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atillathehunn

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Emirates Business Class on an A380 is apparently can't be beaten, but be sensible about where you fly. Flying to Dubai is expensive. But if you fly a bit further- Amman and Muscat seem to be good choices- you can do well. I've seen Gatwick-Amman in business class for about £800 each way.

I've been looking because I'm the same. Having flown economy on an Emirates A380, I'm dying to try business class. But probably can't justify it just yet.

Both Amman and Muscat are great weekend break destinations. Check out Amman for a day, eat the amazing food and see the history. Then take a drive down to Petra and Wadi Rum. Spending nights camping in the desert at Wadi Rum when I worked in Jordan are nights I still think of fondly years later.

Muscat also a great choice, some great beach side places to stay at.
 

fowler9

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Norwegian announced today that they are to launch flights from Gatwick to Buenos Aires. The flights will be 4x weekly onboard Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft & will commence from 14th Feb 2018. Prices start at £299 (one way)

http://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/281857/norwegian-unveils-299-gatwick-buenos-aires-flights

Cheers

Ben

Ooh, cheers for that. I have a mate who really wants to go and I would fancy going back. I wouldn't go in February though, it was painfully hot and on our last night there extremely humid, had the pleasure of an incredible thunderstorm though. It was like the gods blowing us home after 6 1/2 months away. Ha ha.
 

atillathehunn

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Norwegian announced today that they are to launch flights from Gatwick to Buenos Aires. The flights will be 4x weekly onboard Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft & will commence from 14th Feb 2018. Prices start at £299 (one way)

http://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/281857/norwegian-unveils-299-gatwick-buenos-aires-flights

Cheers

Ben

Norwegian really are chasing hard after the legacy carriers. TATL expansion, Singapore and now Argentina - all legacy strongholds. Buenos Aires in particular has no direct competition from London for BA.
 

Iskra

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Emirates Business Class on an A380 is apparently can't be beaten, but be sensible about where you fly. Flying to Dubai is expensive. But if you fly a bit further- Amman and Muscat seem to be good choices- you can do well. I've seen Gatwick-Amman in business class for about £800 each way.

I've been looking because I'm the same. Having flown economy on an Emirates A380, I'm dying to try business class. But probably can't justify it just yet.

Sounds like a plan.

Thanks for all the advice guys.
 

Crawley Ben

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Norwegian really are chasing hard after the legacy carriers. TATL expansion, Singapore and now Argentina - all legacy strongholds. Buenos Aires in particular has no direct competition from London for BA.

The loads for the long haul routes operated by Norwegian ex Gatwick are always high (I know as I see them everyday when at work). They seem to be becoming more & more popular that's for sure. Where will be next from Gatwick I wonder?

Cheers

Ben
 

atillathehunn

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The loads for the long haul routes operated by Norwegian ex Gatwick are always high (I know as I see them everyday when at work). They seem to be becoming more & more popular that's for sure. Where will be next from Gatwick I wonder?

Cheers

Ben

Yields appear to be doing well, though I don't know how well their profits are doing. As they keep expanding are debt financed, someone somewhere has confidence in them.

I would think we will see a lot more expansion into Latin America. A new market for European tourists, and with visa restrictions dropped for quite a few countries into Europe there will be tourism both ways.
 

Bald Rick

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Changing subject...

I had my first experience of London City Airport this week (LCY). I got from my office in zone 1 to the departure gate in 45 minutes, and that included checking in at the airport machines, buying lunch, and a small hiccup at security that resulted in a necessary purchase of toiletries airside :oops: It felt rather strange being able to leave the office with only 1h15 before a flight departure, and I could have been as tight as an hour.

Flew BA on an E190. Two things:

I was decidedly unimpressed with the plane, given the rave reviews it has had on these pages. It was just the same as any other BA plane. Perhaps an inch more legroom. But still tatty. What is special about it?

There was free refreshment, including booze. I thought this had been phased out on BA domestic?
 

gsnedders

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There was free refreshment, including booze. I thought this had been phased out on BA domestic?

Not on flights to/from City.

As for the aircraft: I think many people just like the 2+2 seating, slightly larger legroom, and larger windows. I don't see the greatness either, honestly.
 

berneyarms

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LCY flights (apart from JFK) are operated by BA Cityflyer rather than BA itself.

I love the Embraer 170 and 190 for the simple reason that there is no middle seat, which I detest, and I personally find them very roomy.
 
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Shaw S Hunter

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Does anyone know which RAF A330 MRTT Voyager was at BHX today? I saw it pass overhead but I can't find details on flightradar, which is unusual for these flights.

Thanks in advance.

Planefinder normally does pick these up; quite interesting following them on refuelling flights (training or otherwise) over the North Sea. I believe what you saw was ZZ330. No idea about o&d.
 

