Two for the Price of One: Off to Manchester Airport on the edge of my seat…
Featuring the British Airways Terraces Lounge, Manchester.
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 – BA215 Boston Logan to London Heathrow Terminal 5.
Transit and changes… from holiday to work, British Airways Galleries North Lounge
British Airways – BA974 London Heathrow to Hamburg
IBIS St Pauli, Hamburg
Trade Show 101 (or… don’t sleep on your glasses).
Airline Interiors Expo – round-up
Rushing back to Hamburg Airport
British Airways – BA967 Hamburg to London Heathrow
Homeward bound
Mixing business with pleasure
Off to Manchester Airport on the edge of the seat…
It was time for the off… and for those who known… I start and the front door of my block of flats… waiting for a Black Cab.
No Uber? Uber at 2:45am in the morning in Birmingham is a joke at best. Sometimes, relying on a black cab is the best thing.
Still, I managed to hit the coach station with plenty of time.
The entrance to Digbeth Coach Station
Sadly, the coach didn’t seem to in the mood to be on time, with it turning up 25 minutes late, and departing a good 10 minutes later.
My bags are ready to go… the coach isn’t…
Nothing like wanting to be on time.
Eventually the coach pulled out, and the driver made his way through the back-end of the Black Country (Dudley and Wolverhampton), the heading to Staffordshire (Penkridge), and “fast” to Manchester Airport.
Except the driver was shall we say… a man possessed. I did write about this earlier, but his driving made me… uncomfortable.
How uncomfortable? I’d say white-van man levels of driving. We’re talking minimal braking distances, flashing lights at cars and trucks to tell them to get out-of-the-way, and breaking road traffic rules for overtaking.
Heading towards Manchester – one of the safer moments.
I think it was a mixture of wanting to overtake slow trucks which were playing leapfrog and trying to catch up with his timings (53 minutes down by the time we arrived at Manchester Airport), but it was… downright scary.
Not National Express’s best performance that day.
Survived.
With the coach dumping me at the airport, a lot of people were hurrying to catch flights – now running late thanks to the coach. Me? I found a trolley, and begun the long push over to Terminal 3.
(and no, I didn’t pay for it. Some kind person left it behind).
Take that! No £1/€2 for you today Manchester Airport!
And that of course means going through the blue tunnels, heading inside and outside… and inside again before hitting the terminal.
Inside the blue tubes of Manchester Airport
In the dim and distant past (2007), you were able to connect to Terminal 3 via Terminal 1 indoors and in the warm. Those days are long gone sadly.
Eventually, I was in the warm of Terminal 3, and heading up to check-in.
Terminal 3 at Manchester Airport
Even at near enough 6am in the morning – the airport was busy, with the early morning bank of flights already set to go.
Thankfully, the check-in queue for the first flight had dissipated, so I checked in the for the 8:35 to Heathrow. My bags were accepted without any problem (one small benefit of oneworld Sapphire is the two bag allowance), and both boarding passes for the domestic leg to Heathrow and the international leg to Chicago.
With those formalities completed, I was allowed to go on my way through security. With the Brussels attacks still fresh in the mind of security, there were full checks on everything – with full liquid and gels out.
Obviously, security were not in a mood to be messed around with – so I complied. Thankfully, there was no issues at security, and I was on my way quickly.
I had a quickly look around – but with me having to do some shopping at Heathrow, I passed on what was there and headed to the lounge
The gates and waiting area.
Duty Free
British Airways Lounge, Manchester Airport
It seems this lounge is turning into a regular haunt for me… and that’s no bad thing as it’s a quiet space, with no waits for anything.
Entrance.
After being scared half to death on the coach, I opted for a shower before going any further.
So… many… nozzles.
The shower did it’s job – waking me up and calming me – as well as killing off the sweat of panic from earlier.
Refreshed – I exited the lounge and tried to find a spot to sit that I liked.
Seating area towards the atrium
Galleries style sofas.
Back down into the atrium
Business area
Food area
Catering was as expected in this lounge – the only hot item was porridge, and a selection of cereals and pastries.
I grabbed an orange juice or two, and settled in.
Cereals
Pastries and Toast (although I wish this lounge did bacon rolls first thing in the morning… it would make it a lot more nicer for those who want hot items).
Wines and juices.
Refreshed, and feeling a bit better – found a seat near the outside windows. For me, one of things I love about this lounge are the panoramic windows out onto the runway. Namely because I can do lazy plane spotting and watch the sun come up.
It’s nice to see the sun come up… even if Ryanair are there! Smokey engine start…
Face off! Who will win?
Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 coming in, and a Ryanair Boeing 737 taxing past.
United Airlines Boeing 757-200 landing.
FlyBe Bombardier Dash8 Q-400
With boarding called from the lounge, it was tine to make tracks. I headed downstairs from the lounge, and straight into the queue for boarding.
Into the sea of humanity
Priority boarding had been called – so me and half the plane made their way through to the from of the queue to board.
The waiting British Airways A321
I took my point and headed to the queue to board too. With a blip, my boarding pass was accepted – and I headed down the jetway to the waiting plane.
Next: BA Domestic – BA1387 Manchester Airport to London Heathrow
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