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Monday 4 November – part two: this isn’t anything like Virgin Atlantic…

We took the Skylink one stop over to the C terminal, where we’d be flying out to Honolulu from, and we quickly found our gate. We were told by the gate attendant that we’d be best getting food at the terminal, as they didn’t have that much of a supply on board, and they may run out. That announcement was made to everyone a number of times, something that really shocked us. I could never imagine Virgin Atlantic or British Airways doing that – they would seriously be lynched by their passengers. It would be the first of many differences we’d notice today between airlines in the UK and the USA…

We headed off to try and find something, and the prospect of a tuna salad at TGI Friday’s takeaway bar seemed like a good one to me, although they didn’t actually have any left, and the only other options were meat, so we found a sandwich bar, and both got sandwiches, some chips, and water.

With that done, we headed back to TGI Friday’s to have breakfast, as we figured we should fill up before we boarded. The view from our table….



We both went for the Friday’s egg breakfast, fluffy scrambled eggs with breakfast potatoes, wheat toast, and seasonal fruit. It’s served with your choice of sausage and bacon, so I obviously opted out of both, while Mark had both, including my helping.



Now tell me, where’s the sausage on this plate? I have never seen sausage look like this before.



It wasn’t bad, although the scrambled eggs weren’t particularly good. Thankfully, by putting them with the breakfast potatoes, they were fine.

Once we’d finished, we headed over to the gate, where we were just 15 minutes away from boarding, so we didn’t have long to wait, and thankfully for this flight we were group 1, so it wasn’t long before we were on board, and found our seats in the Main Cabin Extra part of the plane…



It wasn’t quite as good as Premium Economy in terms of leg room, but heck it was much better than the more cramped conditions in the rest of the aircraft behind us, and we could live with this for the next eight hours.

The donkeys were a bit reluctant to go into the overhead compartment…



When it came to take off, as you can see from these photos, it was starting to rain outside in Dallas, so we were quite glad to be leaving, and heading off to warmer climbs again.



Once we were up in the air, I was able to get a few photos of Dallas, before the low cloud completely enveloped us… It was certainly a grey day here.



A few miles further on, the cloud broke, and suddenly you could see Texas laid out beneath us in all its glory, and it really brought it home to you how big this state is, and how little there really is here. There were just vast expanses of absolute nothingness, with perhaps one road to be seen in the middle of it all. From up here, you could also see how beautiful the landscape was, with different colours and textures to the land.



Then the drink and food service started, and because we were close to the front of the plane, we were fine as far as food went. I opted for the fruit and cheese plate, which was very pleasant:



… while Mark got some Chex Mix….



… and some fruit and nut mix…



I have to say that we were a bit surprised and disappointed with the food offer on this plane, bearing in mind it’s an eight hour flight. It’s a far cry from the hot meals, with a choice, that we get served up by Virgin Atlantic. Now while I can understand that you might get away with this on a domestic route, if that’s what all your competitors are doing, I hope to goodness that they don’t serve this up on their international routes, because they’re competing against other airlines who do so much more.

Now frustratingly, I can’t tell you where the remaining photos were taken, as this is where American Airlines (and I suspect various other airlines in the US) are still in the last century. They only had central video screens at the front of the Main Cabin Extra area – five in total, but no seatback monitors and of course no pause, rewind, play functions, like we’re used to with Virgin Atlantic. Now the reason I can’t tell you where these photos were taken was because as soon as the film started (the Lone Ranger, which I didn’t watch), you lost the map showing you where you were. So here’s a set of photos probably from Texas/New Mexico/Arizona/California – you get the general idea of where we were, even if I have missed some states out… and apologies if I have!



As we flew and flew and flew over the land, it really emphasised to me just how big the States is. It’s quite an eye opener to see it from up here, and really does bring into focus for me just how tiny the UK actually is. I remember being told once that the UK would fit inside Florida, which gives you an idea of the relative sizes of our two countries…

On the subject of it being an old aircraft, when I went to use the restroom, I genuinely had no idea how to flush the thing, as a) there was no sign to help you, and b) I don’t think I’ve used a restroom this ancient in… well actually I don’t remember how long. I used to get through flights without using the restrooms until a couple of years ago, so I probably last encountered toilets like this maybe in the 1980s or 1990s. I had to apologise to the woman who came in after me, and she said she wasn’t sure how to flush it either. When she came out, she’d figured it out, and shared with me, so at least then I know…

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