Flight 1 – London to Doha
This is part of a big trip report in 4 parts, read part 1 here.
Getting to Heathrow
I decided for this trip to try a new method of getting to Heathrow by having my bags picked up separately, which made quite a difference. However, I have also written an entire article about getting to and from Heathrow airport, check it out here.
I live in South London, near Epsom, which you would think would be an easy place to get to the airport from? I’m afraid not. London trains all work on a “hub and spoke” system, where they go in and out from the centre. Only one train really goes around, the Overground, and that goes nowhere near the airport.
Driving isn’t bad, over an hour at busy times, but generally not terrible. If I’m flying on a weekend my other half will drop me off or pick me up. But on this occasion, I am going around 6pm on a Wednesday, so peak rush hour. That wouldn’t be a pleasant drive, so I didn’t ask anyone to do that for me. We’re a 1 car family, so I wouldn’t take the car away for a week to have it sit in an expensive car park and deprive the other half of a car.
Taxis are either expensive or not very good from here. Uber is not reliable in either direction, I have trouble getting picked up by Uber at Heathrow, I think because they don’t want to end up where I live. And I have issues in the outbound direction because there aren’t many Ubers in the area, so not a good guarantee of getting to the airport on time. The local cab firms, to be fair, are ok at getting me to the airport, but it’s the picking up that always goes wrong. I’ve tried a few local companies, some more than once and every time they’ve picked me up from Heathrow there’s been an issue. Most commonly is they try to collect me from the drop off zone. I’ve even paid for an in “airport meet”, as I had a lot of bags, and he was so late that I had to wait for him at the car park. I have settled on Addison Lee as my preferred airport taxi company, they have always been reliable, they always check flight times and pick you up inside the terminal. However, at peak times they can be expensive, for this trip they quoted £78, it’s usually nearer £60.
So I decided to try something new, I was going to send my luggage ahead and then catch the express bus.
This would mean that on the day I went to the airport, I was going hand luggage only, meaning that using the bus is not a pain and I could skip check-in and go straight to security.
The cost of getting the bag picked up the day before was £32. Given that’s less than half the cost of the taxi, I think I’m onto a winner.
The only catch is making sure I have all my luggage packed the day before.
Luggage pickup
The company I used was airportr, www.airportr.com, they were recommended by BA on their website and if you look at the site you will see they are partnered with many major airlines.
The pickup itself was very easy. I received a text in the morning telling me roughly what time the driver was going to arrive. I had booked a 3-hour slot from midday, and he arrived at 12:45, which was great. He had a photo ID badge on display, which was reassuring, and he showed me which flight I was booked on on his phone, so I knew this was all going to the right place. He scanned my passport, which is required for checking my bag in on my behalf, and asked me all the usual baggage check in questions, did I pack it myself etc. He then sealed my bag with one of their security tags, took a photo and he was gone. I received e-mail confirmation that my bag had been collected and that was that.
When it came time for online check in to open, I received a phone call from an unknown number, which I refused to answer. I immediately then got a text message from the same number saying it was the driver, and could I please check in for my flight so that he can check my bag in. I was going to do this anyway, so I checked in. I was just texting a reply to say it’s done, and he phoned me again, he was clearly very keen for me to get this done. I had assumed that maybe the driver was responsible for my bag until I was checked in or he couldn’t hand over to the warehouse or something until then. But this wasn’t the case as I later found out. I text him back and he replied with thanks. I later got an e-mail stating that my bag was now in storage overnight and would be checked in the next day. So, I have no idea why he was so keen to talk to me at check in time, possibly worried that I might forget to check in online and leave it until I got to the airport, in which case they’d have to wait to check in my bag.
Mid-morning on the day of my flight I got another message from them, both by text and e-mail, stating that my bag had now been checked in and was with British Airways. The messages contained a reference number, so I assumed that was their bit done.
Just to be sure I did go and double check at the airport that they did in fact have my bag.
