VS023 LHR-LAX 30 JUN 12 (Upper Class)

This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin

Ground Staff

Food & Drink

Entertainment

Seat

Cabin Crew

This is my first ever trip report, so any tips on how to improve it for my next one would be appreciated. I will add images in due course, when I work out how to do it as the images are too big.

Our connecting BA (operated by BMI flight) landed at LHR five and a half hours before our VS flight was due to depart. After walking between T1- T3 our BA baggage receipts were scanned through into the VS systems and new boarding passes were issued. I requested a wad of UC purple baggage tags, as I like to collect anything airline branded.

We proceeded to the UC wing, and the security staff were extremely friendly and we cleared security in a matter of minutes as nobody was in front of us. Walked up the stairs to the clubhouse and had to wait about five minutes before the baggage attendant appeared at the desk so ours bags could be stowed. I have always loved the clubhouse and today’s visit was no exception. The clubhouse burger was delightful and the service from the waitress was fantastic despite the fact she couldn’t pronounce ‘A la carte’. It was good to note that the ‘Sky Lounge’ was open, so for the first time I was able to access the ‘Roof Garden’ and plane spot. As it was nice and sunny I ended up staying there for half an hour. For the first time I had a shower at the clubhouse. The showers were lovely, clean and spacious but unfortunately the steam function was not working. Our names were paged and I proceeded to the reception area, where the lovely lady stated that our baggage receipts had to be re-entered into the VS systems. I popped down to duty free about two times and browsed the shopping mall which could be mistaken for LHR T3. About 45 minutes before boarding it was announced that our flight would be boarding from gate 21. Our plane was G-VWEB, Surfer Girl, and I was glad I was able to add another new VS aircraft to fly on, to my log book.

There was a small queue for UC, but we quickly boarded through door L1. We were greeted by the friendly FSM who pointed us towards my seat. Seat 8A is my favourite on the A340-600 as it is right in-front of the wardrobe and I have the weird and totally inappropriate feeling that it is my wardrobe. Our group were the only people using the wardrobe, but as with most of the wardrobes in the VS fleet one door was stuck and couldn’t be opened. A friendly flight attendant instantly came towards my seat as soon as I settled in and asked what I would like to drink. I opted for the apple juice, which is staple of mine. I noticed that the menus were not placed on the ottoman like they used to be but were given out during the flight (more of later on), which I don’t like as I like to decide what I am going to eat whilst I am on the ground as it gives me something to do! We were still parked at the stand at our departure time, then the captain came on the PA, stating that the premium economy section of the aircraft had to leave the aircraft as a passenger had found an iPod from the previous flight and none of the passengers in that section had claimed it. Obviously this is an indication that the aircraft hadn’t been searched properly but I would have thought that even though it was a hassle shouldn’t they have de-boarded the whole cabin as if the whole plane as if the aircraft hadn’t been searched properly they should re-search the whole plane? A fleet of yellow jacket ground staff had entered the PE section and within 20 minutes the doors were closed, a manuel safety video performed,and we taxied towards 27L. As we were queuing up I spotted an ANZ 777 and I assumed it was bound for LAX as well and I was glad we were taking off before it so we might be able to beat those passengers at immigration.

Once we were airborne 45 minutes behind schedule the cabin crew started to hand out the menus and the cabin crew took time to explain to each passenger about how the menu works and the ‘Graze’ option etc. Crisps and drinks were handed out to each passenger and food orders were taken. On our flight here were the menu choices:



Starters
Roasted tomato and basil soup
with pesto

Smoked salmon
With pickled cucumber, caper and tarragon mayonnaise

Main Courses
Grilled fillet of beef
with braised peas, pearl onions, tarragon and fresh cream with crushed new potatoes

Stir-fried chicken
With mushrooms and jasmine rice

English pea and mint tortellini
With balsamic dressing, Italian hard cheese and fresh rocket (v)

