[MartynSinclair]

Roger Victor – you live in an ideal world that i wish were true. Just becasue people have minds does not make them any less professional. We live in a multi cultural society and whilst you may not have had much exposure to both busienss and leisure travel being disrupted ON A PERSONAL basis (i know you are ATC), I have had personal experiences of hearing people shouting Allah is great and then BANG!. SO when a travel sight like this starts to to receive blogs from people who belittle terrorism and state that the “holy” Qoran” is a peacful book, yet the facts show that the majority of the world’s terrorists justify their actions on their interpretation of that book, it scares the living daylights out of me that this sight allows such posts. My comments are neutral but 100% factual.

I would be quite happy for the editors of BT to make a blanket ban on all political and religious statements.

Please Roger Victor, dont be as naive to think that posts you personally deem as being a “lack of class” should be swept aside. All anti sematic comments and references to terrorism and nazism which are blatantly untrue are sent to a central register and stored. With a little help identities can be established and appropriate action (of the legal type) can eventually be taken.

I would support 100% a total ban on all political discussions and discussions about terrosrism. Until then, unfortuantely it is a free for all and to me that is a danger.

I would never consider your role as an ATC officer any less professional if you were to be “policitally unsuitable” in a post. What concerns me though are psedonyms beleiivng that they have G-d given right to introduce progranganda which is simply not true. My comments about Allah being KYC stands – who is Allah and why do the majority of pax fear everytime somebody shouts Allah is great, waiting for a bang.

So please Roger Victor, whils this site remains a “speakers conrner” or “chatham house rules”, please contribute in a positive way to this problem and do not consider it as a matter of decorum.

To prove the point, thnk you to your collegues who fast tracked a G550 into the London arrivals system recently with a medical emergency on board. We were taken out of the hold out of sequence and some how vectored for an immediate landing. Your professionalism showed through and i heard afterwards that whoever was in charge of the inbound approach routing, bypassed the STAR and got us on the ground within 15 minutes of request.

You wanted to know how services have been affected by the stike – the planes are flying, pax are moving, people are getting from A – B and please G-d that safety will not be an issue.

[RogerVictor]

I post on here as a business and occasional First class traveller. All paid from my own money. I add the occasional piece of knowledge that my job allows.

Back to the thread – How is the FIRST cabin being received by you guys in these trying times? The hard product becomes so much more important when the soft product is compromised. Has it been? Has anyone flown new FIRST pre and during the strike and noticed a difference?

[RoadKing]

MartynSinclair;

Why don’t you shut up and go elsewhere?

Editor;

It is very annoying to receive news notifications for ranting off like this. Could you please notify this guy that he is way out of line and perhaps ban him for a while if he does not adhere to the rules?

[MartynSinclair]

Road King

I too find annonymous postings extremly rude.

Editor – why not insist that people become accountable for the rubbish they publish.

I am happy to avoid all political and religious references as long as it is agreed BY ALL and enforced. Unfortuantely Road King, there are no rules, which is the root cause of the problem. If people use certain offensive words incorrectly, what do you expect should happen.

The is a public forum Road King and I would support 100% a “BT code of posting”.

Its a great day, the sun is shining – its fabulous out there – enjoy

Martyn

Martyn

[ekond111]

MartynSinclair –
I really would prefer that you keep your self opinionated one-dimensional bigoted views to yourself – I personally find them offensive – get your facts right on which sect of fanatics have committed more acts of terrorism to fellow human beings, what is your perception of the IRA, Klu Klux Klan, Adolf Hitler – unless you found their actions acceptable as they saw what they did as acts of g-d.

Now in keeping with the thread:
During the strike period have flown First to and from NYC – old cabin – service was barely up to club standard – also Club to LAX – not very pleasant and Club to Las Vegas -again not up to the usual standard.

VK/BA Crew – thanks for the update on the rollout of the new First product – has anyone seen a published rollout schedule?

It’s a shame that during the strike period it may have been prudent to take a couple more of the Long haul fleet to have them installed with the new product. Use the opportunity to accelerate the rollout.

[jpmarcel]

Could the people here focus on the original topic of that discussion ?
I really appreciate to read, and sometimes contribute to, the discussions on this site.
When it is time to discuss about politics, I go to other websites and occasionally to political parties meetings. So please find another place for your crappy narrow-minded discussions.
Please editor do something, and occasionally ban users who do not respect this forum’s rules.

[ekond111]

…Thanks for that JP…erm any comments about your First class experiences, I would be interested in hearing your thoughts.

Anyone flying First LON-JFK-LON – a few helpful hints.

The cabanas in the Concorde Room at T5 are great – you can even have a meal delivered to you.

The Champagne is of a good quality – not vintage but still good.

The buffalo cheese starters – excellent.

The Shepherd’s pie – average.

The mini-burgers – same as the First lounge – average.

The Salmon – excellent.

The Custard desert – excellent.

Remember to have a wee sit down in the Concorde seats and reminisce- although badly maintained which is a shame.

In the Concorde Room at JFK.

The steak is great.

The Champagne is poor.

The restaurant resembles a school dining room – but not overcrowded.

No cabanas – shame.

