#57 out of 81 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings.
198 reviews
Hola Amigos!
This is the last entry to my Trip report to Chile back in early 2019.
After a happy 5 days in Santiago and Valparaíso, it was time to go back to Madrid. Instead of the flight in, this time I was to fly directly. Flights to Europe from SCL tend to be some of the longest flights operated from Europe…and boy they are long!
Heres a link to the previous flights on this trip:
I shared an Uber with a friend who was flying to Guatemala more or less a the same time, there was some heavy traffic arriving to the terminal, and once in there it was a mess. We got separated because he was flying Avianca or Copa, can't remember. Anyways that's the last time I saw him because of the mess…
Once I got my BP, I went through Emigration and Security controls. Both super slow and inefficient…since my departing gate was located in the new concourse, the walking time was super long and the trip between there and the lounge was made the visit pointless. So I went straight to the gate.
The new terminals are a HUGE improvement over the older ones. Finally Santiago and Chile have a decent terminal once again!
I didn't have to wait too long before our flight was called for boarding
Our flight was rather full, btw this flight still has a rather rare tag to FRA. I couldn't tell whom went where.
One last breath of "fresh" South American air…
This 789 did not have the latest interiors LATAM was unrolling on its fleet, but it's still a great product. The Green seats are "Economy Plus" with more legroom, whereas the Main Economy class cabin has red and blue seats.
The legroom was fair enough for our 13h flight, and we have a nice pillow and blanket waiting for us.
The sun set as the plane was filled up…
Three nights drinking and partying took their toll on my poor body and finally I succumbed to sleep.
But over Asunción we were served dinnner. This time I went for salmon and boy it was great!
I then slept most of the flight and I even missed breakfast. By the point I woke up we were already over Spain. I waited our landing watching some quality TV
And so the second longest flight I ever had passed by painlessly…
The border check took no time, and since I didn't check any bags, it took me less than 30 minutes to be on the metro enroute to my flat.
It's so satisfying when this happens.
This is pre-pandemic LATAM, and I hope they have manage to recover their level of service, because it was great! Probably the best choice to South America. Catering was amazing, IFE was more than satisfactory and the hard product overall was all that one could wish for on these long flights. Service was decent without being remarkably good or bad.
SCL was a mess. Hopefully with the new terminal this is not the case anymore.
MAD, was amazing and efficient. If it were not for the ride between the T4S and T4, you'd be from plane to land transport in record time!
Thanks for reading :)
1 Comments
Hi Chibcha, thanks for sharing this pre-pandemic report that will allow to compare with post-pandemic service. The catering is really fantastic for Economy...I really hope service levels will get back to this or better soon.
I always find passport check to be very efficient at T4S as well. I don't think MAD gets enough credit for being a very pleasant airport...you always hear about AMS, but AMS is a huge mess since Covid, while MAD has been a dream to fly in and out of in my experience. Well T4 anyway...I imagine it's not as pleasant in other terminals.
Thanks for sharing!
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