Review of American Airlines flight from Seattle to Philadelphia in Economy

Hi,

welcome for this back home flight to Guadeloupe, from my translated Seattle report serie.

intro

The rounting allows  me to  discover Alaska and Omaha airport, it also 6exclu/7 for the data base.

Le vol

We go to the airport nearby 9am, it's early but our Rodeway inn SeaTac isn't very nice so it'll be better. We go by foot , weather is good but coldy, no matter, we'll miss cold weather in Guadeloupe.


After printed our BP we directly go  Airside, crossing customs &etc, at 9:25am we're airside:

Go to gate D11, with this seaplane making ad for an underwear mark

Our plane is already here. It's a ex-US Ariways A321, so it's a old narrow-body often used on ex-US Airways hubs (Philly, Charlotte, Phoenix), it's pity we won't have IFE like my flight with the  A321B I had for my DFW-DEN flight, for a 5hours flight it'll be nice.

Since it's  early, I decide to visit a litte SeaTac, I had been surprised by such a traffic in SeaTac, I didn't remember it.

I walk to terminal B

Where Delta is based

This one is pushing-back to Las Vegas

in front of us, A-terminal

 
Then I took the South Loop which serves terminals A/B and south satellite. North Loop  serves terminals C/D and north satellite. The Central Shuttle link terminal A (south) to terminal D (north). 3 distincts shuttle in total.
Satellite south

escalators

Face to us, terminal B (where we from) 

332 Kahului bound Hawaiian

Concourse is empty, there is carpet evereywhere but it's dirty.

Alaska in a ????? livery…

There is a wait to take-off, with Omni air in head.

E175 Delta bound to Sacramento,CA

Delta's  arriving from Tokyo Narita in A359, and a 737 to Anchorage

We can see Vancouver Island's mountains (CA): what a beautiful view.

757 from  Orlando

Frontier to Denver

Asiana Cargo 747 to Seoul

DASH Q400 AS from Bellingham, WA, a few miles northern than us

Alaska in the old livery bound to Denver

Southwest from…. Denver

757 Delta from JFK

The A350 is just in front of me

amazing

I have to come back to the South Loop, the Hawaiian A330 is pushing-back

And a 737 United  to Denver : everybody in here goes to Denver today ?

The first car is reserved to international arrivals; here, Narita's flight

The train is moving slow, about 2minutes between each terminals

I have to meet my  mother at Terminal B, every international passengers went down at terminal A station, to cross the TSA, and nobody go in

Then we go to Terminal D. The fastest way would have been to get out of the train in terminal A and take the A <-> D shuttle.

This is the talking fountain, it emplifies water sounds when you drink… hum, why not?

Our flight is scheduled on time.

Boarding via a blind pathway : welcome to the usa…

the gameboy

the door

Now go to my seat ; where the pitch is correct but not very good for a 5hours flight

No IFE here

We are seated at 11:15am

Beside us, a 737 to Los Angeles LAX

We push back at 11:25am, five minutes early

A 321

North satellite, with mainly AS

Alaska in Boeing livery

we enter the take-off lane

It's 11:40am when we line-up, for a take-off on 34R

KE, LH and JAL far away

They are waiting behind us

747 Lufthansa from Frankfurt, 787 Japan aiirlines from Tokyo.

Control tower

rotate

The north of the airport, with the Highway 5 and the Tramlink which link the airport with Seattle downtown

Far away, we can see the Cascades mountains

Tukwila

Bellevue CBD, passengers on the left side have a beautiful view over Seattle I guess

on the south

Right turn, with Bellevue again

Mercer Island

Boeing field, with his museum, and the 737MAX nailed on the ground. SeaTac in the back

Mount Rainier, just amazing

an other

I can see the south of Seattle CBD, like the Columbia Center Tower, one of the building  targeted by the 9/11 attacks..

Boeing field, Washington lake

Mount Rainier, on the right you can observe mount St-Helens

SeaTac

Tacoma and Olympia

Wingtip

Then we flew over Cascades, heading  east to Philly

And again, Mount Rainier with his 4392 meters, higher submit in United States (except Alaska) when we take the culminating point from the base, if you take from sea level, it's Mont Whitney in the Sierra Nevada

Snowy lakes

These view remind me that I'm definitively more a travelgeek than an avgeek.  Mount Rainier is an actif volcano (as is Mount St Helens) and these two volcanoes put in danger more than 4.millions of inhabitants because they are located between Portland and Sea-Tac metropolitan  areas (Puget Sound)

it's beautiful, we flew-over many ski  areas

a last one

because the snow gives way to  the east plains, we  exit de Washington by south of Spokane

we still flying over some snowy peaks

either plateaus

We fly-over Missoula, the second city of Montana after Billings

Wi-fi was available, but  you only can go on AA site unless you pay.

It's more or less mountainous outside

Catering is served; just speculos with drinks, that's  very low for this flight I think, but welcome to the usa lol.

