Virgin Atlantic 747-400 Upper Class to New York

hello and welcome to another video I am taking a flight that I've been looking forward to for months and months since I booked it today I'm flying my very first time with Virgin Atlantic on the queen of the skies the 747 let's go and enjoy the trip today's video is sponsored by Squarespace a quick reminder that if you like my videos don't forget to subscribe and turn on the notification bell virgin have their own check-in area here at Manchester Terminal - and there's a dedicated kiosk for upper-class Manchester has a pretty bad reputation for its security lines so it's great that upper-class comes with dedicated fast-track security having seen the queues in the regular line I reckon this saved me about 20 minutes one of the other benefits of upper-class is access to a lounge but the clubhouse at Manchester is being refurbished instead I was given an invite to the escape plus lounge thankfully for families the Virgin Holidays veeram is unaffected and still open escape is a popular and decent quality lounge brand from the UK and they operate a few Plus lounges at certain locations only virgin and Qatar Airways passengers can get in here it's a perfectly acceptable lounge but doesn't replace the glitz and glamour of the virgin club house it's still a fairly decent place to catch a little bit of respite from the terminal and something to eat or drink before your flight departs [Music] [Music] Manchester's amassed an interesting collection of international long-haul routes over the last few years singapore airlines operate to both houston and singapore on the same flight number if you did both of those flights back-to-back that would be 24 hours of flying Ethiopian operates a 787 down to Addis Ababa and Air Canada Rouge operate to Toronto using their 767 the less said about hainan airlines the better they operate to Beijing virgins route here is centered mostly around leisure this a330 is off to Los Angeles sadly my flight was occurring just a day after Thomas cook had collapsed and I remember taking those from JFK back to Manchester only a few months prior to this video so from the info where I said this was my first flight with Virgin Atlantic you're probably wondering why it's taking me so long to fly them I live in the UK where they're based and I've been doing trip reports for about five years now on YouTube well the answer is I've just really haven't got around to it in the early days when I was mostly focusing on flying British Airways a flight with Virgin Atlantic meant a lost opportunity to flight British Airways and a crew more status more abnormal air miles with them and increase the level of flown that I was able to do so I never really gave virgin a second look there's a couple of other reasons which we'll go into later in the video why I haven't taken virgin before but now the time has come for me to take the 747 and I'm really excited today's aircraft is nicknamed forever young ironic for an aircraft which is pushing 20 years old this aircraft is actually in virgins older livery the new one can be seen on a parked 747 on the far side of the airfield with the new billboard lettering there's nothing quite like flying on the 747 and today I'm privileged enough to be sitting right in the nose the very front seats get a slight forward view as you can tell from the curvature of the fuselage by the way I don't recommend that you hang around the gate area for too long the seats are pretty basic it's dingy and there's very few charge points available if you don't already you should follow me on my other social media Twitter and Instagram it's there that I live blog my trips in real time Virgen let me board a little early to take some great pictures of the cabin boarding is through the second door and through the Premium Economy cabin there's an additional cabin of this upstairs on the upper deck which I'll be reviewing next year on the return leg of this ticket entering the upper class cabin you can't help but be struck at the wonderful symmetry of these seats as they point in towards the nose upper class is just a business class product but virgin have the same number of seats in the nose of the 747 14 as British Airways do in first class on their 747s the seats are in a herringbone configuration which is now well outdated a big downside to the herringbone configuration is that nearly all of the seats make it very difficult to look out of the window the front seats are the only exception to this because of their unique placement and the curvature of the fuselage it's a quite an easy head turn to get your face right up against the window as well as that especially privileged feeling of being at the front of the aircraft the front seats also come with a hidden storage compartment this particular section is unused and you can just burn all of your stuff in there these seats don't have a great deal of storage as we'll find out later the only real downside to sitting at the very front is that because there isn't a huge amount of privacy in these seats everyone can see you still it's wonderful to be sat in the nose of the 747 in business class and after a quick glass of champagne or two it was time for us to push back and head for an on-time departure to New York [Music] after a brisk takeoff and having been treated to the wonderful sound of four rolls-royce engines we're on our way towards JFK Airport in New York the 747 is renowned for being a particularly fast aircraft today we'll cover the three thousand three hundred and thirty eight miles in just six hours and 44 minutes let's take a look at the seat there's a very small storage pocket down on the left-hand side here where the literature and headphones are kept there's also a single USB charger and the headphone jack this little remote control can be used to control the in-flight entertainment screen which folds out from the console like this there's quite a lot of glare