Last year was the first time I flew out of the country, from Manchester heading for Vancouver Island (I have a seperate review about the holiday titled "Vancouver Island-a Wildlife watchers dream"),for my backpacking holiday.
I booked my flight through a company called Candian Affair, which I had found by surfing the net. I had searched a few sites and made a few notes on prices, and these were cheaper by far.
Now for those of you who don't know (I never knew they did), Thomas Cook have now bought their own fleet of Aeroplanes, and have been running them now for a few years after buying out a German Airline company.
They use the fairly new Airbus A330, which boasts a 35 inch seat pitch, which is the best out of any scheduled or chartered airlines flying to Canada, and thats just for Economy class.
On boarding the plane, you are greeted by the very smart looking stewardess's in their blue uniforms, and are directed to your seat, once you stow away any hand luggage, they come round and check for any overhanging baggage or items which might fall from the overhead storage space.
They then issue you a pack for your flight, these include your free headphones for viewing the tv, a bottle of water, and napkins, cleansing wipes and a brochure of items to buy in flight.
The one mystery I had was losing a plastic carrier bag which contained a magazine for reading during the flight and a bag of boiled sweets, which had been on my arm from leaving the waiting room to actually boarding the plane, where did it go?
The amount of leg room was surprising, even when the person in front decides to recline his chair, there is still enough space to move your legs.
Each seat has a built in tv screen to the rear, for the multi choice of films available, I was able to watch, Master and Commander, Stuck on you, Ice Age, 50 first dates and a few others that I cannot remember, but because I was in the air for about 8-9 hours, it gives you a chance to see about 3 films each way.
Also from the armrest of your seat, you can choose the film your watching and even check the flight details by watching the animated plane on a seperate channel, here you can see where the planes location is on the map, the height, speed, temperature outside (-79 over Greenland) and the estimated time of arrival (its amazing how long you find yourself staring at this).
For the people who choose the more spacious seats, with no seats in front, they have a screen that folds out from the seat.
You can purchase the choice of your seat on the website, for an extra £7, I was trying to save money, so I did not bother.
Before take off, we watched a safety announcement on the small tv screens, the stewardess's and stewards went throught the safety procedures, pointing out the emergency exits, how to put on your life vest, get into the crash postion, and was well presented.
This was followed later by a very handy guide to exercising your legs during the flight to avoid the risk of Deep-vein Thrombosis, or DVT, and was presented by the GMTV doctor (no he was not on board, just the video).
This was particularly useful for me as I suffer from poor circulation in my legs, so much so that I had bought the socks that are recommended for wearing during the flight ( there murder to get on, so tight, its just like wearing a pair of womens tights, not that I'd know this of course).
During the flight the stewardess's would come round with the trolley of goods, you can buy, chocolate bars, crisps, canned drinks, sweets, Alcohol and other odds and sods.
They certainly look after you on board, because my flight was an early morning flight we were served Lunch and a Tea, which is a bit strange as you seem to arrive in Vancouver about 14.30 Pacific Time.
The meals were brought round in their own little tray, you had a drop down table on the back of the seat to rest it on, they were hot and tasty but only small portions, still they filled you up after eating some of your bought snacks.
The plane itself was fairly spacious and kept very clean, they would come round for your rubbish quite regularly, the toilets were clean, but small ( well what do you expect on a plane), there are toilets for disabled, and I did notice some people in wheelchairs boarding the plane.
The pilot introduced himself and flight crew, and kept us informed of anything that might be useful information, like as we were approaching Calgary for the first stop before Vancouver, he let people know who might be getting off here, that the weather was very bad, and the airport had just re-opened after a 2hour thunderstorm had brought it to a stand still (in North America/Canada they close down for safety reasons during thunderstorms due to the risk of lightning strikes).
The flight itself ran to schedule and there was no problems what so ever, I quite enjoyed the experience of a long haul flight and would certainly go again, especially with Canadian Affair and Thomas Cook, and would recommend to anyone thinking of a trip to Canada (they do east coast flights to Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa and Halifax as well).
I now regularly receive the newsletter with their tempting low cost flights, in mail form and to my e-mail box, and it probably won't belong before I'm off there again.
So check the website for the latest prices, and get yourself over there now for the spectacular and colourful fall and have a great trip.
More details
Class flown most frequently
Economy
How often do you travel with this airline
First time
Where did you book
Online Travel Agent
Safety
Very safe
How well does it cater for disabled people
Very well
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