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Welcome to my 175th Flight Report Article! Hopefully it won't be long until I get to my 200th!
After arriving into Glasgow Airport, I had a few hours airside to enjoy some plane spotting and grabbing a decent dinner before heading onward to Dublin with Ryanair on my first international flight from Scotland.
Glasgow Airport is a very interesting UK airport for spotting as you get the regional fleet of Loganair ranging from the DeHavilland DH-6 Twin Otters, ATR 72, Embraer ERJ-145, budget airlines are heavily covered by Jet2, Ryanair and easyJet as well as legacy carriers British Airways (who operate multiple domestic shuttle flights to London Heathrow, Gatwick & City), KLM and KLM Cityhopper as well as two regular Emirates flights including the Airbus A380.
With the night drawing in and making it tricky to get decent photos of the aircraft parked around, I made my way to the main area between the Gate Piers to find myself dinner for the evening and a good chance to charge up my phone & GoPro.
I am a fan of Frankie & Benny's but I'd never dined at the one at Glasgow Airport as I've usually turned up with less than an hour before a flight or using an Airport lounge. I opted for a hot dog option called "Dirty Dog". I didn't rush as I still had nearly 3 hours before flying off to Ireland.
I took the time to explore a bit of Glasgow as the evening's flight were winding down to the final flights. I went to the Gates I'd yet to visit before and noticed how it looked very 1970s… The gates were occupied by closed up Jet2 Boeing 737-800, making me wonder if this area is the original GLA Airport Terminal facility which is now used mainly by the holiday airline?
I went over to the Gate area I had been at earlier when my easyJet flight dropped me off as my next flight was going to be departing from. The flight was the second to last flight out of Glasgow Airport that evening, the aircraft flying me to Dublin Airport was just pulling in having just flown over from Dublin.
For this short flight, Ryanair was operating Boeing 737-8AS(WL) EI-EVE. This aircraft was built in February 2012 and delivered brand new to Ryanair on February 9th 2012, who have flown it ever since. The aircraft is now 12 years old and is one of the mid-age Boeing 737-800 flying for the airline's flagship Irish subsidiary.
The Irish registered Boeing 737-800s seem to mostly be the older EI-D** & EI-E** Boeing 737-800 with the exception of a small number of EI-G** aircraft and the brand new Boeing 737-8MAX. A lot of the newer post 2015 built EI-F** Boeing 737-800 seem to have been re-registered and reassigned to Buzz! & Malta Air.
This aircraft had an older non-refurbished cabin, but oh my word- the state of the seats! I was seated up in the front of the plane, but I noticed a good dozen of the seats in the first 11 Rows of the plane at least looked like the one I snapped in the photo below. Now I am sure this isn't a safety hazard, but it shows how old and well worn the older seats are these days!
The flight was boarded pretty promptly and we were soon cleared to leave Glasgow Airport. We made a short taxi during which the crew did the formalities as we taxied over to the Runway for take off.
It had started to rain slightly and combined with the fact it was night time, it made getting many photos quite difficult.
We departed quite promptly as there were no other flights at Glasgow Airport, we were nearly an hour ahead to the last flight. We flew out into the night and as soon as the crew were released, they went ahead with the Getaway Café and Duty Free carts on this shop. I opted to kick a small bit of inflight purchasing their way by getting a cup of tea and a Toblerone chocolate bar to pass the 35-45 minute flight.
Our flight once we left Glasgow took us south over the Firth of Clyde, across the Irish Sea, past the coastline of Northern Ireland before making a final right turn to line-up for the arrival into Dublin.
There wasn't much else to photograph until the flight was well into its descent into Dublin Airport, we flew past the Dublin city on our arrival which allowed for my phone to grab an "okay" photo.
We landed on time into Dublin Airport and then proceeded to make a prolonged taxi from the South Runway over to Terminal 1, which is the Terminal at Dublin that Ryanair dominates.
We finally parked on stand just after 11pm local time in Dublin. I didn't fancy rushing off as I had the night in Dublin Airport's Terminal awaiting me, so I held back until almost everyone else was off, then made my way into Dublin Airport.
As you can see, Seat 9C also had the dodgy seating as well… Maybe EI-EVE will be retiring off soon or due for a cabin refit with the newer seats.
I took my time getting over to the Passport control and customs before heading landside for the next few hours. Quite a few people seem to spend the night in Dublin Airport before an early flight.
Whilst the place is known for mega-cheap flights, mainly due to Ryanair, the Airport hotels are a different story with most (if not all) the hotel regularly coming in at £100+ per night. Given I had a very late flight and an early departure with lounge access, I didn't find a £120 hotel worth the expense and opted to "rough it" for better or for worse!
Another standard experience on a short hop across the British Isles from Ryanair, it was nice to finally make an international flight from Scotland as all my other flights have been domestic to England. It made for a nice short video, and the price of the flight was good as it only came to £23 one-way.
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