[VintageKrug]

Champers is most certainly vintage in both the T5 First lounge and the Concorde Room.

[ekond111]

VK great to have some dialogue pertaining to this thread

…Well they’ve taken the vintage Bollinger out and replaced it with a premium Lanson which is good but not really a vintage champagne like the Louise or Bolly or Krug (now that’s going back a while). Personally a standard Veuve Clicquot is as good as the Premuim Lanson – still better then most competitors First class lounges –

QF First Class lounge in Sydney – excellent lounge – excellent SPA – Excellent food – choice of three champagnes – none of them Vintage – best one there – standard Veuve Clicquot.

CX Wing in HKG – standard Moet – great restaurant – the cabanas could do with a re-furb.

CX Pier in HKG as above but the personal quiet rooms are in good shape.

BA First class lounge in LAX – poor food and Champagne selection – but nice to have some Guiness there. The AA/Qantas First lounge – better food selection there – no Champagne

BA First class lounge in Toronto – Moet and a reasonable menu.

BA First class lounge Chicage – poor menu.

BA First class Lounge Phoenix – Moet and poor menu

BA CR in JFK they have a Piper Heidsick…since the demise of Concorde they’ve stopped the provision of a Vintage brew there – shame.

[austline]

Just arrived home and here ia an update on ekond.

QF First Class Lounge Sydney and Melboure; Veuve Cliquot, Tattinger and Devaux Rose – top dining.

QF/BA/CX First Class Lounge LAX; Moet NV – very poor lounge crowded and food very average.

BA First Class Lounge Johannesburg; no Champagne, poor food.

BA Lounge Lagos – lounge still closed as BA didn’t get an import permit to bring in their own furniture, furniture is a banned import into Nigeria! hope it opens soon as it was the only decent lounge at MMI.

[VintageKrug]

It is Vintage in the Fist Lounge – Lanson Noble Cuvee 1999.

Vintage is not about the brand – it’s about the vintage year.

Some rather exciting new champagnes soon to be used, apparently.

[ekond111]

I agree….but the I was informed the Lanson was selected purely on cost about 25% less then the bolly which is costs less than a Dom or a Krug.

It maybe penned a Vintage but lags behind in terms of qualirty with it’s counterparts.

Thanks for the update that it’s being replaced look forward to that – hopefully it won’t be sourced from ALDI etc….

[continentalclub]

There seems to be some misunderstanding persisting here.

The Lanson is actually rather more expensive in the wholesale market than the Bollinger La Grande Annee 2000 which preceeded it.

A wine is either Vintage or Non Vintage (NV). In the latter case, grapes from differing harvests (that is, years) are used.

Vintage wines make use of grapes harvested in a single year, and are therefore described as being a vintage of that year.

It is not possible to ‘pen’ a wine as vintage if it’s not.

There is no direct correlation, per se, between a wine being vintage and it therefore being of good ‘quality’ (leaving aside for a moment the subjectivity of taste).

However, in practice, NV wines are usually of mixed provenance to allow poorer years’ grapes to be blended with finer ones, thereby improving their quality.

If a year’s grapes are poorer, they’ll definitely go into NVs. If they are good, then they’ll generally be kept together to produce a vintage and only some will be allowed to go to help the NVs out.

By default then, Vintage wines are almost always of higher quality than Non-Vintage, though your taste buds are, of course, your own.

Legend has it that some, cheap, NV champagnes are kept in some airline First Class lounges for emergency use only. And, when I say emergency use, I mean for use when a passenger clearly doesn’t know any better……

[ekond111]

CC a very informed view – I only reiterated what the staff in the CR lounge told me.

I agree about the Bolly 2000 but for a long while they had 1999 – the 1996 was definitely better – in terms of price vs quality. The 2000 only had a relatively short stay.

As did .the Tattinger vintage which was deployed in First for a while but doesn’t travel well on night flights – it appears these products are tested on Day flights. – it all makes a difference.

In the CR lounge they display their champagnes – and in the First lounge one helps themselves.

CC do you find the CR lounge a tad formal at times?

[continentalclub]

Formal? I can’t say that I do. It’s certainly no Virgin Clubhouse, but there again neither the Concorde Club Room nor any part of the BA First product is designed to be analagous.

CC’s review of the CCR is broadly-speaking as follows:

Reception: variable. Sometimes hugely friendly, sometimes rather more perfunctory.

Washrooms: dreadful. Like something you’d find in a RoadChef.

Cabanas: delightful. A real haven.

Terrace: doors a bit of a heave, often too warm, weak wi-fi, staff presence patchy; beautifully furnished, very comfortable, great lamps.

Lounge: fabulous projection above the fireplace, friendly service, very comfy sofas, nice and quiet, reasonable menu availability.

Dining Room: exceptionally discrete, comfortable, quiet; somewhat disappointing food (options and frequency of menu rotation), service way below the concept’s aspirations. Overall, Plane Food knocks it for six in terms of food and service.

Bar: looks great, superb selection of drinks; service several notches below that you’d get in a real premium bar (similar comparison to PF vs Dining Room).

Overall, I like it immensely, and I’ve seen folks from Bill Nighy to David Beckham looking equally comfortable and unhassled in it.

[Author]

Posts