Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Category: Hounslow (Borough of)

  • British Airways (Berlin to Heathrow T5)

    Every time I fly back from Berlin Tegel I wonder whether it’ll be the last time I visit the airport, with its replacement seemingly having been nearly ready for nearly ten years. Tegel has long since been unable to comfortably cope with the volume of passengers and it feels crowded and uncomfortable.

    The boarding process is unusual as the BA lounge is landside, so then there’s a long queue for the security and border checks. Above is a photo of the queue for the flight at the next gate, it’s one of the few airports I can think of where the queues to board are within a five second walk of the terminal entrance.

    The British Airways check-in desks. It took over 40 minutes of queueing to board the aircraft, with no seating for those who needed it. Interestingly, or at least I was interested, my battery pack was examined by the security personnel for compliance, which has never happened before. It is a large battery pack at 20000mAh and I was quite impressed that it was checked, since it is only just under the allowable level.

    The aircraft was G-EUPE, an Airbus A319 that British Airways have operated since it came into service in 2000. I had a window exit row seat, which was sufficiently spacious and clean. It was also a busy flight and was at near capacity, although fortunately there didn’t seem as much pressure on the overhead lockers as usual. Then flight left around ten minutes late, but the captain gave updates and it seemed to be because there was a slight delay with getting everyone through the security process.

    The crew were professional and the buy-on-board (BOB) seemed to be popular, with a new menu having come out at the beginning of October. I still don’t think it’s a very innovative on-board menu, although my views on this are a bit irrelevant since I never buy anything on board British Airways flights anyway.

    The DHL truck had appropriate branding for where I had just flown from.

    The flight arrived into London Heathrow T5 at the expected time and the disembarkation process was efficient and timely. It took around twelve minutes from the airport doors opening to my leaving the terminal, allowing me to leave Heathrow in good time.

  • British Airways (Heathrow T5 to Berlin)

    Today’s expedition was to Berlin Tegel airport and, as usual, I arrived hopelessly early in the day to ensconce myself into the BA lounge. It was evident from the volume of rain hitting the roof of Heathrow T5 B Gates building that there were going to be some weather issues, although there were only a few cancellations and relatively minor delays.

    Fortunately, my flight was only delayed by around an hour, although there’s always the fear of a creeping delay where that one hour turns into two or three.

    Boarding was from gate A2 and I fail to understand why BA don’t make this process easier to understand. They did have separate queues for the different boarding groups, with groups 1 and 2 each having their own lane, and groups 3 to 5 were merged into one lane. But, in a piece of design brilliance, the lane for groups 3 to 5 was in front of groups 1 and 2 and so the others couldn’t be easily accessed. I’m not important enough for group 1, but I can sneak into group 2 and it took quite a determined staff member to get me, and some others, to the right place.

    There’s the aircraft at the end of the airbridge, which was registration G-EUOE, an Airbus A319 which British Airways have been using since it was manufactured in 2001.

    The aircraft was clean, although the crew had their usual challenge of trying to fit all the hand baggage into the overhead lockers. It’s the one disadvantage of exit row seats for me, having to engage in this whole overhead baggage game. This is a problem for me as my bag is relatively small, and usually there is someone with a ridiculously sized cabin bag who takes great exception to my small bag being in the lockers. So they try and shove it somewhere else. Always unsuccessfully I’d add.

    Waiting on the tarmac for departure, with the captain sounding professional and fitting the British Airways brand perfectly. I was also pleased to note that there was silence during the safety demonstration, it makes things feel so much calmer. Indeed, the whole flight seemed calm and the crew were efficient and polite.

    We landed around sixty minutes late, with the pilot being able to make up a few minutes of the delay en route. I flew to Berlin Tegel around five years ago and thought it’d likely be the last time there as operations are being moved to Berlin Brandenburg Airport. Unfortunately, this is currently one of the world’s most mocked projects, with an opening expected nearly one decade late. All of which means that Tegel is looking quite rickety and spending more money on it is pointless given that it will all be demolished soon.

    Anyway, this flight was a Reward Flight Saver (RFS) so it cost £17.50 plus 4,000 Avios points.

  • Heathrow T5

    I hadn’t realised that BA has introduced this into Heathrow T5, what could also perhaps be known as a job replacement programme. There were rows of manned check-in desks here once (well, last year), now just self-service kiosks for bag drop. Such is progress I suppose….

  • Heathrow T5 at Night

    I haven’t been at Heathrow T5 at night for some time and I had forgotten just how impressive a building it is. It has been open for twelve years now, but it still has a modern feel to it and it’s one of the more impressive structures when looked at from the side.

