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#936154 by Kraken
23 Jun 2017, 10:54
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Did OLCI the evening before & as always on the new Delta system, it was very fast and easy (a huge improvement over the clunky old VS system).

Dropped bags at Disney Springs this morning & the only thing worthy of mention is that they should bin the sign that says Upper / PE one side & Economy the other. The agent who was checking your booking / taking the $10 or VHols voucher was having none of it. He treated both queues as one & served people in the order they joined the queue. Bag weight limits were being enforced as there were a few passengers re-packing bags. As we were in Upper, the agent just lifted our bags with one hand & as he could do this with ease, we were not directed to the scale.

The normal final day routine for us followed – SeaWorld for Mako, lunch at Mythos in Islands of Adventure, then back to our accommodation to shower & change then make the trip to the airport.

I know it’s midweek & out of school holidays, but the TSA security was a breeze. We waited longer to have our passports & boarding passes checked than we did to go through the screening process. Today it was “leave everything in your bags, keep belts, watches & shoes on & go through the metal detector”. No body-scanning today.

Took the train to the airside terminal, picked up a couple of litres of T10 & up to the Sky Club which was fairly busy. Found a couple of coveted seats with power sockets next to them & took up residence for a couple of beers before boarding was called. Priority boarding was in progress when we got to the gate & we were soon onboard and settled into our seats, with obligatory champagne served & topped up.

Pretty Woman soon passed us to form the early flight to Gatwick & Tinker Belle was at the next gate to form the later Gatwick flight. Hot Lips is our ride for 7h21m to Manchester.

Pushed back bang on time at 18:30 and took off to the south. Interestingly, we did not turn towards the ocean after takeoff as is normal, we turned inland and did the north turn over the Magic Kingdom. First time in about 18 ex-MCO flights that we have not headed towards the ocean straight away. (And yes, we did use the normal departure runway – 17R today).

Drinks orders were taken before takeoff and promptly delivered after takeoff. Nice to see that the crew are pro-actively offering an alternative to the god-awful root vegetable crisps – todays alternative was BBQ kettle crisps which are a huge improvement!

Current menu for VS6, 118, 16, 28, 50, 18, 22, 72, 74 & 76 (June Cycle 2017) is;

Starters
Sweetcorn and miso soup (v)
Heirloom tomato salad (v)
Hot smoked salmon
Above all served with warm breads

Mains
Beef fillet
Shoyu chicken
Vegetable korma (v)
BBQ shrimp salad

Pudding
Lemon and poppyseed pud
Vairhona chocolate cake

Cheese
Point Reyes blue cheese
President Camembert
Idiazabul

Went for the smoked salmon & the beef, which were both OK. Nothing to write home about, but nothing to complain about either. Passed on pudding and had the cheese which was also good.

After the meal I changed into the sleepsuit and flipped the seat into bed mode and attempted to sleep. Did manage a couple of hours of on-off sleep & woke up just under 2hrs out of Manchester. Tried to get back to sleep for the half hour before breakfast service but gave up & changed back into normal clothes ahead of the pre-landing rush for the toilets.

Landed in Manchester about 15mins early, but arrived on stand slightly late as there was a bit of a traffic jam around T2, so we sat on the taxiway by the aviation viewing park whilst the departing planes cleared the taxiways to T2.

The UK Border Agency excelled themselves today – three (yes 3) e-gates open to handle a flight with over 400 passengers onboard. They were only letting people with children under 12 join the line to see an officer at the desk – everyone else was sent to the e-gates. Got through fairly quickly & down to the baggage hall. The first bags off were not priority ones – it was about 5mins before bags with Upper / PE tags on started to come through.

So all in all another good flight from Virgin. Nothing wow about it, but equally nothing worthy of complaint. Just need to plan the next trip now – but will wait for Florida to cool down a little as it was verging on being too hot & humid when in the sun (reminded me of Dubai in August).
#936160 by SlimpyJones
23 Jun 2017, 11:24
Thanks Kraken. Sounds like a standard overnighter experience. Midweek and out of school holidays with still over 400 on board is a good sign. Looks like you missed the heatwave we had here too, you must be relieved!
#936169 by buns
23 Jun 2017, 13:56
James

Thanks for the promptly posted TR!!

I have to admit I have avioded using Disney Springs Check In in recent years following a few episodes where priory bags did not come off first.

Once again, thanks or the TR that shows that VS still has the magic :-)

buns
#936177 by Kraken
23 Jun 2017, 14:30
buns wrote:I have to admit I have avioded using Disney Springs Check In in recent years following a few episodes where priory bags did not come off first.


TBH I don't think Disney Springs makes any difference to whether the priority bags are off first. All Disney Springs do is tag the bags and transport them to the airport. Our bags were correctly tagged as Priority & had Upper Class labels stuck into the bag tags.

Once at the airport, the Disney Springs bags are put into the bag handling system just like any other checked bag & go through the same screening & handling system as bags checked in at the airport.

What I suspect happened is the Priority container (for UC/PE/FC Gold bags) was not the last one loaded into the hold at MCO (it should be, so it's the first container off at the other end). If the ground handlers load the containers in the wrong order it makes no difference where the bag was checked-in & tagged.
#936695 by MoJoJo
19 Jul 2017, 14:02
buns wrote:That makes sense Kraken

Now, bag arrival ( irrespective of cabin) at Gatwick North seems to be an entirely different matter!!

buns


Buns - flew into North Terminal last week. Had been grumbling to another passengers about how long bags took at north. Got straight through passport control without queuing, popped to the loo expecting it to take ages for the belt number to be shown however two belts were being advised and as soon as I walked over out came my cases pretty much the first ones. Hopefully this is now the norm....
#936697 by buns
19 Jul 2017, 16:10
MoJoJo wrote:
buns wrote:That makes sense Kraken

Now, bag arrival ( irrespective of cabin) at Gatwick North seems to be an entirely different matter!!

buns


Buns - flew into North Terminal last week. Had been grumbling to another passengers about how long bags took at north. Got straight through passport control without queuing, popped to the loo expecting it to take ages for the belt number to be shown however two belts were being advised and as soon as I walked over out came my cases pretty much the first ones. Hopefully this is now the norm....


Thanks MoJoJo

Gives me some hope for my upcoming!!

buns
#936698 by MoJoJo
19 Jul 2017, 18:12
buns wrote:
Thanks MoJoJo

Gives me some hope for my upcoming!!

buns


Not sure buns when your upcoming trip is however I am off to MCO on 14th of next month for the week as going out to Heathrow to attend training at one of my new companies offices. I will report back!
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