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Crossing the Pond with BA



BA196 IAH-LHR
Club World
B772 G-YMMI





G-YMMI


Legroom in a Club World 772 facing backwards. The legrest (folded up) makes up the last foot or so of the bed. The tricky part about this is that you have to jump over your neighbor's legrest in order to get out of the quasi-suite. I actually enjoyed the seat configuration. With the windows on one side and a divider on the other, I wasn't bothered by passengers in the walkway or by other passenger's tv screens.


Drink menu


Champagne menu


Wine menu


Dinner menu


Salad and appetizer


Entree: A beef fillet with green beans, potatoes, and carrots in a brown pepper sauce. The steak was well done and had the consistency of overcooked brisket.


A good raspberry dessert


Decided to watch Wolf of Wall Street which surprisingly wasn't censored.

After a nice five hour nap, the lights came on and it was time for yet another meal.


Breakfast Menu. The smoothie was actually pretty good.


Breakfast



Transiting at Heathrow T5:
We parked at a remote stand past T5C which resulted in being shuttled around by a bus. I hopped on the first one as I had a rather tight connection to Hamburg an hour later. We slowly passed through the Terminal 5 maze as we were stuck behind a baggage cart. Oddly enough he didn't pull over and the bus didn't pass him, so it took almost 20 minutes to make it to the main part of T5. Transiting at Heathrow is rather easy as you don't have to enter passport control. Just a quick bag scan and walk through a metal detector and you're in duty free! Turns out the Hamburg flight was late.
 

BA197 LHR-IAH
First
B772 G-VIIN

As this trip was using AA miles and the only options were 30k in coach with a weird routing, or 60k in First, I figured I'd splurge and enjoy the front seat for the first (and probably only) time.


T5 at 5:30 in the morning


Concorde Room


Concorde Room breakfast menu


A quick light breakfast


Concorde Room lunch menu


Concorde Room wine menu


21 day aged bacon cheeseburger


Concorde Bar - Highlights were Blue Label, Glenlivet 18, and Zacapa XO


Booth in the Concorde Dining Room


View from the Concorde Patio

After spending several hours I decided to walk down the hallway to the Galleries First lounge. This is for the Executive Club Gold members and those flying on OneWorld First Class tickets other than BA.


GF bar


GF bar

Off to the gate after a quick train ride to T5C.


Another BA 772


First Class cabin


Side view of row 1


Seat 2A


Stats for the flight


Looking forward


Double window


Window shade down


Starting off with cashews and almonds


Starter of watermelon and feta


Salad


Lunch: Angus beef fillet with vegetables and a potato "tube"


Desert: Strawberry tart


After lunch drink of Johnnie Walker Blue


Tea was served; however, still full from lunch and all the meals before, I decided to try a small strawberry bite.


A view from the cockpit (courtesy of the Captain) of southern Greenland.

The flight was over way to fast, and I have to give credit to the crew for a fantastic flight.

However, we were informed that due to a luggage conveyer belt issue at Heathrow, only four bags made the flight. Yes, four bags.

Good TR, Will. Very nice accomodations on BA (and both on triple 7s ).

That seems to be quite the comfortable ride

CO777ER wrote:Zacapa XO

From Guatemala to the world

You should be glad you "only" transitted between T5C and T5A. I had to completely change terminals (T5A to T3 and vice versa) and IMO it was hell. Not being required to go through the UK Border when connecting ITI didn't offset how inconvenient it was for me.

You should stick to steamships.

Richie D. wrote:You should be glad you "only" transitted between T5C and T5A. I had to completely change terminals (T5A to T3 and vice versa) and IMO it was hell. Not being required to go through the UK Border when connecting ITI didn't offset how inconvenient it was for me.

Did that a few times, and it was piece of cake. There's a bus ferrying directly between the terminals, that even gives you a nice complimentary apron tour.

I heard a lot of people bitch about connecting at LHR. Never understood why. Maybe I was just lucky, but even with short connection times and the airport being packed, I always made my connection without breaking a sweat.

I'd prefer LHR over FRA any day.

Zak wrote:I heard a lot of people bitch about connecting at LHR. Never understood why. Maybe I was just lucky, but even with short connection times and the airport being packed, I always made my connection without breaking a sweat.

Timing is everything when connecting through LHR. If you hit the ground at the same time as a few flights from SE Asia or Asia things quickly get interesting.

Then again, I've got up to full sprinting speed in ATL and CDG, so even at its worst LHR seems tame by comparison.

JLAmber wrote:

Zak wrote:I heard a lot of people bitch about connecting at LHR. Never understood why. Maybe I was just lucky, but even with short connection times and the airport being packed, I always made my connection without breaking a sweat.

Timing is everything when connecting through LHR.

Absolutely. My flight was delayed 20 minutes in HAM, and the ride to T3 from T5 takes about 10 minutes or so. Had there not been the long queue for the security interview and another check at the transfer desk, along with the long way to the gate, I would have had a much more comfortable connection. Because of this, I'm considering flying in the morning to LHR, stay in London overnight and having a tour of town, and then fly on the next day.