    Inside the terminal. I think that passengers are discouraged from staying in the terminal at night, instead it’s better to be at terminals 2 and 3 which have a more conducive environment for resting. T5 is big, empty and also quite cold….

    Looking down from the departures floor all the way down to arrivals, a reminder of just how big the building is.

  • Heathrow – Off to Luxembourg

    A quick breakfast in the BA lounge at Heathrow T3 early this morning, before my flight.

    Today I’m off to Luxembourg for the day, then getting the Flixbus to Bern. Given my past experiences with Flixbus, it’s anyone’s guess just whether I’ll actually reach Switzerland, but we’ll see. It’ll be an adventure.

  • Heathrow T5 – British Airways B Gates Lounge

    I’ve realised that despite visiting the B Gates Lounge at Heathrow T5 that I’ve never managed to take any photos of the interior of it. With the exception of the food, which I appear to have taken multiple photos of on numerous occasions. Strange that.

    Anyway, this is my favourite BA lounge at Terminal 5 out of the three which I can access. There’s also the First Class lounge for those with gold cards and the Concorde Room for those flying first class, names which don’t quite make sense but are logical for reasons I’ll go into on another occasion.

    B Gates Lounge is the quietest of the BA lounges as it’s generally used only by passengers flying from B or C Gates and they usually are only there for a short period of time. There’s a legacy reason for this, as a few years ago there was no way to get back from B or C Gates (or no easy way) and so it would be ridiculous to go there before the gate numbers were announced. However, there are now public tunnels to B Gates, so passengers can walk there at any time, and more importantly, they can walk back.

    So, that’s what I do, I usually stay at the main galleries lounge at A Gates (which is the main terminal) for a short while and then wander over to B Gates. Sometimes I get fortunate if my flight subsequently departs from B Gates, but usually it doesn’t so I have to walk back.

    This is the breakfast selection, which is bacon rolls, beans, hash browns and pastries.

    The salad selection.

    Some kind of fruit stuff.

    From lunch-time onwards the sandwiches are also brought out. The coronation chicken is in my view the best sandwich offered.

    These photos are from two different visits and they show the main food selection which is available from lunch-time into the afternoon period. I like these selections, usually there’s a curry, chilli or casserole option and there’s rice or pasta to go with those. The food has a decent flavour to it and the meat, which is usually chicken, is tender and flavoursome.

    There’s a full drinks selection available at the lounge, including wine, champagne, soft drinks and there’s also a coffee machine. Take care if using the coffee machine as I managed to smash one of the plates which were meant to be unbreakable. It was stuck to the base of the milk jug when I picked it up, although the bloody thing managed to unstick itself as soon as it got into the air.

    There’s a story about that actually. I went to reception and mentioned in a casual manner that there was now a plate smashed across most of the floor. The staff member told me that I shouldn’t worry (although being honest I wasn’t particularly worried) and that he’d come and have a look. He did do exactly that, he went to have a look and then returned back to his desk as he couldn’t find anyone to clean it up. He wasn’t being lazy, he was the only staff member at the reception desk, and they do need someone there.

    The situation for the next fifteen minutes was that I was sitting there with my rather lovely coffee, surveying how far this plate had smashed across the floor. Customers carefully walked by the random shards and I pretended not to know anything about it. Then, eventually, a member of the cleaning staff comes along and does a double take at why there is a smashed plate across a tennis court size space of floor. Out come numerous warning signs, some tutting from the member of cleaning staff and then lots of furtive action at cleaning it up.

    I don’t know why I got distracted there recounting that story. I did incidentally mention I could clean it up, but the staff member at reception seemed adamant that neither I, nor indeed he, would need to do that. For anyone interested, my coffee was lovely.

    Anyway, I got distracted there. The lounge is spacious and there are plenty of different types of table and seating depending on what the passenger wants. I like the high chairs and tables as I can use my laptop. By high chairs, I don’t means the ones that toddlers use, just that the chairs are high. Unfortunately these are mostly near the kids area of the lounge, but it’s rare that there are any bloody screaming children, so that’s fine. By bloody I’m just randomly swearing, the children don’t have blood on them.

    The newspaper selection is reasonable and BA also have the system where you can download magazines and newspapers for free in the lounge. Most of the television screens are on silent, but there are instructions on how you can download an app which lets you listen to them via headphones. I like this, the less noise in an airport lounge the better, and televisions blaring out aren’t conducive to quiet and calm.

    There’s also a spa area of the lounge, although I’ve never engaged with that. There are also showers available at this lounge and the queue for these is usually minimal, so there isn’t the wait that there might be in other lounges.

