this took longer than norm. Just bought some more CK Free and some perfume to do with flowers for the OH which was surprisingly expensive for the size, (I should've learned by now).

Got the to CH just after 7am – brilliant. Nice and quiet. Booked treatments for the ladies and me. Mother-in-law and my wife went for something to do with nails – cleaning or something. I went for the full ½ hour back massage – all around the 9:30 time. Mine only cost £21 instead of £30 – so I reckon that was a bargain, plus it was amazing. Before this though we found some seats in the Gallery and put away our first Redheads of the trip. Just as I remembered.

Clearly they were fairly strong because we all felt the need to grab some food. We went over to the dining area and were given seats in a booth. Father-in-law and I went for Eggs Benedict with salmon. The ladies had some fruit or something. We were asked if we wanted to double up on the Eggs Benedict so I assume they've had some feedback on the portion size. This seemed a bit unnecessary to me – we'll have plenty of oversized portions when we get to the States – perhaps this works for people with limited time who don't want to eat on the plane – that would make sense. Au people who only have a short flight to JFK in econ may want to fill up in the CH and then snooze their way across the Atlantic.

After eating wandered over to the TV area – would I like to plug my Xbox into that! Gears of War 3 on a 15 screen display! Too many empty seats meant that we didn’t know where to sit. The mother-in-law was toying with the idea of asking where to buy the furniture – we certainly tested most of it!

Apparently Amir Khan turned up and sat near us – think he was of to LAX? He appeared to get a little bit of special attention but really no more than anyone else if they'd ask. To be fair, I didn't recognise him. Since Sky took all “big-time” boxing I haven't followed it at all. (Anyone remember The Big Fight on ITV? Chris Eubank, Nigel Benn et al...?)

We had a couple more cocktails – I tried the Blackberry one – amazing again, before heading over for some more food. Went for the Haddock Omelette – brilliant again. And the coffee was really good.

Flight was called soon after. Bye to the CH again – hopefully will see it in the future – I've got 52k miles so give it a couple of years. The whole experience was brilliant. Service was superb, relaxed yet attentive. Not too stuffy but clearly up-market. Friendly but not too familiar. The décor is really clever. I can see why people strive to retain Au. The lady looking after the treatment area was lovely – I get the impression that people enjoy working there...

Gate 17 had Indian Queen waiting – boarding must've started early – there weren’t many people in the gate. Still some queuing though. We went through the priority line and left the parents-in-law to queue – they took the finger pointing and laughing in good fooling! We waited inside the gate for them though – no rush to get on really. Took a picture to send to my mother. They had separate jetways for UC and the rest so we said goodbye and wandered on.

We were in 4&5K, nice and quiet. I grabbed a champagne and started to faff around with various books, Macs and phones.

Take off was on time – just about. We were going to take a more direct route to MIA to avoid some dodgy weather – good plan, not a big fan of turbulence. Captain said there was nearly a full plane – which I can verify from a wander I had shortly after take-off to see the in-laws in seats 43 A&C.

Got back and cleaned my suite with the towel – it wasn't too bad but as I was spending 9 hours in it I thought i'd give it a brief wash, (plus spotted some stuff that may have been dandruff on the top of the chair...)

During the meal run the FSM was really busy – in amongst it. He was mainly doing wine but he was obviously using this opportunity to make sure every thing was going well. I saw him querying with an attendant about someones food order. He had been really busy because there was a medical incident in PE and a lot of crew had attended – presume those with training? I didn't get details- nor did I try. Bad enough being ill on a plane without a load of onlookers. The captain went to check – presume it's his call to divert or not. We didn't so hopefully all was well.

Food was good – I'm not fussy – nor do I have a educated palate but to me it was good. Risotto with prawns to start – nice, not too much and quite light. I went for Salmon for a main – good again. Generous portion of fish. Not too rich again, which I prefer on a flight. I had the cheese and biscuits which was good – passed on the port this time. Had a couple of Bloody Marys' before dinner which were nice and spicy. Oh, nearly forgot – crisps and olives just after take off – the olives were excellent!

Grabbed the FSM as he came around to ask if it was OK for the in-laws to visit briefly when it was quiet. I mentioned that I had researched that it appropriate to ask him. He confined that this was the case and seemed to appreciate that I'd gone to the effort to check protocol and to ask him. So he said it was no problem – he even suggested having a quick sit at the bar. Top marks to him for being so reasonable. I wandered back a couple of times - they were in 43 A&C so about half way down economy. Good excuse to stretch my legs and nice for them to get visited. I snuck a copy of the Indy to them – they only had the Mail!

However, while typing the first part of this my father-in-law appeared by my suite! “Alright, just stretching me legs”!! To be fair it was quiet and he was wearing a nice pair of brogues! He did a swift circuit and wandered back.

