V-Flyer

Right then, Virgin trip report from a Virgin virgin – I hope I’ve managed to capture all the info necessary. I was furiously scribbling in my note book which my husband found amusing and ridiculous in equal measure.

A bit of preamble first as I enjoy reading others…… stayed overnight at LGW following the drive up from the west country. Generally we have at least one minor disaster which usually extends our journey time by 2 – 3 hours, in recent years we suffered through the great snow of 2010, several road closures and a puncture. Amazingly we arrived at the Sofitel some 2.5 hours after leaving home – clearly a good omen.

I had done OLCI before leaving home, logged on at exactly T-24 but only managed seq 5,6,7 – grrrr!

I had emailed ahead and asked for a runway view room which we got. I could see a VS 747 on stand but couldn’t work out which one it was, my husband made me leave the window to go down to dinner so I was unable to continue further investigation.

Usual excellent stay at the Sofitel and it was up and out to the monorail. I think my little boy would have happily spent his two week holiday riding it backwards and forwards- he thought it was great.

We had done twilight check in, which was very easy, no queue so we headed to security through the premium channel which made me feel dead important and then on to the v-room. We were very impressed it was quite busy but we got a nice clean table, had breakfast and watched the planes through the floor to ceiling windows. I thought the food selection and quality was very good. The hot food was hot and the cold food was cold which is always a good starter for ten. Internet access was quick and uninterrupted and my son busied away the hour and a half in the children’s play area which he initially dismissed as ‘for babies’ and then following making a friend or two and getting on with colouring a picture of a trunki decided it wasn’t too bad after all.

Flight was called on time so we made our way to the gate (first mistake – didn’t make a note of the gate number – oops!) I think it may have been 68. It was a fair old walk anyway, enough to burn off that delicious scrambled egg from the v-room.

Boarded quickly and took our seats on the newly refurbished Ladybird. We were in 15 D,E & F downstairs. Now, having never flown VS, let alone in the bubble I can’t comment on whether it was better, worse or the same but for what we paid for the upgrade, and the holiday overall I was very VERY impressed. The seats were spacious, plenty of leg room and spotlessly clean. We were offered sparkling wine or orange juice. The captain gave us a flight time of 8hrs and 55 mins. There were 444 passengers on board. We pushed back at 11.30am, had a small wait to get on to the westerly runway and took off at 11.45am.

Quickly after takeoff we were given hot towels, amenity kits, dinner menus and earphones. There was then a drinks service. The menu was as follows:

Starter – smoked salmon with crème fraiche and rocket.
Main – Lasagne al forno or diced chicken breast with mushroom and red pepper sauce, broccoli mashed potato and carrots or wild mushroom stroganoff with risotto.
Warm bread roll.
Dessert – chewy Belgian chocolate cake.

Wine (2011 Sicilian Chardonnay and 2011 French Shiraz) and water was offered with dinner followed by coffee.

So, my impressions and opinions on the food offering. Overall very good for an aeroplane meal, the ceramic dishes and proper cutlery were a nice touch. Not sure we need the table cloth, seems to get in everyone’s way and create more washing. However the linen napkin is preferable over a paper one. Coffee in paper cups is a bit easyJet but it didn’t really bother me. Although I know this topic has been covered previously….. why all the mushrooms?! I love mushrooms but three dishes where mushrooms are explicitly added is a bit strange.

Baileys and brandy offered then another drinks service and then we settled down to watch a film. The IFE was very good. A good selection of films and TV programmes. I use an iPad a lot so you really do have to touch (jab) the screen from time to time, there were also momentary freezes where you think you haven’t touched it hard enough and then you touch it again and it jumps about. Overall, I don’t think you could ask for much more from inflight entertainment, we were impressed.

Flight was smooth, cabin crew were hit and miss. Here’s where the excitement of flying with VS and the reality don’t match. They all look so fantastic, so smart and professional, it makes me want to run off and be a flight attendant. I headed up front to take a sneaky peak at UC, I spoke with the FSM and a male member of the crew who were brilliant, everything you would expect. The male CC was very proud that he had served HoneyLamb on several occasions and knew that he liked her G&T with lime (I hope I remembered that correctly, if not it would be my fault not his). However the lady we had in our cabin was surly, unresponsive and spent as much time as possible in the galley. Maybe she was having an off day or maybe my expectations were set too high and I imagined them all to be like the FSM and HoneyLamb’s friend.

As an aside, I imagined the UC loos would be better than they were. I asked CC if I could use the loo at the front of our cabin and she looked at me like I was mad and said ‘of course’. When I went in, I realised why, it’s exactly the same as every other loo with the addition of some cowshed hand cream. Big disappointment, I expected some sort of gold throne, never mind!

Afternoon tea was served around two hours before landing, it was the (in)famous cheese and red onion sandwich, which I thoroughly enjoyed and could have eaten three more of and the Great British cupcake which is not my thing (don’t like butter cream).

I sat next to a really nice guy on the flight, really funny and interesting so that made the time fly (excuse the pun). Before I knew it we were landing in rainy, windy CUN. Hurricane Ernesto was about to make landfall 250 miles south so it was a bit bumpy coming in but otherwise no problems.