    So, that was my quick explanation of why I like the B-Gates lounge. Spacious, quiet, clean and comfortable. Fortunately not many people will actually read this random splurge of text, otherwise they’d all go to B-Gates lounge and then I wouldn’t like it as much.

  • British Airways (Heathrow T5 to Baltimore)

    This post is more just to upload the photos than anything else, as I can’t remember much else about the flight now. I flew from London Heathrow T5 to Baltimore on an A380 in August 2015. Unfortunately, the photos aren’t very clear, but since they’re the only ones I’ve got of that flight, they’ll have to do.

    I was travelling in Club World and obviously I wasn’t paying since otherwise I’d have been in World Traveller.

    The aircraft at Heathrow T5.

    The Club World cabin during the boarding process.

    This happens too often….

    The starter and salad.

    Corn fed chicken, mashed potato and batons of carrot.

    Some sort of mousse.

    An ice cream from later on during the flight.

  • Heathrow – Security Scanners

    From Business Traveller, this will be a significant improvement for travellers. The number of passengers who still seem surprised that they have to remove liquids, even though they’ve passed 22 signs telling them, never ceases to amaze me.

  • Flights – London Heathrow T5 to Hamburg (British Airways)

    This is aircraft G-EUPO after it had landed in Hamburg Airport, arriving on time from London Heathrow T5. The aircraft is an A319 which BA have owned and operated since 2000.

    I was able to board in the first group which was fortunate as the flight was nearly full. The aircraft could have been a little cleaner, but it looked well maintained and in good order. I was in an exit row seat which was sufficiently spacious and comfortable.

    There was a crew member who seemed to be new and he was being ultra efficient in term of his security protocol. I’d far rather that he was like that than not caring, but he had a passenger remove a book from the seat pocket as they were in an exit row, which seemed slightly excessive. At the end of the flight the same crew member tried to get the customer in front of me to return his seat to the original position, which confused the seat occupant as he was in a seat which didn’t even recline. The crew member was polite though, and I liked his enthusiasm, with the entire crew seeming to work well together.

    From the in-flight menu, this is the page which brought British Airways to the attention of that media titan, the Daily Mail. The afternoon tea doesn’t include a cup of tea, which is only sort of mentioned in the description.

    The flight was fifteen minutes late in leaving Heathrow T5 due to congestion at the airport. The pilot explained he’d be remaining at the stand, as opposed to waiting in a queue on the runway, in a bid to save fuel. The pilot gave regular updates and fortunately he was able to make up time during the flight so we landed on time.

    This was yet another comfortable flight with British Airways, nothing spectacular, but efficient, well managed and organised.

  • Megabus (Heathrow T5 to Gatwick)

    Today I’m going from Heathrow T5 to Gatwick, ready for a flight tomorrow. Usually I’d get the Underground Piccadilly line up from Heathrow and then get a train to Gatwick from Blackfriars with Thameslink all using Oyster. However, since it was early morning that would mean that the prices to do that would cost getting towards £20 and it would also take a couple of hours.

    I checked the National Express price, and that remains at a ridiculous £26 for a single journey.  Although it’s a convenient service to take, I find it unfortunate that a company price gouges like that, it’s not a great image for tourists. The price is so ridiculous that for any group of two people, it’s just as cheap to take an Uber.

    Fortunately, the wonderful Megabus have taken an interest in this route. If booked ahead this ticket can be under £10, although mine was £15 booked just before the journey. This is more expensive than going from Norwich to London with Megabus, but at least it’s a chunk cheaper than National Express and I’m sure they have some high overheads to operate to and from airports.

    The bus arrived on time, at 10.00, with a scheduled journey time of 70 minutes. It was clear from the ticket details where to wait for the bus, although the actual information at the bus stop could be clearer as it was nearly all for National Express. I was confident that I was in the right place though and there were Heathrow staff nearby to offer assistance to anyone who wanted it.

    The driver looked at the ticket on my phone seemingly confused, although he must have seen hundreds of them before. He looked at his watch, looked puzzled and so perhaps he thought it was a different time of the day to what it actually was. Who knows…. The driver didn’t exact engage like the American Megabus drivers, but that’s not unexpected.

    I got the seats at the top and there were plenty of working power outlets and there was also wi-fi available.

    I had a lovely view of the sweeping countryside. Well, the motorway.

    This photo doesn’t really show it, but there were an alarming number of chips and cracks on the bus’s windscreen. I can’t imagine that it’ll last too many more journeys. The driver seemed competent though and his driving was professional and smooth throughout.

    Anyway, the bus arrived into Gatwick early, so the journey took just 50 minutes. For the price I think this is a really decent service and hopefully it’ll take some trade away from National Express who I think are over-charging quite heavily for such a short route with such a captive market.