#62 out of 94 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings.
967 reviews
Successfully getting away from the UK these past months can be described as a moving target, to say the least. With six days off work and an ever-changing "green list" of countries not requiring self-isolation on return, I was accepting of the fact I may not get my first (or second, or third…) choice of destination. And so the months leading up to my eventual trip to Greece looked something like this:
1 Aug: Switzerland-Liechtenstein-Austria planned (LX/OS)
14 Aug: Switzerland red-listed
31 Aug: Zakynthos booked (U2)
7 Sep: Zakynthos red-listed
13 Sep: Istanbul booked (BA)
1 Oct: Turkey red-listed
2 Oct: Athens booked (BA)
Credit where it's due, Easyjet were very straightforward and efficient in processing a refund once they cancelled my ZTH flights and BA made the process of claiming and redeeming a flight voucher fairly simple considering it involved calling an ex-UK call centre. I settled on Athens as it was practically the only viable destination given my time constraints, voucher value and desire for some warmth before the long British winter. It turned out to be a brilliant trip - check out the tourism bonus at the end for some tips on an Athens city break!
With a choice of three daily ATH departures with BA, I opted for those that best maximised my time there whilst giving me enough time to get there from Bristol. I lucked out that they coincided nicely with the £3 coach tickets I'd booked for my original IST flights, with the added bonus of BA now scheduling a weekly 787-8 down to ATH each Friday through October! I'd never flown the -8 variant, so that added a much appreciated perk to a trip I was already grateful for happening at all.
The 0720 National Express coach from Bristol got me to T5 at 0940 - plenty enough time for my 1240 departure. Having taken taken the train back from LHR after my trip, I can vouch for the coach as by far the simpler (and usually cheaper) option to/from Bristol if the timings work for you.
The coach dropped off steps away from the T5 arrivals door. Stepping inside I wasn't blown away by a deserted terminal, but did have to pinch myself to remember this was Heathrow on a Friday morning.
Whereas the terminal would usually be in full swing as the flood of westbound transatlantic flights gear to leave, it instead felt more like my midday experiences flying out of HAN. Nevertheless, it was beyond comforting to once again hear the sound of the PA chimes and suitcase wheels rolling along tiled floors. At times this year, I thought I'd be waiting a lot longer than this to do so.
There were clusters of check-in queues scattered around the hall. For my ATH flight I was directed to the B desks - a stringent check of Greek passenger locator forms meant online check-in was unavailable for this flight, and this document was indeed thoroughly checked by my friendly BA agent.
At this point I enquired about cash upgrades, as my previous IST flight had been desperately advertising them for as little as £50 but unsurprisingly this was not the case on a 787 flight. The entire J cabin was taken, with just two seats free in the premium economy cabin which BA were cheekily selling as business on this flight too. I was quoted £99 for the privilege, which made for a poor deal given the lack of a window seat, reduced catering, being the last to board and the option to select the last row of Y to myself for free. I politely declined and requested seat 39J instead - one of only two pairs on BA's 787 in economy. I got my paper boarding pass and proceeded through security, taking no more than 10 minutes.
This was in fact my first time flying out of T5, having arrived aboard IB's regular A340 flights from MAD numerous times before. The main airside terminal area struck me as nearly identical to that in T2, which I'd flown from previously with UA, SQ and AC. I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of shops, cafes and restaurants open having seen pictures of mothballed airports over the previous months. After getting a good laugh out of Travelex's GDP to EUR exchange rate, I settled down for a coffee with roughly 1.5 hours until my flight.
The HP shop a bastion of stability in these tumultuous times.
Even with AA, QR and JL departures all using T5, the FIDS was incredibly stark. Just six widebody departures from the B satellite displayed, including mine down to ATH.
With B48 designated as our gate today, a steady stream of foot traffic made its way down to the intra-terminal people mover. At this point I could already tell this was not going to be a full flight.
I love the ground-level views you get of aircraft at T5 when coming up from the people mover! The B gates today were populated (scarcely) by a blend of BA 777 and 787s, an AA 77W and QR 77W.
That said, none of the gates I passed had passengers waiting or preparing to board. The only other passengers in the building seemed to be those on my flight and a group that somehow managed to miss their QR flight and were giving the ground staff the hairdryer treatment on how it was their fault…
By the time I arrived at B48, boarding had already been initiated with those at the rearmost of the aircraft being called first. Great news for myself sat in the very last row, but I'm sure airlines are as keen to reinstate priority boarding as soon as health and safety allows.
My boarding pass was scanned with a quick removal of my mask to verify ID, and with that I was all set to board the first flight with my national airline since a 2013 LGW-BCN hop aboard a 737-400. Needless to say I wasn't expecting a repeat of that experience!
My ride G-ZBJK - a 2-year old 787-8 - was to be found at the end of an impressively long walkway/jetbridge. It had spent the past week running exclusively between London, Cairo and Toronto.
