Review of Iberia Express flight Palma De Mallorca → Madrid in Business

Welcome to this short report of a very quick commute from PMI to MAD where we connected to our flight to CLT. After an amazing time staying at the Hilton Sa Torre and exploring all of Mallorca, we were by no means ready to go back to the US!

Hilton Sa Torre Resort


MegaPark in the area we ended up calling "Kleindeutschland"…those of you that have been already know that the Playa del Palma around S'Arenal is really the 17th German Bundesland…


One of many amazing beaches we relaxed at, Cala Mondrago


Anyways…back to the AV enthusiast side of this trip!

PMI is Spain's busiest airport by passenger volume but they do a good job of moving high volumes of leisure travelers quickly. After returning our rental car, we walked from the garage to the check in area. If this would have been in the U.S., there would have been a tram or moving walkways because of the "extreme" distance…maybe 750m?

Iberia priority check in queue was rather short with only one agent working. She moved quickly and once it was our turn to work with her, she was very polite switching between English and Spanish with us. She made a distinctive point to tell us about all of the Priority advantages we had a the airport, e.g. priority screening and VIP lounge…which we knew about already but it was nice to get the review.


Iberia economy check in queues


We arrived "just in time" as we wanted to spend as much time at our hotel before going to the airport. For that reason, we didn't have any time for the lounge and ended up getting to our gate about 20 minutes before boarding.

Enjoyed watching the steady stream of RyanAir, AirBerlin, and TUI flights coming in and going.




Our plane arrived a few minutes late from MAD but the crew did a good job with turn around and boarding started about 15 minutes behind schedule. We already had a tight connection in MAD so this eliminated any potential leisure stroll or lounge visit in MAD.



We quickly settled in to our seats and were offered orange juice as a pre-departure drink. This was the most friendly gesture from the crew the entire flight.



Typical EuroBusiness configuration with the middle seat blocked out and economy legroom. I'm only 1.75m and my knees were hitting the seat in front of me.



My spouse who is 1.94m had to sit sideways…



A pretty good in flight magazine…



After takeoff, pre-packaged warm towelettes were distributed. This was a bit shocking because on our ticket there was no indication of a meal service…



To our pleasant surprise, a light breakfast was served on this approximately one hour commute! I'm not sure if this is standard because our FA seemed a bit annoyed that she had to serve breakfast…




It exceeded expectations simply because this was totally not expected. The fruit was fresh and the sandwich hit the spot for this time of day. The croissant was cold and way too firm; I'm sure it was in a refrigerator with the rest of the tray. The coffee was piping hot and more of an American or British variety which was disappointing.

I've never been to MAD and was utterly impressed by the beauty of the airport upon arrival. Wish we had more time for pictures but between our already tight connection, pass control and secondary security before boarding our next flight, we were a bit pressed for time.