VS007 LHR-LAX 6 MAY 13 (Upper Class)

This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin

Ground Staff

Food & Drink

Entertainment

Seat

Cabin Crew

I left home in St Johns Wood, London at about 7 am and as it was a bank holiday it took about 20 mins from my home to the check in desk at terminal 3. Check In was a breeze and in a few clicks I was headed to the lift to go through the security channel. Straight through security and up to the clubhouse. After many years of flying VS, I always go to the clubhouse to have a bite, book a treatment and relax before heading back to the main terminal to have a look at the Duty Free. I find it quite strange to do it the other way round.
I headed back to the clubhouse and had a few more redheads and soon enough it was time to board. I like to leave the clubhouse a few mins before the flight is called to avoid the queue to get my hand luggage from the porter. Its never an enormous queue but I guess it is just one of those things I just do.
I got to the gate and the line for Economy was miles long luckily I managed to get through to the UC line and used my mobile boarding pass from my iPhone to get through the gate. On getting through I noticed the crew had not boarded the plane yet and the plane was just being pulled into the stand. It took some time but we eventually boarded a very hot plane which we were made to understand was due to a fault with the plane which needed to be fixed with the engines off ( or something....I was mostly on the phone so I wasn't paying full attention ) We took off almost an hour behind schedule but throughout the delay we were offered drinks and updated quite frequently. Upon boarding the plane i noticed the seat was quite dirty with liquid stains and pen marks and I ended up scrubbing the seat with my hot towel as although the cabin was quite empty, I only sit in 14K when flying VS and I wasn't willing to change. ( I have a lot of "things") Once we were on our way the flight was very smooth. I had the duck salad to start, a chicken dish for my main and a lovely dessert which I don't recall.
Although I have flown VS a lot I have never had anything from the Graze menu and I was hoping to try it on this flight as it was a longer flight. I had the mini burger which was delicious. I got a bit restless and walked around the cabin and ended up at the bar where I got chatting with a lovely member of the cabin crew. I saw her measuring the alcohol and noting it down and she explained it was a new pain staking task they had to do on flights. We also chatted about Richard Branson and she told me she loves having him as a boss. She was invited to a party at his home and herself and two other cabin crew couldn't leave that night ( don't remember why) but he let them stay over and they had breakfast with Richard and his parents the next morning (imagine that happening at BA! HA!). Finally it was time to land and although it took a while to get taxied to our gate at LAX, very soon we were out of the plane. Getting to immigration it was COMPLETELY empty!! I was initially worried about the queue as I know fast track isn't available at LAX. I was third on the queue, got my luggage in a few mins and was out in the LA Sun in no time! Overall an amazing trip as expected from VS.
I typed this very quickly so please forgive all errors. Ill try to correct anything in the comment section.

Thanks for the TR - I do my shopping once I have settled into the CH too, especially now you have to book treatments on the day. Glad the flight went well, although having to clean you seat before you sit down sounds grim.

Lovely TR, many thanks :-)

Thanks for the TR. Shocking about the seat, though!