Review of Air France Hop flight from Lyon to Bordeaux in Economy

connecting the two french wine capitals

As part of my job, I have been travelling to Bordeaux a lot of times in the past year, up to a weekly basis at some point. This was the first time I experienced a "regular" flying experience, where even some crew member might recognise and greet me!

 I know this is just a small domestic flight, and it is hard to make it interesting but I'll try my best!    

Let me try with this tip with the École du Vin de Bordeaux where you can discover amazing wines for really little €uros…

Flying blue Miles earned with this flight: 318
Status earned: 2 XP
Air France doubling the XP status in 2020: 2 additional XP

As all of the Air France Hop flights; you can't choose your seat at booking, regardless of your Skyteam membership status. I am still not sure why the E190/170 and CRJ700/1000 fleet is the exception…
However you can during check-in, which I did, based on the cabin map provided:

AT LYON - SAINT EXUPERY AIRPORT

I arrived at Lyon airport with a cab, as usual, and as very usually, this attempt to run into someone that could become a regular taxi driver in like the one I have in Bordeaux was a fail…

Going through security was realyl fast, and even though this was the in between lock downs time, where all flights were departing from T2, as T1 was closed.

I really quickly reached the Hop hub of T2…

A good thing to know when you flight onboard the CRJs is that, even if you only have a cabin luggage, it will have to be dropped at the plane door and to be placed in the small hull under the cabin. 

onboard the crj700

Aircraft: Mitsubitchi CRJ702
Registration: F-GRZF
Engines: 2x CFM34
Age: 19 Years
Layout: Y70
Observation: Entered service with Brit Air; now the aircraft is in service with SkyWest…

We were called to board on time; with the Skypriority respected, premium passengers were called first.

Posting this report gives me a bit of the blues as the CRJ700 is melting down really fast; this particular unit has since last February been sold to SkyWest USA...

The pitch is ok, the tray tables are really old, seats still have an ashtray but they are old fashion - which means more comfortable!

We started taxiing shortly after and took off from runway 35L as usual..

And take off

Finally flying over these really thick clouds..
The crew seemed super friendly and especially since the flight wasn't full; they spent time having small chats with most of us.. 

And the service started… 

Since the first lock down, Air France stopped printing its magazine, and so it is digitally that you can discover it:  

You can really tell that the domestic network has shrunk by at least 50%…

At the time, there was still 11 CRJ700s in the fleet, nowadays there are just 6 remaining… It will soon become very rare to fly onboard one!

at bordeaux - mérignac airport

We arrived at the terminal B, where Air France operates… 
We alked up the stairs of the jetway to reach the terminal. 

Thanks for reading this report!