I should have sell it in Philly, but I trash it

Sky starts to be more cloudy as we entered inland Montana

with the corporate pic

It's totally overcasted when we cross North Dakota border

inflight magazin

the fleet

New destination from Philly : Edinburgh ! operated with 757

We entered  the  clouds

it's dark

A few hours after, a second prestation has been made, just a drink this time. Still stingy

a canada  dry

It's still covered when we arrived on  Michigan coastline, so we didn't could enjoy Chicago, just southest than us

wingtip2.0

We overcross Ohio

The entry in Pennsylvania came up with the beginning of our descent over Philadelphia

Lights on, it's more dark outside

We reach east coast under a mixed weather

Delaware river, from northern Appalaches to Atlantic Ocean (in Delware state.)

We overfly south of Philly

After such a long flight we deserve beautiful views of the CBD

PHL airport

Downtown Philadelphia.

It's hard to take  goods  pics  with the weather and my bad phone

North suburbs of the city, with Fairmount Park on the right

.

The Central business district, and the airport in the background. The first bridge is the Besty Ross Bridge

Still turning on our right

PHL

The east neighborhoods of Philadelphia, actually located in New Jersey

sunset

flap

Again the CBD while we are on final, the same as 2 weeks ago from Sint-Maarten SXM

it's better

Lincoln Field stadium, with sunset behind

I don't regret my right seat

The last one.
Actually, I find that Philly's downtown looks a bit like Atlanta's one.

TouchDown at 7:20pm

Strong braking, we quickly exited the runway, it's rushtime  here on a eastcoast airport.
An united plane who heads west to… Denver !! As you see, because we didn't go skiing in Colorado this year, everything reminds us that.

American Airlines bound to Washington (Reagan national)

AA's territory

A330 bound to London Heathrow

And a British 747,, London too

Then we go to Terminal A-West, many aircraft waiting for landing

Another 330

Frontier on A321.

744 British

A350 Qatar going to his gate

We follow him

To be gated  beside Sport the Jaguar A321

Who arrived an hour ago from Denv… as F9170 and will take off soon to San Juan PR as  F9108

A beautiful livery.. in the background, an A300 UPS is taking-off to Richmond RIC

A-East terminal

everybody gets  up

deboarding is quick, we're airside as usual from domestic arrivals

Philly is welcoming us, I would have loved to stay a few days, Philadelphia is  a beautiful city, especially during spring, like Boston for that matter

We walk above SEPTA Airport Line which link Philadelphia international airport with the city center

control tower

taxi area

then we take the free shuttle to our motel (econolodge) which was just correct.

flight radar24

the flight

The approach over Philly, which allows us to have beautiful views on the CBD

thank you for  reading this, sorry for the mistakes I could make. You can visit the bonus about the Puget sound just below!

bonus

We decided to do Seattle and 3 Nationals parks during these vacations, we would have loved to go to Vancouver, Victoria, Portland etc, but it was too much.
 We  begin with Seattle, a beautiful city!

Our landing at SEA (non reported because of pics troubles!) just after an emergency with an AA flight (Vancouver-> Chicago O'hare).. Something about landing gear

Take the boat to Bainbridge island allows to have an amazing view on Seattle Skyline of $7go and back. 30/40min of boat and the, you're on a pretty green pine island.

The famous Pioneer Square, with his neo-roman buildings from XIXème century

Unavoidable Pike Market

 gumwall

Fremont borough, north of Seattle, is very nice. We went by foot (5kms each way) via Queen Ann hills, a beautiful rich neighborhood. It was srping and Seattle is a green city, all was "in flower" (idk how to say that in english).
This is Lenin, pretty weird in such a capitalist country as U.S., especially in the western states… Why not, i like the man

Then we went to Canadian border, Bellingham , where I had the chance to watch a Guadeloupe's friend playing SoftBall.
But we went here for North Cascades National Park

Weather wasn't good this day (otherwise we only had good weather) but the lakes are supposed  to be green. Here, Diablo Lake

.
Unfortunately, snow this year has been exceptional, the park is still recovered by 4/5meters in april, that prevented us to go where we wanted to go

Lower, a luxurious forest which reminds us Louisiana, or Olympic National Park (that we did after). The sensation of humidity and cold (30°F) was weird

but so beautiful

Then we crossed the state to go to Mount Rainier National Park (50 miles north of Portland, OR). I think that is  my prefered park, it was just amazing (but all was amazing, like everywhere in the wolrd actually!!!!!)

Snowmelt has no yet started

I ran faster than usain bolt

Mount Rainier from the South. Also here, snow bothered us

local chard

And finally, Olympic National Park, beautiful  too!
Ruby beach

It was suer windy and very cold

Unfortunately I don't find other pics of the inland of Olympic Park, but as the other, snow bothered us. From the top of the Hurricane Range, we could see Mount Olympe, Vancouver Island, Victoria City, Mount Baker (near Bellingham in the north of the state). The park was infested of raccoon

Voilà, it was a beautiful travel. Doing it in april was good: not much tourists, spring was beautiful especially  in Seattle (in the parks it was still winter) and even if with the snow it was terribly beautiful, it  was also a brake for the national parks.


See u soon, loulou