A bit later my OH wandered back to get them 'officially'; they just sat on the ottomans for 10mins, had a look around bit of a chat and wandered back.

Regarding the IFE; I can't believe myself really. I make a right fuss about how bad the Gatwick fleet's NOVA and Odyssey systems are but 7 hours in to this flight and I've had a go at the inflight trivia challenge (18/20 – some guessing!) and bejeweled for 10 mins. Spent my time reading, eating, chatting, wandering, typing this and watching Paranormal Activity on the MacBook Air (its like an iPad, but actually useful!!!). Don't watch Paranormal Activity in a big house, at night, on your own – thats all I'm saying...

Afternoon tea was good; we both went for the sandwiches which were fine. I was on the peppermint tea by now, trying to settle a stomach not used to so many meals in a day.

Had an interesting but brief chat with one of the flight crew as he wandered back after getting some snacks; we could see a plane out of the starboard windows. I asked if he'd noticed it! Obviously he had. Apparently we were all using the same 'track' to get across the atlantic. It was a Lufthansa out of Frankfort; it was 2000ft below and 2 miles to our starboard. There was another about 1000ft above us but we couldn't see him. As I understood it the 'track' was like a motorway, complete with lanes but in 3 dimensions. Anyway, probably boring as hell to most of you but I'll be doing some online research...

This part I'm typing from the villa in Davenport; see how the memory is from yesterday...

The end of the flight went fairly swiftly – UC does help make time go quicker! Tidied up my bits and pieces for landing. Really good views of Miami on the way in; we passed south of the city to turn north and then east to land from the west to east. Not too long waiting for a gate. We were off the plane quickly; priority disembarkation was working. Quite a hike to immigration...Jesus – immigration. Everyone who said it's one of the most hateful experiences ever – you're all right!
We wandered to a queue – they all looked as bad as each other. But God our chap was slow – really slow. Kept chatting with his mate, made the idiots who couldn't fill in their forms properly complete them at the desk while he waited. Some of his other colleagues were cracking through people, but not this guy. He wouldn’t let couples come through together, he spent ages digging in his bag for snacks, (not that he needed anything extra on the food front...). He saw about 6 people in an hour! Then he clocked off! His colleague drifted into his booth, spent a while faffing around. So by this time we went to one of the US Residents queues – most other people had gone through. We saw someone efficient, “how long you staying, where are you staying, thanks – have a nice stay”. 5 minutes – job done.

Now, I'm a civil servant. I appreciate the fact that the taxpayer pays my salary and I try to remember that every day. So I work hard even when I'm not in direct contact with the public. I make sure the people who work for me work hard. But this guy was a joke. Honestly, 'Welcome to the USA – have you met fat, lazy Joe?' He's the welcoming face of “the only Superpower left”. American's should be embarrassed with their Border people; and all this effort, all the time, all the delays and stupid questions – for what? The place is still dripping with illegal immigrants.

So this was about 1 ½ hours of our lives that we'll never get back. The in-laws were through before us and they were well back in getting off the plane.

Didn't have to wait for luggage! It had all been moved off the carousel by the time we get there.

The trip to the car rental centre was relatively easy via the new sky-train thing. Well signposted with clear purple signs. Quite a bit of walking but who cares after a 9 hour flight? Train was quick and clean.

Got to the car place – we were with Alamo via the VA site for the miles and it was comparatively priced. I had checked in the day before including adding both driving license details and pre paying fuel. Guess how busy Alamo was? Yep – the busiest desk there. Brilliant. So I was pretty wound up by now. I wandered over to the drop-off desk just to check that I didn't have to queue. There were loads of people browsing the car catalogues at the main desks; “do we want full-size or premium – or maybe mid-size. What do you think dear – I can't decide?” Eventually, I spoke to Andy – who was an arse. I tried to explain I had done everything but he insisted I needed to queue – it was at least an hour wait. I suggested he didn’t understand – I explained that I didn't need to check in – I've done it. He advised that, as he worked there, he wasn't confused but I could speak to his manager. By now I was livid – I really wanted to hit the smug tosser. What's unemployment in the US at the moment? 7 or 8%? Really, people like this need to be binned. His manager, at the next desk, got the full works – but to be fair took it all really well. I suggested that it's in their interest for me not to take up agents' time when I'm all done. He took me to some self-service kiosks and put my reservation number in. All the details were there. Additional driver, pre-paid fuel, everything. I just swiped my card and it printed my rental agreement. Job done.
I apologised for being a bit 'brusque' but the Manager did say that Virgin Holidays hadn't made it clear exactly what to do – so I'll get some feedback to them. But I did mention that Andy would've had me queuing and wasting everyones time so hopefully he'll get reprimanded.
Anyway, went straight to the garage, showed a chap my agreement who pointed me to the luxury car line so I went and got a Cadillac. Didn't fancy the Lincoln Town Car – and the Lincoln MKZ – it had 28k miles. Plus we had 4 adults and a load of luggage – the Caddy DTS is massive!