TheEscapist_

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Last week a went to Amsterdam with KLM for a weekend trip. Going there a 737 comfy and lots of leg room with the economy comfort. Coming back an E190, again like a lot of people I love this plane! No middle seat, seats seem bigger and more leg room. Unfortunately I paid for extra leg room and booked seats for me and my boyfriend at the front but at the gate was changed and we weren't sitting together. KLM claim there was an aircraft change but the same aircraft it was already planned to be. But odd when we got back to Edinburgh, there was no stairs to get us off the plane. Was waiting for about 30 mins for stairs to arrive.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

atillathehunn

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Not on flights to/from City.

As for the aircraft: I think many people just like the 2+2 seating, slightly larger legroom, and larger windows. I don't see the greatness either, honestly.

It's the fact it's 2+2, better legroom, smaller plane so fewer people. Quite zippy too, but that's not so important.
 

fowler9

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Got my first close up look at an AH-64 Apache today at Armed Forces Day in Liverpool. Also saw a flypast by the Red Arrows and a Typhoon. Managed to miss the Battle Of Britain Memorial Flight because I can't tell the time.
 

AlterEgo

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Not on flights to/from City.

As for the aircraft: I think many people just like the 2+2 seating, slightly larger legroom, and larger windows. I don't see the greatness either, honestly.

Better legroom, favourable window alignment with seats at the front and back, big windows, unlimited legroom in 2D (2A in some aircraft), and most importantly the ability to get into and out of LCY!
 

Harbornite

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Planefinder normally does pick these up; quite interesting following them on refuelling flights (training or otherwise) over the North Sea. I believe what you saw was ZZ330. No idea about o&d.

Thanks, you're right as I found out from fb and I zoomed in on my pic and noted the reg.

What I've noticed is that flightradar usually shows the Paderborn- BHX and North sea flights but on this occasion, it failed to show the return working (for that reason, I'll check out planefinder_. Fortunately these flights are quite frequent, running almost every sunday.
 

Butts

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Better legroom, favourable window alignment with seats at the front and back, big windows, unlimited legroom in 2D (2A in some aircraft), and most importantly the ability to get into and out of LCY!

Also if it's an E190 with Flybe 15A,B,C,D all Exit Seats often available free of charge if you check in at the Airport. :p
 

M7R

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Emirates Business Class on an A380 is apparently can't be beaten, but be sensible about where you fly. Flying to Dubai is expensive. But if you fly a bit further- Amman and Muscat seem to be good choices- you can do well. I've seen Gatwick-Amman in business class for about £800 each way.

I've been looking because I'm the same. Having flown economy on an Emirates A380, I'm dying to try business class. But probably can't justify it just yet.

We fly business on long haul for work but have only gone to Korea long haul so far...

Korean Air (ok but seats aren't the best at being best and it's always red hot, the toiletry bag is not too bad, food is OK, it's normally a 777 or poss A380 in the summer months between Heathrow and Incheon in Korea)

Air France (seat pretty good on the 777, wash bag was more style over substance and the food was good if you like posh nosh.. I believe it is some times a 380 between Pairs and Korea too)

KLM seats really good and works well as a flat bed, food is normally alright too, films not quite as good as say Korean Air but enough of a choice, KLM don't have any A380 but upstairs in a 747 is still rather nice as it's like your own private (ish) jet as there's only 30-40 people up there tops.

Emirates. This was a 380 between Dubahi and Korea and it was pretty good. Seat was not too bad and the extra memory foam topper they give you was good as well. The bar was nice too as it gave you somewhere to go and have a walk to, sit and chat etc. And the wash bag is another level! It's a huge thing with razor, shaving foam, deodorant, plus the normal tooth bush (larger tooth paste), comb, eye mask etc. It really can not be beaten.
 

Bald Rick

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Also if it's an E190 with Flybe 15A,B,C,D all Exit Seats often available free of charge if you check in at the Airport. :p

I made the mistake of checking in at the airport, using the machines. (This was BA). I was offered the chance to swap seats. The seat selector came up. The only seat available was mine.

Bizarrely, there was one spare seat on the plane, and it was the one across the aisle from me. Presumably a no show. Shame I didn't get the option, as there was a rather lovely blonde in the window seat!
 

atillathehunn

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I made the mistake of checking in at the airport, using the machines. (This was BA). I was offered the chance to swap seats. The seat selector came up. The only seat available was mine.

Bizarrely, there was one spare seat on the plane, and it was the one across the aisle from me. Presumably a no show. Shame I didn't get the option, as there was a rather lovely blonde in the window seat!

Money spinning idea... Charge more for the seats next to the beautiful women...
 

sheff1

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Bizarrely, there was one spare seat on the plane, and it was the one across the aisle from me. Presumably a no show. Shame I didn't get the option, as there was a rather lovely blonde in the window seat!

Could you not have said "Oh dear, I'm in the wrong seat. That's mine there" ;)

Most of my flights this year have been with Flybe and the 2+2 seating plus good alignment with the large windows do it for me. Add in the fact that the smaller payload means boarding and alighting is much quicker and what's not to like.
 

