Two for the Price of One: Boston Omnishambles
In this epic…
- Two for the price of one? Or when two become one?
- Off to Manchester Airport on the edge of my seat…
- BA Domestic – BA1387 Manchester Airport to London Heathrow
- Heathrow Transit, American Airlines Flagship Lounge
- American Airlines – AA87 London Heathrow to Chicago, Main Cabin
- Streamlined Immigration?
- The Crowne Plaza O’Hare
- Evening adventures with the Sony A5000
- The Hyatt Regency O’Hare
- Off to O’Hare, American Airlines Admirals Club
- American Airlines – AA1205 Chicago O’Hare to Boston Logan
- A Boston Omnishambles
- British Airways – BA202 Boston Logan to London Heathrow Terminal 5 in World Traveller Plus
- Transit and changes… from holiday to work, British Airways Galleries North Lounge
- British Airways – BA974 London Heathrow to Hamburg
- IBIS Budget St Pauli, Hamburg
- Trade Show 101 (or… don’t sleep on your glasses).
- Pounding the Halls of AIX – What you might had missed…
- A Walk around the Hamburg Dom
- Rushing back to Hamburg Airport
- British Airways – BA967 Hamburg to London Heathrow
- Homeward bound
- Mixing business with pleasure
Boston Omnishambles
Arriving at Terminal B in Boston, there’s two things… 1) it’s small enough to navigate quickly, but 2) like most American airports, you have to exit the secure area to transit to the International Terminal, and re-clear security.
On the way out.
Nothing like joined up thinking in airport design.
At least the buses are free at Logan International Airport – A rare thing indeed (and that includes the Silver Line from the Airport to South Station. And thankfully – there was no wait for a bus.
To the buses!
Short ride is short.
Everyone out!
A two-terminal ride on the bus, and I was at the International Terminal
Yes. Boston Airport runs on Dunkin’.
From there, it was a case of heading up to the departures level….
BA Check-in area. Rather quiet.
…and running into the mother of all security queues.
Yes, this is the premium flyer queue.
This was broken in October 2015. It was still broken in April 2016.
Nothing says “Thank You For Visiting the United States of America” than having two document checkers and two luggage screening lanes open at a peak time evening rush.
Alas, Boston Airport and the TSA seem to think this is perfectly adequate. Because, they don’t give a damn about passenger experience far as I could tell.
In the end, it took me a mere 30 minutes to clear the queue – with priority access. I dread the thought how long it would had taken people without priority access to get through.
I spent a little time getting some essentials (raiding duty-free for friends, buying the odd 1Kg bag of jelly beans, a bottle what called is allegedly could be water (who in the UK remembers the scandal of Dasani being recalled and failing badly ? It’s still for sale in the USA…)
Main waiting area
Norwegian Air Shuttle flight loading
The BA gate empty.
The waiting 747… nowhere near the gate.
With those actions done, I decided to head to the lounge for a bit. Boston Logan Airport has an “interesting” design, where the lounges are on another floor out of the way in peace and quiet. That’s good in theory, but in practice… there boxes of fancy waiting areas…
To the lounges!
The alley-way of lounges.
Virgin Atlantic’s Lounge
Lufthansa Senator Lounge
Aer Lingus Lounge
British Airways Galleries – Boston Lounge
I headed into the lounge, and checked in. This time – instead of heading to the First Class/Emerald Side, I would be heading Club World/Sapphire side (Hold it… you lot don’t know I did that. That’s a trip report I’ve yet to write-up).
Although with this dungeon of a lounge – the only difference it makes is that there’s more people in the Club World/Sapphire side…. And maybe some extra fizzpop bubbles (which I couldn’t have anyway at that point in time ).
So, the lounge. It’s a reasonably lit lounge, with plenty of plush furniture around.
Seating
Seating
Food – well if the first class lounge was a disappointment in October, the Club lounge was equal to it in terms of food content. Sadly, as I was travelling in the “lower” classes, there would be no pre-flight dining for me.
Dining area
Food serving area.
Small chicken pesto rolls are small.
I’m not sure you can make sandwiches any smaller…
Cheeses
Cold items
Nibbles
Coffee machine.
Wine
More Wine!
Spirits.
But there was a bigger priority for me: Space to sleep in. Whilst the seat I had selected was “reasonable”, I knew I had get some decent rest before the madness of Aircraft Interiors Expo. With minimal down-time I would have – I checked to see if there was any capacity in World Traveller Plus.
Amazingly, two seats were open next to each other. I paid the $330 fee to upgrade to give myself the space I would need to crash out of the flight towards the UK.
Normally, I wouldn’t… but with a need to be awake and active on the ground after a busy weekend – I had limited options. And I took the upgrade.
A delay in boarding was also announced, thanks to Swissport blocking the ramp. It would seem that we would be departing an hour later than planned. Whilst my “connection” was safe, others were getting rebooked. Hopefully the pilot had a lot of slack in his block to block time
Eventually, boarding was called – so the lounge emptied out (with myself included) as we headed for gate E6.
Back into the maelstrom
The massive queue? Must the British Airways boarding queue..
Yep. It’s the BA queue. And who is that advertising? Oh. Qatar Airways. Hmm…
By the time premium passengers had got to the gate, boarding was in full swing.
Priority Queue.
Eventually, I was blipped – and allowed through the gate. Heading down the escalator and passing one more line of the TSA and collecting my duty free – I boarded the waiting Boeing 747 that would take me to next stop.
Down we go!
To the plane!
Next: BA202 Boston to London Heathrow T5
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