Sistership G-ZBJJ 'Paul Jarvis' was parked up at the gate between ours and the main terminal building.
Views of our ride were limited due to the mostly-enclosed airbridge, but a huge bonus of the staggered boarding system was how relaxed and leisurely the whole process could be. No rushing, no queues on the bridge, no overwhelmed cabin crew to greet you at the aircraft door, and no backlogged aisles of people stowing hand baggage ahead of you.
The J cabin would quickly fill up, but for now its occupants remained waiting in the terminal.
Worth 99 squid? To some people, probably. But even in hindsight I'm glad I didn't take up that offer.
BA's 787s carry the industry standard 3-3-3 configuration in economy class. I remember reading there'd been so much negative feedback on the narrow width of the seat that BA actually changed them a bit? Fortunately for me, it wouldn't be relevant sat in row 39.
Row 39 features just a pair of seats opposed to the three across the rest of the Y cabin. Not only does this mean fewer people to disturb when leaving the seat, but also a considerable gap between the window seat and the aircraft wall, similar to that found on the rearmost few rows on most 777s.
There's easily enough space for two people's bags in said gap, although I'm sure flight attendants would only permit them there after being stowed under the seat in front for take-off and landing. Once seated, looking fully out the window requires leaning across but the views from the seat were still excellent thanks to the Dreamliner's mega windows.
Outside the ramp agents were busy stuffing our belly full of whatever cargo was deemed profitable enough to bump this flight up to a widebody once a week.
On the seat were pillows and a sealed blanket, both of which would not be found on the same flight when operated by a narrowbody, so props to BA for this creature comfort.
Legroom was about standard for long-haul, and therefore vastly superior to that on the usual aircraft plying this route. All seatback pocket contents had been removed bar the safety card and sickbag. The only other ammenity provided at the seat was the now-standard hygiene pack, consisting of a sanitising wipe and sachet of hand gel, distributed by the crew. On my return flight aboard the A321neo, these would be handed out upon entering the aircraft.
Boarding was soon announced as complete, confirming I'd have this pair of seats to myself for the next 3+ hours. I'd estimate this flight at 40-50% full in Y, with J at near 100%.
With that we soon made a quick pushback at 12:40 to begin the fairly straightforward taxi out to runway 27R.
The crew performed a manual safety demo despite advising us to look to our screens for the usual video, which never came. Outside, the sights were like no Heathrow I'd ever seen in my lifetime.
Firstly, I was scanning the rows of BA tails at T5 without the iconic shape of the 747 amongst them. The previous morning had seen the final two jumbos in the fleet depart LHR for the last time, leaving in their wake a much more uniform and - in my opinion - generic landscape of twin engine jets.
Without even the A380s around, the tarmac was practically a cut and paste of four different widebody types. It's a stark contrast to the memories I have of long haul flying out of LHR through the 2000s, where jumbos would be intermixed with 757s, A340s, MD11s and so on as far as the eye could see. Even my last flight from here in March of this year was aboard a 767 - days I now feel are well and truly behind us.
With T3 mothballed, it seemed to be being used as parking spaces for excess Dreamliners.
At what should have been the midday rush hour - during which I queued for 40 minutes on that 767 in March - we taxied nearly the entire length of LHR without so much as slowing down. I really appreciated the size of the Dreamliner's windows at this point, with their size allowing you to look out the opposite side of the plane as well as your own. For all its faults, I've not known another plane to give quite that sense of perspective.
A solitary EK A380 made a brief cameo at T2, expecting that to be my fill of quads for the day. However…
Huzzah! Turns out I hadn't unknowingly seen my last 747 at LHR back in March! This VS bird looks like she'll have the honour of being the last "British" jumbo to leave Heathrow. I'd love to know more of the background to this scene, so stick a comment below if you're in the loop.
With that, we swung onto 27R and made a rolling takeoff westbound. Even at the noisiest end of the plane, the 787 has a whisper of a spool-up.
Wheels up at 12:54 and into the grey October skies. It felt good to be flying again.
Fortunately the weather cleared up as we looped southeast to plot a course for southern Europe. At this point I gave the IFE system a quick explore as this flight would be the perfect length for most films.
I settled on Moneyball, a film I somehow had never seen. The screen was medium size and the resolution fine. I didn't need to dim the window to see the picture, even as the sun crept round to my side of the aircraft.
As I'm yet to have a seat neighbour aboard a 9-abreast 787, I'm yet to feel the full pinch of the narrow seat width. That said, it wasn't hard to envisage the squeeze when noting where my shoulders rested when sat back in the seat.
The seat padding was otherwise good, as were the soft fabric headrests. I much prefer these seats to the faux leather ones Air Canada and many other airlines tend to opt for. It made for a comfortable vantage point as we crossed the English channel towards a cloudy continental Europe.
