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240 reviews
Servus and Herzlich Willkommen to the third and last part of my trip to Porto this summer!
This trip report covers the flight back to Germany, the Porto Munich sector on a Lufthansa CityLine A319(!).
You now might wonder how it's a Lufthansa CityLine flight but on an A319? Didn't they only operate E190, E195 and CRJ 900s? Sure, but with Lufthansa's JUMP Project, Lufthansa CityLine got the honor to get transferred some few A340-300 which were flown to leisure destinations like Tampa or San Jose. Although the A343s were already returned during COVID, CityLine was allowed to keep their six A319, three of them in Star Alliance special color scheme, and still operates them from their base in Munich to destinations all around in Europe, still primary focused on leisure destinations.
But now let's just jump right into it!
Have fun reading, I would be happy about feedback!
Lars
Key information:
- LH 1783 from Porto OPO to Munich MUC
- A319-114, D-AILT in STAR ALLIANCE special livery
- Flight time ~2 hours and 45 minutes
- load factor in Business: 12/16 -> 0,75=75%
I arrived at mediocre busy Porto airport in the morning. After having a coffee landside, knowing the lounge would be closed after having it looked up in the internet, I proceeded to Lufthansa's check-in, which they use alongside with SWISS. Check-in was rather crowded with pax booked onto the flight to Frankfurt and Zurich, less to Munich. Of course as a business class pax, I was allowed to use the Business Class/First Class counter.
Premium check-in.
Home printed boarding pass. Later I changed my seat to 1A.
Closed lounge. But trust me, if you're they first time flying from Porto with lounge access and the lounge is still closed, you'll miss nothing. There is just some nice seating space but apart from that niente nada. No hot meals, not even a soup, but just some custard tarts and cake. The lounge is accessable landside, very uncommon in Europe and has it's dedicated security.
I used the fast-lane security which was absolutely efficient.
After passing the security I checked FR24 to see by which plane my flight would be operated. I was really amazed to see that it would be D-AILT, a Lufthansa Cityline A319 with Star Alliance special scheme! That would mean my first flight on one of those!
Our little beautiful A319!
Boarding was as always during Covid done in groups. As a business pax (group 2) I was allowed to board first with group 1 (HON Circles), of which were non onboard.
The KLM flight to Amsterdam would be operated by this little Embraer E190 of KLM Cityhopper.
I was greeted by a really friendly crew and given a antiseptic wipe as well as a bottle of water.
Wing view from seat 1A.
The cabin crew started small talk directly after boarding and whilst the safety demonstration and was in overall very attentive.
The table could be pulled out of the compartment. Because of Covid, there was no inflight magazine, so there was solely the air sickness bag, the safety card and the FlyNet info paper left.
If you look closely, you can see that Lufthansa Cityline has it's own A319 safety cards and doesn't use Lufthansas ones.
Taxiing by CS-TUK, the worlds ONLY A330-900 Neo in Star Alliance colors, which arrived from Rio and would proceed to Newark after a long stop over.
Rocketing out of Porto!
The A319 provides an excellent wing view, even in row one!
This was the first time that I could photograph the marine layer out of an airplane! Looks pretty amazing, not?
Row one of the business class in Lufthansa's A319. There are two coat racks and the "iconic" Lufthansa Business Class writing.
Then, the food service started, the amazing cabin crew began by putting napkins onto the trays and asked every pax of row one if they needed help for pulling out the table out of the compartment. On all my last flights with Lufthansa, I had never been given a napkin for my table? Is this a Cityline extra or when did they introduce it?
Afterwards, the menu was handed out. Unfortunately it was the same as on the inbound flight………
But after the menu, they served the drinks, sparkling water and diet coke as always for me, and handed out salted almonds! This was also a first time to me! Did Lufthansa really improve their service during the pandemic or was I just lucky to have gotten such an amazing crew from Lufthansa Cityline that made some extras possible. Ps: I freaking love salted almonds, cheers to Lufthansa.
The beverages, they were served in much styler glasses than on the inbound flight from Frankfurt!
Somewhere over desert spain.
Impressive :0!
Finally, the meal was served.
The appetizer on the inbound was slightly better regarding the taste and presented way more nicer.
The meat was really much better on this flight than on the inbound, as it was very tender and still some kind of fresh. Also mentioning the presentation here. Lufthansa, is it soooo unbelievably hard to present it just a bit more beautiful?
After one full meal and two extra cheese plates (My mom is lactose-intolerant and my brother doesn't like cheese at all), the really good meal was finished. In overall, it was way better than on the inbound, also encounting the amazing crew.
To finish off as always in Lufthansa Business Class, I got myself a cup of peppermint tea and asked for one more package of salted almonds.
The purserin needed exactly 2 minutes to bring the very nice tasting tea, 2 packages of almonds and some pralines! Very attentive!
After ordering and finishing a coffee, I brought the two cups into the galley and started small talk with the crew. Believe me or not, I stayed one hour with the crew, talking about everything, Lufthansa, the JUMP project, jobs in the aviation industry in the near future etc. I even took a selfie with the purser, but I think I am not allowed to post it in here.
Flying over lake Zurich, I went back to my place.
I'll not comment the next pics, just enjoy the beautiful approach into Munich!
If you look north in the pic above, you can easily spot Zurich Airport and Dübendorf Airbase!!!
And some few pics of Munich airport:
I really hope you enjoyed the trip report as much as I enjoyed my flight on Lufthansa!
I would be really happy about feedback.
Also I do hope that this enough pics, and next time I'll try to photograph as much as I can in landscape mode!
Yours,
Lars
This was surely the most amazing intra-european flight on Lufthansa that I have ever taken, and surely also the best crew I have ever had by far! The lounge was closed but rated like my last visit there, food could have been presented a bit more nicer.
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