The airport
Thanks to the flighty app, I already knew my flight was going to leave from C gates, so I knew I was going to head as quick as possible to the lounge at B gates, rather than the two in the main terminal, which are normally somewhat busy. This was going to be my first time checking in through the new “Club” check-in area on the far left side of terminal 5. Up until now I’ve always checked in at the first wing with my gold status, but now I don’t have that status and flying in business class, I’d have to go to the club section to check in if I wanted to.
Of course I didn’t actually need to check in, because my bag had already been collected, checked in for me and I had my boarding pass, so I could head straight to fast track security. However, I wanted to get the full experience, so I headed to that end of the terminal and as it was the first time using the airportr system I wanted some kind of reassurance. Annoyingly, the BA app doesn’t tell me my bag has been checked in. So, I approached the business class area and there was a guy at the start of the queue to direct me, I told him that I wanted to check my bag was there, and he was quite insistent that they never fail and that the bag is always there, but I could always check if I wanted to. I said I would as there was no queue, and I went straight to a check-in guy who looked at my ticket and confirmed the bag was indeed present.
I hadn’t noticed before, but there was a dedicated fast track lane right next to the club check in area. The other fast track lanes are alongside the normal security entrances. I headed through this dedicated fast track lane to be somewhat disappointed by just kicking you out into the normal security area, just to a dedicated queue line for a couple of machines. There was only one machine running and it was quite busy, so there was someone there frantically trying to move people to other lanes in the normal queue to try and speed things up. Not very “fast” track. I got through security eventually, trying to ignore the people who clearly have never been on a plane before, then headed straight down to the transit to terminal 5B.
Upon arriving at the B gates building I headed straight to the British Airways lounge, which was pretty quiet. I found myself a nice comfy seat and settled in. I needed to have dinner, so I went and checked out the food options. There seems to be a bit of a minor change to the way they do food, the hot food is freely available in buffet style, as is the salads. But lighter snacks such as sausage rolls and cheese plates were behind the counter when you get counter service. This seemed a bit strange, I don’t know if they’re trying to restrict the amount of cheese or sausage rolls we eat, or they think it’s an improvement service to give you someone serving you some food. The problem being you have to wait till that person could be bothered to look at you to get served. The food selection wasn’t particularly impressive, some kind of chili and some fish goujons, plus a pasta dish. I tried the fish with some potatoes and then I went back for a sausage roll afterwards. The food itself was ok quality, but not the most interesting range of food to have for a meal before you depart. The drinks are the usual self-serve and there was Prosecco on offer if I wanted it. As with most things with BA, there’s nothing wrong with what they did, it was perfectly nice and the lounge is quite pleasant, but nothing out of this world amazing. Time to head down to the gate and prepare for my flight.
The flight
As this was booked in business class and it was a 777, I had a club suite to sit in, which is always nice. I booked the furthest forwards and furthest left, in this case 5A, as there are four rows of first class in front. They offered me pre-flight champagne, which I took with a hot towel. Then the menu came round, and they took my order before take-off. As this was an overnight flight and I’d eaten in the lounge, my intention was to sleep as much as possible, so only a drink and a light snack after take-off for me. I planned to follow this by sleeping as long as possible and not be woken for breakfast on landing. The lady serving me commented that I was a very easy customer. I settled down to a film, eventually I felt sleepy and laid down on the fully flatbed to get some sleep. I still maintain the club suite is one of the better seats available in business class, you can get very comfortable in it and lie on your side with your knees tucked up if you want to. Also, the pillow was particularly fluffy, which made it very comfortable. I closed my door and went to sleep for the night. I woke up about an hour before landing. After changing out of the pyjamas, that I brought with me, (Qatar ones I think), they don’t give you pyjamas in business class on British Airways, I grabbed a juice and headed back to my seat for landing. The crew were very friendly and helpful, and the flight was very pleasant, I’ve done plenty of these flights before so nothing remarkable to report here.