Jetlagged

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Money spinning idea... Charge more for the seats next to the beautiful women...

Please don't put ideas in MOL's head. He has enough crazy ones of his own. The latest of deliberately separating people who do not pay for seat allocation, I find particularly mean and annoying. It backfired on him on my last flight though. They put my GF in 2C and allocated me 17E and left 17F empty. Guess who had 2 wing exit row seats for their flight?
 

atillathehunn

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Please don't put ideas in MOL's head. He has enough crazy ones of his own. The latest of deliberately separating people who do not pay for seat allocation, I find particularly mean and annoying. It backfired on him on my last flight though. They put my GF in 2C and allocated me 17E and left 17F empty. Guess who had 2 wing exit row seats for their flight?

I believe there has to be someone, at a minimum, in the window seats for the overwing exit.

On flights full of cheapskates (who don't pay for priority seating), I've been asked to move to the overwing exit because it's mandatory that somebody sits there. Three other people were moved from around the cabin to populate the other seats. I guess what she couldn't see was that I was terminally hungover, very close to death, and wanting the cold embrace of the floor.
 

telstarbox

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What are the busy and quiet times for flight departures/arrivals at UK airports? I know at London City there are a lot of early morning and evening ones, but what about elsewhere?
 

Joe Paxton

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Please don't put ideas in MOL's head. He has enough crazy ones of his own. ...

A lot of his 'crazy ideas' - paying to use the loo, stand up seating etc - were nothing more than a way of getting Ryanair's name out there for some free publicity.

Such publicity stunts have more or less stopped since Ryanair launched its new approach with the "Always Getting Better" programme in 2014.
 

atillathehunn

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What are the busy and quiet times for flight departures/arrivals at UK airports? I know at London City there are a lot of early morning and evening ones, but what about elsewhere?

Manchester has a very noticeable peak first thing in the morning, then sort of averages off for the rest of the day.
 

Tetchytyke

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What are the busy and quiet times for flight departures/arrivals at UK airports?

I think it depends on the airport.

Heathrow has a lot of early morning arrivals and a lot of late evening departures.

Newcastle is largely a charter/holiday airport and so has a lot of early morning departures, the arrivals peak tends to be late in the evening. I've waited an hour to get through passport control at Newcastle after arriving at 1am. That was not a fun way to spend the early hours of the morning.
 

flymo

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What are the busy and quiet times for flight departures/arrivals at UK airports? ?

Still remember landing at LHR on an BA A380 from HKG at 04:32, parking at T5, followed closely by another BA A380 from Jo'burg and another BA A380 from somewhere else. There were around a thousand people disgorged from 3 planes in about 9 minutes with one guy on passport control. The computers for the E-Passports didn't clock on until 05:30 (must have a great union) so over 1 hour to get through the UK passport line in the carbuncle on the backside of humanity that is T5 at 04:30, and still had to wait for my bag.
 
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Jetlagged

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I believe there has to be someone, at a minimum, in the window seats for the overwing exit.

On flights full of cheapskates (who don't pay for priority seating), I've been asked to move to the overwing exit because it's mandatory that somebody sits there. Three other people were moved from around the cabin to populate the other seats. I guess what she couldn't see was that I was terminally hungover, very close to death, and wanting the cold embrace of the floor.

I suppose I should be offended by being called a 'cheapskate', but isn't that why we all fly Ryanair over the likes of BA in the first place?! I found it very strange that the window seat had not been allocated but maybe they were a no show. We were not able to check in online until 22 hours before departure. It seems at that point the only seats they had left were the ones the cheapskates would not pay for, so we ended up with 2C and 17E. Perhaps I'll hang onto that one as a future strategy.
 
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atillathehunn

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I suppose I should be offended by being called a 'cheapskate', but isn't that why we all fly Ryanair over the likes of BA in the first place?! I found it very strange that the window seat had not been allocated but maybe they were a no show. We were not able to check in online until 22 hours before departure. It seems at that point the only seats they had left were the ones the cheapskates would not pay for, so we ended up with 2C and 17E. Perhaps I'll hand onto that one as a future strategy.

No I think there are a huge number of reasons why people fly Ryanair: better odds of a point-to-point route, unless you live in a hub city for a legacy airline; better use of smaller regional airports by FR et al. - cheaper parking, quicker access.

Ryanair et al. can be just as expensive, if not more so, than legacy carriers, because the market elasticity can bear it. My point about the cheapskates was that on certain leisure heavy routes people won't get the add-ons necessarily, and they price them to reflect that. When I fly for business they automatically pay for the priority boarding and I can select a seat no quibble. When I fly for leisure I don't go near it.

You're right to keep in your back pocket that free random seating is not random. They have to take into account weight and balance, exit rows etc, and whether on the balance of probability they can sell your seat at a price vs 'randomly' assigning it to you.
 
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