33, male, married, no kids, foodie, bargain hunter.
33, male, married, no kids, foodie, bargain hunter.
Member since:11.11.2002
Reviews:14
Members who trust:6
I'm not a great fan of jogging, but I do it from time to time. Usually I resurrect my running shoes post-Christmas in an attempt to deflate the spare tyre of excess which miraculauosly appears around my midriff every year. I run, I eat less, I drink less. Necessary evil.
An enforced 15-minute jog (sprint?) from one end of Copenhagen airport to the other wasn't on the cards last weekend, but was required. Laden down with hand luggage, duty-frees and dressed in hot, bulky winter wear suitable for my frigid destination of Estonia, this Op might well be for the best instant weight-loss system this side of the helium diet. For, in their infinite wisdom, SAS had allowed my 30-minute connecting flights to arrive at gate 2, terminal A and leave from gate 40, terminal C. 'SAS - are you tough enough?' asks the title of the BBC fly-on-the-wall series? You better be, boy.
I
needed to get to Estonia last week, and the only direct flights from London are via Gatwick, which is a real trek for me. I therefore went for the next cheapest option, with SAS via Copenhagen. This came in at £188 plus tax return. Total flying time of around 3½ hours via Airline Network.
SAS are a well-established airline based in Sweden, although they have three main European hubs - Stockholm, Copenhagen and Oslo. They serve all the countries of Scandinavia nad the Baltic states, as well as routes into Europe generally. They have a particularly well-developed set of routes in the Germany/Poland.Czech republic areas of central western Europe. In the UK they serve Heathrow, Birmingham, Manchester and Aberdeen, and Dublin in the ROI. Outside of Europe they fly to Seattle, Washington, Chicago, New York and various far eastern cities, mainly out of the Stockholm hub. SAS code shares extensively, with Lufthansa, Wider¢e, airBaltic, Cimber Air, Estonian Air, Icelandair, Maersk Air and Skyways. This makes through ticketing to just about anywhere in northern Europe fairly transparent. In the UK they also code share with British Midland, which would be help with through ticketing for regional UK airports, I guess.
The SAS website is, surprisingly perhaps, a bit lacking in that Scandinavian style which does so much to endear us to them. Whilst flight information, timetables and so on are available, the whole thing feels a bit counter-intuitive to use, and you're left feeling that it could have been so much better. Still, I didn't book through their website, but through a travel website, and what must be said in their favour is that their fares are much more competitive than they used to be. An article in the in-flight magazine tells of how SAS had surveyed their customers' views about ticket pricing and in-flight services, and guess what? Most customers want cheap flights with less frills. This means reduced in-flight meal and drinks services. This, I believe, is a Good Thing. Air travel is no longer glamorous, and I don't see why it should be the norm to expect gourmet meals on a 90 minute flight - you wouldn't expect it on a tain journey of similar length (and, increasingly, similar cost) so why not cut t down to a snack and a drink, and pass the difference on to the customer. Hats off to SAS for reducing their fares by an average of 20% on European routes over this time last year. If you're wired SAS offer a variety of SMS services for booking, checking in and downloading timetables, although I didn't make use of these.
My 'meals' consisted of a small continental breakfast of cheese, ham, roll, butter and jam with coffee on the way out, and a snack-sized cold pasta meal on the evening flight back. There was also a yogurt and a pastry on the latter flight. The coffee was good, and on the evening flight a free bar (with great chilled vodka), even though there was little time. Staff were informal, professional and easy on the eye (both sexes). The meals were served in nifty little polystyrene boxes, which might sound naff but were actually very stylish - I tried nicking one of them to take home as a lunch box - sad, or what?
Both flights were on Mc Donell-Douglas MD-80 series aircraft - a narrow-bodied effort with two engines at the back seating just over a hundred people. Most operators in Europe seem to use ither Airbus or Boeing 737 aircraft with the 3+3 configuration of very hard seats. I have to admit to being very pleasantly surprised by the SAS planes - although narrow, they have a 2+3 configuration in economy which makes for wide and comfortable seats compared with the likes of BA short haul. Leg room was more than adequate (though I'm only 5'8") and the overall experience was that of a comfortable, quiet and efficiant flight. I particularly liked the fold-downdrink holder in the back of the seat-front tray - which allows you to fold up the tray and still have somewhere to put your glass.
We were kept well informed by the captain (in unsurprisingly perfect English) - who usefull yinformed us on takeoff that we would probably have to cruise at low power for a few minutes to maintain separation distance between us and the plane in front of us - and that it may appear due to the low speed of the engines that the engines had in fact stopped. Helpful for nervous fliers, I reckon.
I wouldn;t normally have chosen SAS as I thought they would be expensive as most things Scandinavian are, but was very pleased to have my eyes opened. Comparing the legs from and to the UK with SAS with the distant legs to Esonia (code shared with Air Estonia) there was no comparison. I'll be looking SAS up again. I mean, what other airline is chepa AND gets you fit?
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
I wouldn't consider SAS to fly anywhere personally! If we want to go to Estonia, we go by boat, it's much more fun.
Nicole78 11.11.2003 21:41
Great op. I wanted to go to Estonia once when I was living in Finland. But somehow I never came around. But I went with Finair any way, so I don't have any experiences with Scandinavian Airlines.
NH Hotels, the hotel chain leader in Europe, with more than 300 hotels in 20 countries in Europe, Latin America and Africa. Enter into our web site and find the best available tariff at all times
Record Rent a Car is present in the main spanish airports and has a very wide fleet. We offer: exceptional discounts, free additional drivers,
unlimited mileage... subscribe to our Club Record and take advantage of special offers.
Advantages: Good food, excellent lounges, attractive specials Disadvantages: Bad seat comfort, stewardesses are one big disappointment
From_The_Continent 06.04.2001 (06.04.2001)
·
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Scandinavian Airlines - SAS
Advantages: Competitive prices, plenty of destinations, good service Disadvantages: You have to pay for food and drink on board - but that's almost standard nowadays...
JVL 22.04.2008 (22.04.2008)
·
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Air Baltic
very helpful by (100%):
