Introduction: Spending The Night With A Virgin
Virgin Atlantic 787 Upper Class Hong Kong to London
Virgin Atlantic Revivals Lounge London Heathrow
Conrad London St. James Grand Deluxe Room
Virgin Atlantic 787 Economy Class London to Hong Kong

This trip report will be a short one, as it essentially consisted of university hopping around London for a couple of days (in a slightly more luxurious fashion but you’d expect, but…).

(And no, if you’ve stumbled upon this travel blog for the first time, this isn’t a “young traveler gets laid in obscure country” story. I’ll justify the naming of the report in the next installment.)

As longtime readers will know I’m not far away from my university applications, and while I’m still deciding between universities, I’m pretty much dead set on the UK. So this year I decided to make the trip to London to explore a few of these universities, and my dad decided to join me. (For non-longtime readers, my dad loves to fly direct, and both of us had meetings we had to attend on both sides that required us to fly direct, so…).

One of the universities I’m looking at is UCL, which I visited on this trip

Continue reading “Introduction: Spending The Night With A Virgin” →

The first fully flat bed I’d ever sat in as a child was one of a Cathay Pacific 747. I thought it was really cool how I could change the seat into a bed at the touch of a button, and I loved the sense of privacy that the seat had as a 4”5’ lad. I remember not understanding why my mother hated the seat, since I wasn’t prone to claustrophobia and didn’t have to take care of my sister. But I’m a growing boy, and unfortunately herringbone seats haven’t grown nearly as fast as I have.

On Saturday I had the chance to try a herringbone seat for the first time in seven years when flying Upper Class between Hong Kong and London. In the meantime, as a premium travel analyst, obviously I’ve been on the lookout for different reports on herringbone seats, as well as their correspondent nicknames – coffin class, prison, etc.. Prior to this flight, the herringbone seat was one of two major business class configurations that I’d yet to try, the other being the Apex Suite. I wanted to see if I liked the product, and where it stacked up against the rest of the configurations I’ve flown in the past.

Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787 Upper Class Seats

I figured I’d break down some of my thoughts on herringbone seats based on my experience in Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class “suite” (if you can even call it that). While my thoughts of the seat are mostly negative (as expected), it did pleasantly surprise me in a couple of ways.

Continue reading “What Are Herringbone Seats Like?” →

Hello from London! I just had the chance to try Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class product from Hong Kong to London. While I’ve flown the route countless times, this was my first time flying Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class. I’ve flown the route in economy before, as well as in premium economy, so I’m more or less familiar with the aircraft.

Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class intrigued me because of how highly esteemed the product is. I visited the airline’s Clubhouse lounge at London Heathrow last year, which was spectacular – it easily bagged the number one spot in my five favourite business class hub lounges. However, I was convinced that the herringbone seat would bring down the comfort factor of the Virgin Atlantic experience, and predicted that it would be an underwhelming experience.

I’m pretty good with predicting how airline experiences will turn out. As a student I plan my travels far in advance, so I have a lot of time to read into the products that I book. However, as usual, there were things about the Upper Class experience that I was pleasantly surprised by, and others that I didn’t quite like. While a full review will come within the next week, I figured I’d write about my first impressions, as I usually do after experiencing a new product.

Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787 Upper Class

Continue reading “What Is Virgin Atlantic’s 787 Upper Class Like?” →