[Bullfrog]

I remember when many airlines had the ‘spouse fare’ which was a 50% discount on the full fare, when travelling together.

It is also not that long ago when I tried to book my parents an on line ticket to get back from Istanbul to London using the BA website. As my credit card was a UK credit card, and the flight was originating in Turkey, I could not book the flights. They had to buy tickets from an agent in Istanbul to get back to London.

[StewartK]

I think the ultimate nostalgia can be found in Ian Fleming’s account of James Bond’s flight to New York (written in 1956) in ‘Diamonds Are Forever’. Flying in a luxurious Stratocruiser, ‘Bond had been too late to get a sleeping berth’. The flight was full, with 40 passengers. First stop was Shannon (for dinner – steak, champagne and Irish coffee)) but champagne, caviar and capes were served en route. An ‘English country house breakfast was served before arrival. Ah those were the days. The only ‘plus ca change’ moment was the reference to the passengers who included a couple of nuns and two babies (‘to keep the passengers from sleeping)!

[EruditeSheep]

So many things to remember – not necessarily all salubrious though……

A flight on one of the first Freddie Laker SkyTrains from LGW to NYC

RAF VC10 flights between BZN and IAD (all seats rear facing) with the occasional visit to the cockpit jump seat)

Standing (yes, I mean STANDING) behind the pilot whilst landing an RAF Hercules at RAF Brawdy. “Just hold onto the back of my seat”. Witnessing the “jump-start” of one engine for subsequent take-off by windmilling.

Being the only passenger on a flight from LAX to IYK in the days when pilots left the cockpit door open. Landing at IYK in the early evening was general a highly turbulent event due to convective flow between the hot desert floor and snow-capped Sierra Nevada mountains. Pilot’s aside to sole passenger – “You don’t have to go to Disney to get rides like this”

Flight on UA between LAX and HNL in the days when domestic F class was something special.

An open-door helicopter flight over the Great Barrier Reef.

The origin of the word “Gate” in the days when departure from the terminal for flights such as those between Kona and Honolulu was via a gate in the fence…..

[LuganoPirate]

Must not forget Swissair, which was my favourite airline. I came across this website and looking at the menus you’d think it was First class today but was economy then.

http://www.sr692.com/misc/index.html

[Perpetually^^^^^^Aloft]

Near the beginning my career, the company sent me YYZ / ORD / HNL RT in Y on UA. This was back when UA flew (I believe, if my memory is right) four 747 ORD / HNL RT per day. Each of these flights were catered as if they would be full, even if they were not. I loved the flight from ORD to HNL.

Upon checking in, for my RT flights, the ticket counter agent asked if I would not mind waiting forty-five minutes extra for the flight after mine. I asked why and was informed that there was no problem with my booked flight, but if I could wait the extra time, he could upgrade me to F. Being relatively new at this, I thought WOW (at that point I had never flown B or F)! So, I said thank you very much and smiled all the way to the gate.

The UA 747 only had 195 Y pax o/b, nil B pax and 5 in F including myself. It was a great intro to F. The UA cabin crew were great and the food / drink was good. Upon arrival at ORD, each F pax was given a bottle of champagne, gift wrapped in a draw string tote sock!

What a change,eh!

[TheRealBabushka]

This reminiscing is well and good but recall how inequitable access to air travel was back then.

All this harking back to the old days is just another way of wishing the world was less globalised, when privilege was retained in the hands of the few, who are not afraid to make it known where in the pecking order they inhabit.

[Bullfrog]

Reminiscing is great, as it allows us to share our memories & nostalgia. I’m now in my early fifties & remember ‘travel in the 70’s’. VC10s, 707s, being on a TWA 747 100 from London to Los Angeles where the aircraft had to refuel in Vegas due to head winds.

I remember the airlines that are no longer around .. Braniff, Laker, Courtline, Dan Air, BCal, People Express, National, UTA .. to name just a few.

Then was the standard Apex tickets & Super Apex.

