This is a Trip Report from the Upper Class cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
VS crews have precisely the same amount of time as I had in Washington DC, although I hope they stayed somewhere nicer than the Arlington Hyatt. In fact, Arlington is full of brutalist sixties and seventies office blocks which puts one in mind of Ceausescus crimes against architecture in Romania. Still, the Hyatt is convenient for my clients offices and has some proximity to other locations like the Pentagon which are important when you are in the business of selling military hardware.
We switched venues at the last minute so I called the US number to sort out the change to the limo pickup. According to them they had no record of the transfer: bizarre given that this had all been booked just a couple of weeks ago. Still, booking the limo for 4pm was easy enough; I suppose if I hadnt changed venues Id still be waiting in a forlorn heap in downtown Arlington waiting for the snow to melt.
In fact the limo (a Lincoln Towncar from Boston Coach) turned up 10 minutes late, just as I was starting to get worried about security delays and the fact that booking 3K in the Snooze Zone meant that getting to the Clubhouse with time to spare was going to be the only means of stuffing my face prior to breakfast. I neednt have worried too much: despite the Dulles check in staff seeming to prefer servicing the PE line over the Upper Class queue, I was in the Clubhouse in just over 20 minutes from exiting the limo. And 5 of those were me struggling to put my shoes on after security screening whilst weighed down by the maximum possible amount of hand baggage.
The trek to Concourse B at Dulles is now achieved via underpass rather than mobile lounge, which does take some of the uniqueness out of the airport but is definitely cheaper and easier in practice. The VS Clubhouse is opposite gate B32 (the one Virgin always uses) and was fairly full when I arrived, but I did manage to snag a seat close to the bar and overlooking the apron. Then, falling upon the menu with great relief, I ordered up the crusted salmon (excellent) and a succession of beers.
Despite there clearly being an active access point, the Clubhouse wireless access did not seem to be working, but there were a couple of alternatives visible to my laptop which got me connected to my office without any fuss. After taking a quick time out to despatch the emails that had accumulated in the scant minutes since I was last online, I wandered out onto the concourse and hit the gate just as they were opening up the priority boarding line. At Dulles this seems to be handled very well, with a central priority channel (complete with purple carpet) being flanked by the queues.
I was first onto the plane (I love it when that happens) and spent a little time greeting the cabin crew who remembered me from the day before. No beauty treatment this time, just a sleeper suit and goodnight drink. I managed to complete nearly everything prior to push back, changing into the usual black pyjamas, taking out my contact lenses and brushing my fangs.
Rotation was at 7:20 and with just a 6 hour flying time we were destined to be back in Blighty with all too little sleep. As befits the Snooze Zone, the lights were turned off almost immediately after takeoff. The K side is definitely the place to be since it faces the wall at the back of the D seats. Incidentally, as the Seat Map demonstrates, 1D, 2D and 3D are pretty poor seats since they face the toilet. (The 346 I was on only had a port-side toilet at the front, the right hand side holding a wardrobe instead.)
Everyone in the Snooze Zone (there were 6 free seats, including the aforementioned 1D, 2D and 3D) got their heads down quickly but we were rudely awoken by clear air turbulence. Unfortunately this continued for most of the flight, often requiring the cabin crew to take to their seats. Sleep became impossible for me so I resorted to the episodes of Black Books on V-Port by way of entertainment.
An hour before landing the cabin crew attempted to service breakfast to those who had requested it. Unfortunately, and perhaps predictably, the turbulence served to ensure that my coffee leapt from its cup and proceeded to dance across not just my tray but my plate, lap and genitals. Well, thats certainly one way of taking your mind off the jetlag, I thought, as I cleaned up as best I could.
We were held for 10 minutes before our final descent, but still landing at gate 40 early. Then it was a seriously long trek to immigration. Here my competitive instincts were overwhelmed and, careering down the travelators like a man possessed, I made up good time only to be stymied at the last by the morass of people waiting in the arrivals line. What is it about this now? I presume the immigration services do actually realise that there are lots of flights arriving at Heathrow in the morning? Without wishing to sound too parochial, youd think they would be able to provide a faster immigration service to UK citizens but always now I seem to see a tiny queue of overseas visitors and an immense queue in the EU arrivals section.
Still, the line did move and soon I was eschewing the baggage claim (nothing checked) and heading out into a busy airport to make a bee line for Revivals. Here things were equally frenetic with all the showers having been taken and waiting time around 15 minutes. However, when Ive been travelling 4,000 miles I really do need that shower to wake me up and, in this case, to allow me to inspect the burns from my coffee incident. Luckily not too much damage seemed to have been done when I managed to peel off my clothes in shower number 13. The Cowshed potions and unguents are an improvement on the previous stuff, and with every pore gleaming I consumed most of the hot breakfast buffet, followed by a limo transfer to Brentford Mercedes where an annoying fault with my car had hopefully been fixed.
The VS22 was an interesting contrast to the outbound flight the previous day. The same excellent crew and the same mundane food (the salmon frittata for breakfast was plain nasty). And of course this time a working V-Port, even if most people were attempting to sleep. Of course, Id still prefer to do this route (and any VS UCS route) in a 747-400. [:)]
BC
Outbound flight: see here