The only complaint I would have is that there were not enough immigration forms on board. CC said we should have been given them at CI although no one was (I can’t believe the CI staff forgot to hand them out to the whole flight?!). Anyway, CC said they had a few but not even enough for all of UC. Now you would expect UC to get them at least?! I wouldn’t have been at all happy if I had forked out all that money but c’est la vie.

Overall the flight was great. I really wish I could fly VS every time.

Thanks for the TR.
Looks like the downstairs PE is pretty good.

A great first TR thank you .

444 on board, CUN is proving popular!

Brilliant TR Rachel, I have been waiting on this for what seems an eternity lol.

Hope the hotel lived up to your expectations also.

I'm even more excited (if possible) now lol

Nice informative TR. Good to hear positive comments about reconfigured PE downstairs
So all your orginal concerns re OLCI and the possible hurricane didn't materialise, thank goodness.
Hope you all had a good holiday in Cancun.

Great trip report Rachel, my first Virgin flight also to cancun isn't till next March and it's in upper class !!!!! (.v excited) , but you are right - I will be severely peed off if there is no immigration form for me to fill in onboard ( not least because I know the chaos it causes if you don't have one filled out on arrival) have scrimped and scraped and saved for that upper class seat - it better be worth it .though if it is half as good as your premium seat seems to have been I will be happy: )
Am counting the days to my first virgin flight and there is still 7 months to go , how sad is that , but your trip report got me all excited and eager to go !!
Incidentally am also staying at the Sofitel the night before - and staying at The Bahia , obviously we both have great taste ; )

Ian, my TA review should be published tomorrow, I've just sent it in now. My name on TA is HolidayRCool. We stayed at the Sian Kaan GBP. It was fantastic.

Dougalsmum, I've never seen UC before but I thought it looked very nice, even though it's in the nose of the plane it seemed spacious and light. There are only 14 seats I think so I'm sure it's worth every penny.

I'll post my return TR later. UC on the return night flight would be a godsend.

Thanks for the TR -- much enjoyed.

Thanks for the info Rachel, we're staying in the Coba section, upgraded he room though. We did initially book into the Sian Khan, but the mrs didn't fancy walking over the bridge to get into the main resort each day.12 weeks 5 days to go and counting each minute lol

Oh Ian, reconsider! Coba isn't on the beach either, you will still need to get a buggy. It's probably the difference of an extra 3 mins on the buggy. Sian Kaan has a private section of beach so you will get a bed and there is waitress service on the beach.

Sian Kaan is head and shoulders above the other hotels on the complex, the food was out of this world.

I am flying to CUN in Jan in cattle class with the family, a real bind not being able to book seats as I know where I want to sit we booked VS early so that we could do this, alas no. We are staying at Dreams Puerto Aventuras Resort & Spa, first time visit to Mexico but have flown VS many times not as good as they were back in eighties.

What a lovely TR. Well done

I spoke with the FSM and a male member of the crew who were brilliant, everything you would expect. The male CC was very proud that he had served HoneyLamb on several occasions and knew that he liked her G&T with lime (I hope I remembered that correctly, if not it would be my fault not his)

Aaw bless him! Yes it is lime and if it's the guy I think it is, he was superb. On my first flight with him, he searched the aircraft for a lime and on my second one gave me his soup from the staff cart when I didn't like the starter options. Oh and he remembered my G&T and lime. You were blessed to have him as your crew

Yeah I know it probably is Rachel, but she made up her mind and I like a quiet life he he. I'm sure we'll have an amazing time

Excellent read, thank you. I love the observations and personal touches alongside the judgement of the services....

Ian you will, it's a great resort.

Honeylamb, he's handsome too which always helps!

What a great TR. Really enjoyed reading it - thanks very much indeed!

As others have said, an awesome TR Loved the preamble too.

Ahh the mushrooms are back!!! I thought SRB had sold his mushroom farm

Ian, my TA review should be published tomorrow, I've just sent it in now. My name on TA is HolidayRCool. We stayed at the Sian Kaan GBP. It was fantastic.

Have read the review on TA, brilliant read. I have (I think) got the email for Felix the manager at Coba and will be emailing him a couple of weeks before I go to request rooms and matress toppers etc. I think I'll wait until I get out there to book al la carte meals, as we aren't sure when we'll go on trips.
Thanks again Rachel for the brilliant reoprts

Thank you for the great TR.

Thanks for the TR - doing a similar trip in just over 2weeks - up from the West Country and on the GBP Sian Kaan via PE - can't wait and even more excited readin your reviews ! We are staying at the Hilton though so some difference !

Fatcat wrote:Thanks for the TR - doing a similar trip in just over 2weeks - up from the West Country and on the GBP Sian Kaan via PE - can't wait and even more excited readin your reviews ! We are staying at the Hilton though so some difference !

Have a great time! You'll love GBPSK it's fantastic.

Every time I ask the following question, I seem to get a different answer...

What is the best currency to take...
on TA a lot of people seem to advise taking USD
I emailed the virgin Concierge and she advised Pesos, but the list of excursions she sent me, all the prices were in USD...
confused.com

Ian,

Having been before (and this is starting to go towards thread drift !) I would take Peso's - doolars are accepted everywhere bt you get a standard street rate of about 10Peso's to 1$, so in effect you lose about 20% paying in USD.

Back to the thread - would you recommend any seats over others in the new Config ?

Cheers

FC

Cheers FC much appreciated