At 1310 the crew started the all-new covid-induced onboard service in economy. This is replacing the M&S buy on board system for the foreseeable feature and represents a significant upgrade in complimentary offerings.
The standard short-haul pack contains a bottle of water, packet of Tyrell's sea salted crisps and a variation of cookie packs. Lots of single-use plastic here which I'm not a fan of, but understand this is probably the only way to ensure hygiene at present. The downside of the new service is that this is literally it - there's no option to buy more, pay for something more significant or even source a hot drink. If you missed lunch before this flight, your next meal would be dinner in Athens.
I enjoyed the seat's comfort and entertainment of Moneyball as we passed over sheets of European cloud below. The huge empty space to my side made for excellent lounging opportunities.
IFE boxes were located under the window and middle seats in front. With three people per row, no doubt this would feel like a further reduction in personal space.
Whilst great for this flight, I don't think I'll actively be seeking out BA or any airline's Dreamliners for long-haul flying in economy.
Having reached a cruising altitude of 41,000ft, the flight picked up speed and made very good time down along the Dalmatian coast, where the layer of cloud below finally dissipated. I was treated to wonderful views of the Croatian islands as the sun lowered over the water, retracing my steps from a backpacking trip through the Balkans in 2016. Further along we passed Lake Shkodra on the Albanian-Montenegrin border, where I'd spent a number of days on that trip.
The rolling mountains quickly gave way to Greek islands as we initiated descent into Athens at 1519 UK time - not even 2.5 hours after leaving LHR.
The approach was to be a beautiful one, turning due south over the Saronic Gulf to loop round and approach Athens from the southwest.
The huge windows gave a wonderful oversight of our approach, visible on both sides of the plane.
Final approach was made onto runway 03R. Golden hour was in full swing out side, and the light hitting those Mediterranean hills outside the city were the welcome back to Europe I'd been dreaming of.
The topography around Athens gave me real hope for some excellent hiking and exploring opportunities in the coming days! Our 787 made that reality one step closer with a smooth, gliding approach that had wheels down at 17:46 local time - a whole 40 minutes earlier than scheduled.
Thus concluded a very short 2:53 flight - the quickest on this route for the week prior and after. Our arrival into ATH was clearly a notable event, with even the occupant of a towed Aegean A320 taking the opportunity to snap a picture from his cockpit!
We passed relatively little other activity on the apron. The only other signs of life were in the turboprop farm as domestic flights boarded by bus. This was the scene of my only previous experience of ATH - aboard an Olympic Dash-8 from SPU before an overnight connection to TXL the following day.
A short taxi brought things to a close at the gate, as the cabin crew outlined the new staggered disembarkation procedure.
Row numbers would be called and invited to leave the aircraft, with everyone else remaining seated whilst they did so. No aisle-hogging or bag grabs from the overhead lockers were permitted, and in fairness no one tried to. I honestly found this a spectacular improvement over pre-covid times even if it meant getting off the plane 5 minutes later than I would otherwise. I'd like to see this remain once covid is a distant memory, however I doubt people would fall into line as easily without the guise of health and safety. A Tarom 737-700 pulled in next to us while I waited.
I eventually made my way through a now-empty plane and thanked the crew on my way out. I was in the terminal by 1805 - 19 minutes after landing and still 6 minutes ahead of the scheduled arrival time.
Arrivals consisted of a managed queue as each passenger's PLF was checked (but not scanned) by an airport official. We were then allowed to proceed to use the e-gates for entry, which surprised me for some reason. It seems most scrutiny for arrivals into Greece comes at the point of origin, not arrival.
With no bags to collect, I was on the €5.50 bus to Syntagma Square in no time at all, watching palm trees pass by and feeling a warm late-summer wind on my face.
Overall I'm comfortable saying I was happy with my return to BA after a seven-year absence. Undoubtedly this is due to the unusual level of comfort provided by the 787 on a route where you'd typically never find this, however I absolutely can't fault the crew, their service, the adaptations made in light of the pandemic or the ease with which I was able to organise this flight. The return leg aboard their A321neo is a different story in terms of onboard product, but that's been well-documented before. Heathrow T5 was a pleasant and secure experience, although this will have lots to do with current passenger numbers. Athens was perfectly fine in what little time I spent there, only losing points due to the inflated metro fares to/from the airport and slow bus alternative.
Les contributeurs de Flight-Report ont posté 4 avis concernant 2 compagnies sur la ligne London (LHR) → Athens (ATH).
La compagnie qui obtient la meilleure moyenne est Aegean Airlines avec 7.6/10.
La durée moyenne des vols est de 3 heures et 38 minutes.
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8 Comments
Very nice and enthusiastic report - a good read.
Nice to see BA provide pillow/blanket and activate IFE on this SH-flight.
Best, Daniel
Very nice report with great photos!
Thoughts are with you guys in France. Hope we're looking at 3-4 daily TLS flights again soon!
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