How we would phone Heathrow on 01-759-2595 to check a landing time to meet passengers. There was no internet, fllightradar24 & TV ceefax.

I was just a kid, and it was economy every time for us.

Our BA 747 from Hong Kong to London in 1979 stopped in Bangkok, Delhi, Frankfurt & finally London. A real trek !

As a kid, teenage & young adult, I always wondered how comfy & wonderful about travel in First Class. The first few times in First & then Business Class were always a thrill.

Air travel is something so many of us take for granted. To be crossing time zones, continents, cultures and seasons, in a metal tube at a speed which we don’t feel is a remarkable achievement for mankind.

[Nejohn01]

You always remember your first flight – BFS to LHR, Easter 1974 (just after BEA/BOAC merger!) – Trident 1c in BEA colours, rear facing seat at over wing exit! Full meal service. Then onwards to AMS; on a school trip to Holland. Security tight at BFS (height of the troubles) – searched before entering terminal & having to identify your bags for the hold on the apron while walking to the aircraft steps. But all seemed to go smoothly.
LHS -BFS BA Boeing 757 (1980s) allowed to sit in cockpit for descent & landing! Excellent.
First LHR to JFK (BA Boeing 747) – Y class; food much better & even a menu! How standards have dropped.
First INVOL upgrade; JFK to LHR; BA Boeing 747, WT to WTP, 1 month prior to official launch. Planes fitted out & selected passengers invited, at check in, to try out the new product . Still the days of paper tickets & a check in!
Now air travel seems less exciting but progress has allow many more to travel that never could have done in the past.

[drflight]

Ah, the days when you could check-in at West London Air Terminal and the coach left one hour before take off! And the dear old Executive Express (10 shillings extra) which waited at the foot on a Domestic Arrival at Heathrow. One stepped off the aeroplane onto the coach which then went direct to West London Air Terminal.

And the cosy, comfy ex- First Class cabin at the rear of the Vanguard which cost about £1 extra. I loved the Vanguard with the big, oval windows and the steady drone of the Rolls Royce Tyne engines. Even when the Trident began appearing on domestic routes I still preferred a Vanguard flight if there was an option. Happy Days!

[AMcWhirter]

drflight – My earliest BEA flights were with the Vanguard on the EDI-LHR route.

At weekends the first class zone was open to all-comers (no seat selection at that time) and it was the best place to sit.

Why ? Because I found the Vanguard the noisiest and most unrefined aircraft of its generation.

If you sat over the wings the noise and vibration were so great you literally had to shout if you wanted to make yourself heard. And that is why first class was, unusually, at the back of the aircraft.

The fact that sales to other airlines were minimal speaks volumes.

Had BEA not faced competition it would have continued to operate the Vanguard for a good number of years to come.

But when jet competition arrived in the shape of British Eagle at LHR and BUA at LGW passengers deserted the noisy four-engined turbo-prop.

BEA’s Comet 4B (British Eagle and BUA used BAC1-11s) was a breath of fresh air. Yes it too was noisy (but with no turbo-prop vibration) however it shaved a good 20 mins off the flying time.

[AnthonyDunn]

Mmm. I remember wandering along the fingers at LGW (brought up a mile south in Crawley) and my first ever plane trip in a BA Super 1-11 to Zurich for the day on a “familiarisation” routeing. Somehow, I doubt that WW would dream of such a thing for his ground staff these days.

Then, during several Summers on the British Airtours ground staff at LGW in the late 70s and handling other carriers such as Braniff (the flying carrot) and seeing what happens when an airline schedules only flight time and no maintenance. The joys of manual check-in/seat allocation when ticket coupons “meant money” so under no circumstances were these not to be collected at the gate. And changing your ticket meant getting one of those small yellow stickers placed onto a coupon. No such thing as pre-allocated seats or early check-in in those days. So not everything has gone to hell in a handcart.

