So I find out last week that I had to come on project work to Houston Tx. for a week. Check prices on Expedia....KLM 450 pounds...not bad at short notice. Another boost - at the weekend there is a second flight from AMS to Iah on 767 which means I don't have to get up at 4am on a Saturday!
KL 1442 ABZ - AMS B737-300
ABZ's pitiful international gate area was overloaded with a BD charter going to Palma, Ryanair to Dublin and another to Las Palmas other than the 80 or so people on our flight to AMS so found a seat and bought a coffee. I woud go to the lounge but it is crap....like a morgue. Boarding started on time (I had 5c - just behind business class) and we were ready to go on schedule, 1035, which we did. All I can say is there must have been some serious winds behind us as we touched down after 1hr and were at the gate by 1245. Good work. On board service was fine....man those sandwiches have improved a lot - I had chicken and salad. They seemed to be training a new memeber of cabin crew as there was no crew seat for her so she sat in biz class during take off and landing....there was also more crew than normal.
Had a beer at Schiphol (lounges are getting renovated so didn;t even try to enter one!) and went to gate E4 for the Houston flight.
KL 663 B767-300ER
Boarded quickly as it was only 50% full and were ready to go on time at 1430. Taxi'd out to the middle of the Netherlands to take off so we didn't get airbourne until 1500. Flight time today was a particularly long 10hrs 30 mins. They took a much more southerly route than usual hitting land at Newfoundland and going over New York rather than over greenland and down over Chicago which is the usual route. I had a bulkhead seat 14d which was fine but moved to a window seat to get two to myself...plenty room then. Had a wee bottle of red wine before dinner, which was pretty good. Smoked salmon salad, gorgonzola pasta, nice strawberry cake, bread and cheese. Not bad at all. All this while watching the BBC news, King of Queens, two and a half men and necking another wee bottle of the red.
The settled abck to see what the movie wouldbe like. Phantom of the opera.....I lasted the opening credits before getting the laptop out and watching Family Guy on DVD - genius. Battery ran out too quick so dozed, listened to my i-pod and read Q then Private Eye. Before you ask it is a satirical magazine on the UK politcal scene and not a porn mag!!
Crew were v. good and came round every hour or less with trays of juice, coke, water etc. and the snack bar was open at the back if you wanted some pretzels or chocolate. They then came round with Ice Cream or Potato chips at teh start of the second movie - National Treasure. I decided to watch this ..... all I can say is it was probably better than phantom of the opera. Not saying much .... don't get the DVD folks....it was crap too! Watched it anyways as I was getting bored and the i-pod was running low on juice.
Then a second meal was served before landing. It was a salad, pizza sandwich (nicer than it sounds!) Banoffee pudding, some cake and a kit kat. Washed down with a diet coke....no more vino - i was driving once I landed. Touched down at 1820 so 10 minutes ahead of the predicted time.
IAH immigration has improved a lot - staff are almost friendly now which was a new experience and the new hall is a vast improvement. Only thing was someone should have told immigration we were coming!! A member of staff asked which flight we came off and we said KLM? He said that was in hours ago (meaning the first flight!) - they had no record of a second flight on a Saturday. So much for homeland securiuty then....individual passengers can't get in but whole planes can! ANyway, teh officer was very friendly and I didn't even get the usual third degree about the Arabic all over my passport....probably good he didn;t see the Lebanon stamp!
Overall - KLM are obviously a lot healthier now than a few yrs ago and it is reflected in their service on board and quality of food etc. Once the 300's arrive and those 767's are gone things really will be good. Hope the flight back is as empty!
KLM ABZ - AMS - IAH (7th May)
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Sabena_690
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It certainly doesn;t! I think fewer people were heading to Houston this week as the big oil conference was last week and the business traffic will dip after it. I suspect loads will return to normal next week!Sabena_690 wrote:Thanks for the nice report, chunk!
A KL longhaul flight with a loadfactor of 50%... doesn't happen too much with KL!
Regards
Frederic