So the drive to Davenport; it's not too bad but isn't ideal after a 9 ½ flight and the ball-ache that is MIA. About 217 miles to our villa, mainly on the Turnpike, then the 60 and finally onto the 27.

Got to the villa at about 11pm with one coffee stop, (America runs on Dunkin'). Didn't speed. The Caddy has a 4.6 litre engine, 2000rpm at 70mph but averaged 24 mpg!

So, I've now done Orlando direct via LGW, via JFK, using Jet Blue to connect and now into MIA and a drive north.

What's the best way? Direct obviously but this doesn't work if you want to use reward seats as easily, especially for UC. I think I prefer the JKF route. Liked Jet Blue, getting the VS003 means immigration at JFK ain't bad, plus JFK flights usually have plenty of reward seats or are often cheaper for revenue tickets. We try to go PE wherever possible and I really don't like the old seats – in fact we really like the little PE cabins on the A346 and 744.

Sorry about the ramble; hope I haven't forgotten anything.

Let me know if you want any further elaboration.

Craig.

Excellent, love the detail.

Paul

welcome to Miami !!! Its so bad our attorney has made us promise NEVER to use it...apparently she had a 70 year old lady who was a green card holder detained for 13 hours without food water or a phone call. they finally let her through wehn she wet herself !!! they are without doubt the biggest A**holes in US Immigration.

Alamo dont sound much better (and unemployment in Fal is doube digits) but the excuse for poor service always seems to be 'well its Florida,thats how it is' !!!!

anyhow enjoy the sunshine

An epic TR that has kept me entertained for a while great CH & flight experience spoiled by the usual carnage at MIA We nearly had an altercation with Alamo until we found out we could use the checking kiosks - Phew Mrs P was getting ready to rumble As for MIA immigration....

Cheers for the detailed TR

Great TR, I love this level of detail!!

MIA..... Enough said, awful!

That is a shame with Alamo, I found it hard to find anyone who spoke English last time I was there!

Hope you enjoy the warm Florids weather!

flabound wrote:welcome to Miami !!! Its so bad our attorney has made us promise NEVER to use it...apparently she had a 70 year old lady who was a green card holder detained for 13 hours without food water or a phone call. they finally let her through wehn she wet herself !!! they are without doubt the biggest A**holes in US Immigration.

Alamo dont sound much better (and unemployment in Fal is doube digits) but the excuse for poor service always seems to be 'well its Florida,thats how it is' !!!!

anyhow enjoy the sunshine

I know, I know, we were warned; avoid MIA at all costs. We lived and we've learned!

The thing with customer service is that it's so bloody easy to get right! I wish I were a math genius, or an engineer, a doctor maybe or even could lay bricks in a straight line! But I can't - so what I do is give customers exactly what they want and need - it's easy isn't it? The Alamo guy was unbelievable; given that he sent me to his boss I can only assume that they both didn't give a toss. So maybe I'll go back to Dollar and let Alamo know - it's all we can do isn' t it?

Still, first day has gone well. iPad bought for mother, (amazing little shrine for Steve Jobs at the Apple store at the Mall at Millennia, including real apples with bites in them). Sam Adams Octoberfest beer is going down well. Tried running this afternoon - 2.25 miles before having to stop - probably need to go out in the morning really...
Nice and warm - with that familiar Florida smell in the air. My wife has bought her Baby-G Casio in Macys - remembering the 10% card for foreigners.
I've been trying to wean myself off Abercrombie and Fitch - it's isn't going well. Ralph Lauren is just too baggy but at least I looked. Hollister doesn't count - it's the same company!
Off to join the gym at Celebration Health again tomorrow; they're always nice there. Perhaps it'll chip away at the prime rib I ate tonight...

Great Trip Report. Thanks for sharing.

Katie

Thank you for the great TR. Hope you enjoy your trip.

As you see, the more detail the better so thank you for the fantastic TR - look forward to the return.

Two things struck me - being in Y, well, sometimes you have to, but only having the Daily Heil as a newspaper choice, UGH!

MIA immigration, yup, been there done that.

Enjoy the vacay (as they say).

What a brilliant read - thank you very much.

Sounds like VS got it right on this one - dirty suite again, but that seems the norm.

The yanks do like their queues (lines), well done for keeping your cool(ish) at Alamo...

Thanks - a great TR.

Craig

Thanks for a great and detailed TR. I too was Ag for a few years and although it is generally useless (apart from check-in and a few extra miles) you do still feel like part of a club.

Glad you enjoyed the CH, that really is the enduring gem in VS (now slightly faded) crown.

Cheers

Martin

Thanks for a great and detailed TR , i loved the detail and hope you have a great time