There was the occasion that one guy got to the gate after the plane had pushed back, shoved his boarding pass/ticket coupon into my hand as he sprinted past and out onto the apron to where the 1-11 was just about to start taxiing to the runway. Astonishingly, the flight deck stopped the plane, the crew opened the forward doors (which had retractable air stairs) and allowed the guy onboard. The ultimate “Have-a-Go!”

My first long-haul in a BCal 747-100 LGW-HKG, with an early morning refuelling stop in Dubai, courtesy of an MoD standby fare of £26 each way (this was the mid-1980s when there was a trooping requirement for the HK garrison).

For those who wish to be reminded of how “simple” air travel used to be, I can thoroughly recommend domestic air travel around Burma. The “security checks” are so cursory that they are for show rather than for real. Forget fancy boarding procedures, the ground staff/cabin crew know where you’re flying to by the colour of the sticker placed on your chest. Everybody flies the same ATR72-600s tastefully decorated internally for Christmas/the New Year (and presumably for Burmese New Year and festivals). As a foreigner, the fares are reasonable – but well out of reach of most of the locals.

Actually Bullfrog, flying in First is still a thrill that I (in my mid-50s) have yet to experience…!

[canucklad]

Another thing I miss these days are paper tickets, and even better ticket wallets…..

Used to keep all of them, almost as a badge of honor….
When I cleared my mums house, I came across ticket wallets for BOAC–Air Canada-Western-BCal-Aloha- various CP Air’s and my favorite was a KLM ticket holder that actually doubled up as Document holder, capable of holding my 007 passport.

[drflight]

Ah, paper tickets and wallets!

The only ones I ever kept were Concorde and the one I love the most – a £59 one way Laker Skytrain to New York ticket from 1979. I can still remember the thrill of deciding to go to New York and the next morning going early to Victoria Station, buying a ticket to New York, taking the train to Gatwick, boarding the DC10 and flying off. Simple as that!

It still has what look like cloakroom tickets clipped to it showing I had paid extra for a main meal and a later snack!

Just typing this brings it all back – I think tonight I shall go home and raise a glass to the memory of Sir Freddie Laker – bless him!

[AMcWhirter]

As drflight was saying, what was interesting about Skytrain when it first started was that it was stand-by only.

You queued up at the Victoria station office (which is now a branch of Pret a Manger) to buy a ticket. If I remember correctly all seats were sold at £59 one-way (no APD or other UK fees in 1977).

Travellers could phone up and a recorded message would say how many seats remained on that day’s flights.

[Luxembourger]

A McWhirter,

I am really not sure you are being fair to the Vickers Vanguard. Like you, I spent a lot of time flying them from EDI to LHR. It was an extremely economical aircraft and was fast for a turboprop, so BEA liked the plane. It did indeed have poor sales, but I think that was for two reasons. First, and like the Lockheed Electra which also sold badly, many airlines went straight from piston-engined machines to jets. The turboprops were left out. Secondly, the Vanguard was one of a string of British planes that sold badly – the Britannia, the Trident and the VC10 all fell into that category. As best one can glean, the problem was a mixture of the nationalised airlines and the British Government which led to planes being designed to a specification which suited only BEA or BOAC without regard to the wider market.

As regards the question of noise and resulting location of first class, all planes were noisy in those days, though I would agree that the Vanguard was significantly noisier than the Viscount. All propellor-driven planes had first class at the back because the noise is up the front, where the propellors are. You still see this on the ATRs, where the entrance is sensibly at the back of the plane and that is where the ‘preferred’ seats are. For obscure reasons, the reverse is true of the Fokker 50, but then if you fly in business class up front you get all the noise at the same time.

Like dflight, I always preferred the Vanguard to the Trident. But if there was a chance to fly in a Comet that would win any time. An absolutely beautiful aircraft!

By the way, you can still fly without having to go through security on domestic flights in New Zealand. The cap is from memory 62 passengers (or it may be a couple more – it is whatever the number of seats is in the ATR 72s anyway).

[Author]

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