Warm Breads
Your choice of warm bread rolls

Dessert
Lemon and almond tart
With lavender cream

Warm chocolate and salted caramel pudding


Cheese and port
Our specially selected cheeses will be served from the cheese trolley following the desert
(I’ll leave out the descriptions as well can gather what each cheese will taste like)
Red Leicester
Shropshire Blue
Cornish Brie

The crew came out and laid out tables with the new (for me) wooden style cloth centre section. I am guessing this was done to match UCDS. I noticed this time that the new trays the cabin crew used are very large and the bottom of them also has a laminate wooden affect to match the UCDS, but I noticed that this effect was wearing on all the trays and white circles had appeared on all the trays, which didn’t look so great in my opinion. I chose the Roasted tomato and basil soup, which was gorgeous. For my main course I had the beef, which wasn’t to my taste and I left most of it. For desert I had the chocolate and caramel pudding, which had to be one of the tastiest deserts I have had, including ones from the ground. I declined the cheese course as I’m not a huge cheese eater. The crew cleared away and put back my table.

After the meal service I made my seat into a bed and put my IFE to the moving map and dozed off now and again. The new mattress cover is great and makes the bed a tad softer. I have always loved the VS seat but I do wish it would recline a little more. I'm glad the CC decided to put the lights on the dimmest purple setting as it adds a nice atmosphere to the cabin. I’m not a fan of dark cabins during day flights. I popped up to the bar where the lovely Greek FA who served our section was chatting to us and he used to work for BA. All the crew on this flight were fantastic and I hadn’t until the return flight met one miserable or non proactive member of CC or even ground staff on a VS flight. The crew were extremely attentive to the point when they wouldn’t let you do anything yourself, it did start to annoy me, because I do like to put away my tray table myself but when I said that I would stow the table or make my bed myself the FA kept on and on insisting that he should do it, but he was only being a good FA so I’m not going to complain. The only minor complain from the crew this flight was that the lavs were not kept very clean, to a point that when a member of the flight deck crew came to use the toilets he popped into the forward loo in the right side of the cabin, quickly retreated and told a member of the cabin crew to clean it before he used it.

I woke up 90 minutes prior to landing and decided to get changed out of my pyjamas then since there is usually a mad rush to use the lavs after high tea.

High tea consisted of:
A selection of freshly prepared sandwiches
Ham and chutney, tuna and sweetcorn and cucumber and dill mayonnaise

Warm sultana scone
With clotted cream and strawberry jam

Your choice of cakes from our cake stand
Chocolate éclair, blackcurrant and almond slice and a selection of macaroons.

I chose the Ham and chutney sandwich, a scone and a macaroon, all of which were lovely when washed down with a cup of tea.

I do love the (fairly) new UC meal service and I love the new cutlery and glasses especially. The captain told gave his speech that we were close to landing, which is when my moving map stopped working, but it didn’t bother me to much as I could see the maps from other people in my group.

We landed at 19:33 PDT which was 18 minutes behind schedule, but unfortunately the ANZ 777 had beat us to it which = an hours queue in immigration. We were tugged onto stand, as is the norm in LAX and we were greeted with a large queue but what annoyed us a little bit was that we ended up behind our whole aircraft even though we had disembarked among the first because the immigration staff kept moving all the people behind us to a different queue to use the same desks so by the time we had cleared immigration all of our bags were off the carousel and the queue to exit border control had snaked around the whole of terminal 2s baggage carousels. All of our bags had arrived though and we exited the terminal 90 minutes after landing. It was nice that BD agent at MAN placed priority stickers on our bags as VS don’t use them, it means another thing for me to collect.

I do prefer the 23 service over the 7 as it allows you to unpack and go straight to bed and helps to ease the effect of jetlag.

It was another fantastic flight by VS. Thank you.
Thank you for reading and I will post the return in the next couple of days

Trouble with a triple-7 is that it flies faster than an A346 . Glad you had a great flight.