on this so I recommend that you close your blinds if you want to watch this TV you can actually use the recess the TV comes out from as an extra storage space if you want the only other storage is to the left-hand side of the seat here just beyond the armrest behind the seat itself is the storage for the duvet and pillow which you'll see a bit later on the seats do have up and down recline controls but cannot be laid completely flat without the assistance of the crew the reality is these 747s are on the way out they'll be retired completely by 2021 from Virgin Atlantic's fleet therefore the seats are a little bit worn this is an old product and now version are only operating their 747s on certain leisure and seasonal routes I was soon to find out why virgin was still a successful airline despite this outdated product the service and food on board were excellent and outstandingly British to I was able to preorder my main course online through the Virgin Atlantic website a few days before departure I think virgin know their market very well they're very popular in the UK and their food is really geared around that I chose my main and dessert purely off the fact that they were comfort foods for me as a Brit I have to say that virgin also have one of the most attractive table presentations that I've seen anywhere in the sky lunch was served as we crossed Ireland I had the cumin coriander to start because it intrigued me it was quite delicious the braised beef is what I chose for my main now this really is comfort food for us Brits this was really tasty and also quite stodgy so it really filled a hole for dessert I went for the raspberry melting middle pudding the pudding was served in condensed milk and was perfectly hot and moist I really enjoyed this pudding it absolutely hit the spot to round it all off I tried the cheese board and a glass of port it'll be a very sad day when the 747-400 stops flying I paid a visit to the lavatory and also have a look at some of the old fittings in here it's been a while as I use an airplane toilet that had an actual flush handle I really enjoyed the food and drink service on board but the only thing that didn't really hit the spot was this instant coffee as you can see here there is still some granules floating in the mix if the in-flight entertainment doesn't take your fancy then there's some excellent Wi-Fi available onboard the prices were quite reasonable and at 20 pounds of 99 pence for the full flight I think that's fairly good value the strength and quality of the connection was also really good it didn't drop out once and I was able to access anything I needed without a hassle I was even able to track our aircraft on flightradar24 if you want to sleep the crew will provide a turndown service and there's a mattress topper to go over the top of the seat when it's reclined into a bed I was surprised at just how comfortable the bed was but if you're over 6 feet tall I think you may struggle till I flatten this it isn't particularly long headphones are provided to go with the in-flight entertainment as I said before those are remote to use instead of touching the screen and there's a good reason for that this screen is not particularly responsive and it is rather old just use a remote about an hour before landing into JFK afternoon tea was served the real highlight of this is the macaron and eclairs these were created by French celebrity chef Eric lang Lars and were absolutely exquisite there's also a scone with jam and cream Virgin Atlantic were one of the first airlines I could name and that's because when I was a child I remember my grandmother going to New York on one of their aircraft and bringing back an amenity kit well this is today's and it's pretty nice to supplied by her shell it's a pretty nice bag and I'm sure that I'll keep it as a souvenir for years to come shortly before landing the crew came round with some landing sweets I'm not sure I've ever seen these love hearts sold anywhere outside the UK fortunately the weather in New York is way better than it was back in Manchester and it provides for a spectacular approach into JFK Airport [Music] [Applause] [Music] and so to sum up the flight I paid a fare of 683 pounds return in Premium Economy and I was offered the chance to upgrade using the website for an extra four hundred and forty nine pounds one way I consider this to be a pretty good deal and I did only upgrade because I knew that I could select one of the very front seats on the aircraft virgin have great service and some great people working for them I would recommend this experience to anyone that aren't many chances left to sit right in the nose of a 747 today's video sponsor Squarespace gives you a powerful and beautiful online platform from which to build your website Squarespace allows you to link your various social media accounts to your website so you can post similar tiny ously to all accounts and there's a great traffic overview feature that means you can track trends in page visits and views to better optimize your posting and don't just take their word for it I actually set up my website some months ago using Squarespace go to squarespace.com slash winging it to get a free trial and 10% off your first purchase don't forget to subscribe and thanks for watching I'll see you again soon with another video [Music]

Channel: Wingin’ It! Paul Lucas

Views: 351,272

Keywords: virgin atlantic, Virgin Atlantic upper class, Virgin Atlantic upper class review, Virgin Atlantic 747, virgin Atlantic advert, Virgin Atlantic safety video, Virgin Atlantic Manchester to new york, Virgin Atlantic economy, virgin holidays, virgin flights, review, trip report, video, Paul lucas, takeoff, landing, Virgin Atlantic food, upper class, Virgin Atlantic business class, business class, Virgin Atlantic upgrade, virgin 747 retirement

Id: q9a1nB375Uo

Length: 13min 50sec (830 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 29 2019