British Isle Cruise--Day 1 and Day 2

July 26-27, 2015—Days 1 and 2, Flight, and Arrival in London

We’ve been planning this trip for almost a year.  The England portion of the trip has been something my parents have wanted to do for a very long time, and in fact, they actually planned to go twice before and had to cancel.  My dad had traced our family tree to his roots in England, and he’s always wanted to visit the places where our family had lived.  When we looked at the British Isle cruise, we decided this would be the perfect way to both embark on a cruise and at the same time, visit all the places that we had read about in the Family Tree my dad had put together.  This trip was a culmination of a life-long dream, and after almost a year in the planning stage, it was hard to believe the day had finally come and we were on our way.

As we’ve done in the past, my parents flew Southwest into LAX, and my son dropped me off a little before their flight arrived.  Once we collected their luggage, we walked from Terminal 1 to the Tom Bradley International Terminal.  We had booked premium economy on Air New Zealand hoping it would be a little more comfortable since the flight was going to be long and we knew we’d be jet lagged, compounded if we couldn’t get at least some sleep.  Flying business class was out of the question; none of us had won the lottery or hit a huge jackpot on a penny slot, so we weren’t willing to spend the big bucks flying on those lay-flat seats up front.  But we thought paying a little more for some extra space would be worth it, so we upgraded to premium economy and chose Air New Zealand since it was nonstop to London from LAX, and because I had heard the Spaceseats in their premium economy cabin was roomy and comfortable (plus the pictures looked cool).

Right from the start, Air New Zealand proved to be a good choice.  Premium economy had a separate check-in line, and throughout the flight we were treated closer to business class than to economy.  Not only were we quickly checked in (we were first in the premium economy and business class line), but our luggage was tagged with orange “Priority” tags so we knew they would be quickly offloaded at the other end.  There is also an increased baggage allowance, but since we were only travelling with one checked bag each, we didn’t need to take advantage of that. 

After heading through security, we had a late lunch, then went to the gate.  We started boarding at a little around 4:10pm and again, premium economy was included with the business class folks for priority boarding.

My first impression was that I had boarded a futuristic flight—the Spaceseats were really cool looking (Google Air New Zealand Spaceseat if you haven’t seen a picture).  A bottle of water was provided at each seat (nice touch), along with an amenities package, a much better, full-size pillow, and better, larger, thicker blanket.  We spent the rest of the time on the ground getting familiar with the seat controls, finding the little cubbyholes to store little things, figuring out how to make the seats recline, and putting away our carry-on luggage.  The only negative I had was that there was very little space to store carry-on luggage under the seat in front of you, which meant that unless the carry-on was very small, it had to go in the overhead compartment.  Luckily, there was plenty of room overhead, and not all of the bins were used—probably because there were only 6 people in each row. compared to 10 people in each row in economy.

Once settled, the flight attendants provided warm washcloths to freshen up, sparkling wine (not quite Champagne) or juice, and a menu for the meals we would be served on the flight.  Then we sat at the gate for an hour.  We had heard announcements throughout the terminal that the LAX automated luggage handlers had broken down and that luggage was being manually sorted and loaded, causing delays.  The captain assured us that we would be able to make up most of the delay in flight.

Finally, it was wheels up and we were in the air and on our way.  Dinner service began shortly after take-off beginning with the starter of a chicken salad, and choice of bread—whole wheat sourdough, garlic bread, or black olive bread—along with drinks including a really good New Zealand red pinot noir (which I hoped would help me sleep afterward).  For the main course, I had the chicken—specifically, chicken with kumara miso mash, edamame beans and wilted spinach with chili pickled shitake mushrooms and red dates, and spiced pumpkin squash.  Dessert was a dulce de leche mousse cake with whipped cream and shaved chocolate.  All of it was served on real dishes with real utensils and a cloth napkin.  This was probably the best airline food I had ever had!  A second glass of wine was offered, and afterward coffee (which I declined since I did want to try to sleep).  I will say that the service was excellent.

Then it was time to settle in and try to sleep.  My mother quickly dropped off, and surprisingly, I fell asleep as well.  When I woke up, I was surprised that several hours had passed, and that we were only 2-1/2 hours from London!  Unfortunately, my dad said he didn’t sleep at all (there was a boy of about 11 or 12 in front of him who kept getting up, turning on the light above him, calling the flight attendant to ask for a soda or something else, and generally just fidgeting around—he did this the entire flight while his mom slept and since my dad is a light sleeper, he was disturbed enough that he wasn’t able to sleep). 

Breakfast service was as good as dinner the evening before and started with fresh fruit, yogurt, a warm croissant, and a choice of cereal.  This was followed by a choice of scrambled eggs or French toast.  I actually skipped that course and was happy with a light breakfast of fruit, yogurt, and croissant, along with coffee of course.  Because there was so much space and the layout of the seats was unique, I didn’t have to wait until the breakfast service had been cleaned up before heading to the plane’s restroom to freshen up.  I do have to say that the premium economy cabin’s (yes, we were in a separate cabin area) toilet was nice—there was plenty of room, it was actually decorated with wallpaper of books so one wall looked like a library, there was soft music playing in the background, and instead of paper towels, there were little individual “disposable” washcloths.

We landed about 10 minutes later than scheduled (not bad since we took off a little over an hour late).  It was a very long walk to passport control and we had no sooner joined the long line once we got there when we decided to step aside so we could use the restrooms.  One of the airport employees noticed, and said not to worry as she would be sure we could get through.  Sure enough, once we had finished, she opened up a separate line and we were through passport control just like that.  We made our way to the luggage conveyor belt and in less than 5 minutes our luggage came down (those priority tags worked and our luggage was one of the first ones out). 

I had scheduled Just Airports car service to meet us an hour after landing at 12:30pm thinking that we probably wouldn’t actually get through passport control and customs till closer to 1:00pm.  We were outside customs by 12:20, even before our driver arrived.  Luckily, we found him at 12:30pm, when he was scheduled to arrive, and he helped us transfer our luggage to the van and took us to the hotel.

London hotels are very expensive, and since we were staying 3 nights and needed 2 rooms, we didn’t want to spend a lot.  I ended up making reservations at the Comfort Inn at Hyde Park because of the price, the fact that breakfast and wifi were included, and the reviews I had read.  Although a chain hotel, it was typically British, meaning that the rooms were very small, it was a little worn and “tired” in places, but it was clean, which is just what we needed.  We tried to stay awake the rest of the day despite wanting to sleep, so we went for a walk down a shopping street not far from the hotel.  We got back at around 3:00, then decided to get together at 5:00 to go to dinner.  Trying to stay awake, I decided to get started writing this post, and finally we went to dinner down the street where I had the fish and chips (hey, we’re in England after all) and hot tea.  Getting back to the hotel, I took a long hot shower, and now I’m ready to finally get completely horizontal. 

Before I sign off, a couple of things I had forgotten about England:  no wash rags in the hotel (plenty of towels, but nothing small to wash with) and no soap (we bought a bar of soap on the way back to the hotel), but best of all, the heated towel racks—my dream house will definitely have these (when I win the lottery—which reminds me that I really ought to start playing someday if I expect to win).

Hopefully, we’ll all be able to get a good night’s sleep (although I suspect that might be difficult with the jet lag).  Tomorrow, our London adventure really begins.