Great TR. loads of juicy detail. Never flown UC but your report was the next best thing All that lovely food, yum yum

Thanks for the TR. Absolutely no improvement needed.

[buns]

Thank you for such a thoroughly detailed TR

To supplement the facts, your feelings come across loud and clear, so another vote to say you have pitched your TR just right

Shame about the Immigration queue, but as you were heading straightforward the land of nod, perhaps an aid rather than a hindrance

Thanks once again

buns

A fine first TR, thanks for posting Sounds like a very pleasant flight wiht great crew

I too had the same problem with posting pictures and ended up using software to compress them further to put them on the TR.

Top notch first effort

Thanks for a great trip report.
Agree about the timing of the 23, plus it's always an airbus, which for me is a plus.

Thanks for the TR, we are on the same flight on 7th Aug so it's a useful insight into what to expect.

Will the menu listed be exactly the same as on our flight?

Thanks for the TR. Absolutely no improvement needed.

Can't put it any better than that, so ditto!

Great TR and a nice reminder of the VS023 we enjoyed back in May I agree about the timing of this flight, we have only every done morning/lunchtime flights before and this later flight means you don't have nearly as long to try and stay awake. As you say, get to your hotel, unpack, have a short rest then bed. Especially flying UC the whole day flight was part of our holiday so it didn't feel like any wasted time.

thanks for the TR any ice creams on offer at all!

Excellent read, thank you

oldboy

Our connecting BA (operated by BMI flight) landed at LHR five and a half hours before our VS flight was due to depart. After walking between T1- T3 our BA baggage receipts were scanned through into the VS systems and new boarding passes were issued.

We are doing exactly the same trip next month and connecting with BA/BMI from Edinburgh. Did you have your bags checked right through or did you have to collect at T1 and check in again at T3?

Great TR btw!

Thanks for the TR, we are on the same flight on 7th Aug so it's a useful insight into what to expect.

Will the menu listed be exactly the same as on our flight?

I don't think so, as another member of our group flew out the next day to us, and his main course with another desert option different

Our connecting BA (operated by BMI flight) landed at LHR five and a half hours before our VS flight was due to depart. After walking between T1- T3 our BA baggage receipts were scanned through into the VS systems and new boarding passes were issued.

We are doing exactly the same trip next month and connecting with BA/BMI from Edinburgh. Did you have your bags checked right through or did you have to collect at T1 and check in again at T3?

Great TR btw!

The BMI agent at Manhester (who was doing the check in for the BA flight) taged our bags straight through to LAX, but our baggage reciepts had to be entered into the VS systems, and I wanted a 'proper' boarding pass printed off instead of the paper OLCI one. If you have enough time, I recogmend to exit T1 through the domestic baggage claim area, go landside and walk to T3, as it is a much nicer experiance, plus you get your last breath of fresh air before landing at LAX. I also love the VS private security wing at LHR, which is the main reason why I do it this way

Here is a link to the pictures from the TR. I uploaded them onto the gallery.
http://v-flyer.com/the-community/photos/11670-vslover/album?albumid=4593

I just want to say a huge thank you for all the lovely comments. I have always been an avid reader of TR, and always loved 'V-flyer' and I really appreciate how nice everybody has been

thanks for the TR any ice creams on offer at all!

Yes!! I was at the bar, when the CC where distrubting the ice creams. I think that they might be Hagagen Dazs? Also at the bar was a snack basket with an asortment of fruit and 'Divine' chocolates

[honey lamb]

Thanks for the TR, we are on the same flight on 7th Aug so it's a useful insight into what to expect.

Will the menu listed be exactly the same as on our flight?

I don't think so, as another member of our group flew out the next day to us, and his main course with another desert option different

It should be the same as the menus only change every three months in March, June, September and December for UC and PE and every six months for Economy. Remember though that the menu given on this TR is for UC. PE currently has the mushroom-based menu and I don't know what is on offer in Economy

Just as well we're in UC then :-)