Bucharest Trip – Day 1 : British Airways Flight to Bucharest

I mentioned in a previous post for my two loyal blog readers that I was on razor thin timing for my flight, having left the hotel just 2 hours 30 minutes before take-off. I considered the reality that it might take over an hour to walk to the bus stop, get on the bus and then arrive into Heathrow Central bus station. In reality, it was 11 minutes. But, that meant one thing, I was safely at Heathrow Terminal 3 ready for my British Airways flight to Bucharest. For all of its faults, I’m still keen to use British Airways and I opted for them to get me to Bucharest. Steve had used BA the previous evening, whilst Bev, Susanna and Thim had decided that Ryanair was for them. Bev would use a cattle truck to get there if she could, but I’m surprised that Susanna and Thim weren’t a little more decadent. But, naturally, I didn’t say anything about the matter.

Back to the flight though. The boarding gate process was handled well, there was no wait and there was a seat whilst they called the groups forwards. All very organised and calm, this felt well managed. It’s always pleasant when the boarding process feels calm, sometimes it all feels a little chaotic and stressful.

Here we are on board. I say we, but I primarily mean me and the other passengers. It was an Airbus A320 aircraft, registration G-EUUF (although I need to check this, as two sites have different aircraft registration codes for this flight which I haven’t seen before). Assuming it was G-EUUF, BA have had this plane since new when they purchased it in 2002 and I don’t think it’s one that I’ve been on before (but my records are quite patchy, I didn’t know I was going to become interested in recording this for some time). Once again, I should really get out more…

One of the vestiges of my status with British Airways is that I can still book these for free, so I got an emergency exit row seat. I’ll be back to silver status early next year (the lowest status I can get which gives me lounge access), required given that I do like visiting the airport lounges as I get excited by free cans of Fanta. Also for my comfort, there was no-one on else this row which was quite handy. Especially given that Thim was reporting he had a somewhat less comfortable experience on the Ryanair flight he was on. The seating area was clean and everything worked as it should,

Satisfactory leg room and the cabin crew were pro-active and friendly. There were also working power points on the service which proved handy. The pilots were the usual middle to upper class sounding British Airways flight crew, sounding reassuring and competent. Not that other pilots aren’t competent, it’s just that the announcements made by British Airways crew seem to be so quintessentially British that it fits their brand well.

There were no delays on departing and the passengers all seemed sensible and efficient which meant no issues with people trying to shove large bags in awkwardly to the overhead lockers.

The free snack and water, which I still think is a positive touch rather than the previous effort they had which involved giving passengers absolutely nothing.

And safely into Bucharest, twenty minutes earlier than expected. There was little to report from the flight, which is a positive thing as too much drama on board is often sub-optimal. I had mentioned to Bev that I didn’t want her, Susanna and Thim waiting for me as they got in 90 minutes earlier, but that was good since they didn’t bother anyway. Once again, I didn’t comment negatively on that situation. On the matter of the weather, it looked just a little bleak, but the temperature was fine for my needs and the rain wasn’t too bad.

I won’t go on about the European Union as my thoughts on this are well known to my two loyal blog readers (and for anyone else, #iameuropean) and EU citizens were able to breeze through passport control. Those from the UK had a much longer wait which was sub-optimal. Anyway, I was again impressed with British Airways, everything worked as it should, everything was clean, the crew were friendly and the service was efficient. The flight cost £42 each way, which I think is very reasonable, especially as I used Avios from previous flights to reduce that to £24 each way. All rather lovely.