On the plane .....

We had booked our flights to Manila several weeks ago and Marilyn had rung Singapore Airlines at that time to request seats with extra legroom. They took note and said they would see what they could do. On Monday, before I checked-in on-line, Marilyn rang them again to reinforce our message that a bulkhead seat would be nice, or even one near a door. Again, the man she spoke to was very helpful and said that we had been allocated seats with extra legroom on both the Melbourne to Singapore leg, and the Singapore to Manila.

I had downloaded the seat plan for the A380 and the seat numbers didn’t seem to fit, but we assumed that the plane we were flying on had a different configuration so thought no more about it. Imagine our chagrin (I’ve always wanted to say that!) when we boarded the big plane to find that we were, in fact, seated in the row in front of the extra legroom.

There were 4 middle-aged Australians traveling together in the row we would have preferred and they weren’t happy. There were no overhead lockers for that group so their carry-on bags were just shoved wherever a space could be found. Grudgingly, one of them said, “Well, at least we get a bit of extra legroom.” The other problem was that their seats had been set back to form a thoroughfare from one side of the plane to the other so people kept stepping over their legs to get to the toilet.

Marilyn, of course, is not one to let things lie, so had a quiet word to one of the stewards who found two spare seats in front of a bulkhead and was very happy for us to occupy them so all’s well that ends well. We did notice that the business class compartment was almost empty and it might have been nicer to have an upgrade but if they gave us one, everybody would expect the same consideration.

I should say a word about the flight. The A380 is certainly a big plane. The SAL model is configured to seat 417 passengers. Everybody gets a bit more room and there are a few bigger spaces to stand around in. They say that the A380 can fit in 800 seats but I can’t imagine what that would be like.

We were in the upper deck. We seemed to enter the plane at about the middle, moved to the rear and climbed up a rather nice curved staircase to our seats. I think Singapore is one of the better airlines and the service and food this time was certainly up to their usual standard. Marilyn had decided we should request the healthy choice meal and that translated into gluten-free. That was OK but it meant we had rice cakes instead of bread rolls, and fresh fruit instead of lemon layer cake for dessert. Oh well, it’s for the better in the long run.

I am writing this on the flight between Singapore and Manila which is almost empty. We have good seats and have just enjoyed the gluten-free meal – fish in a ginger sauce with fresh vegetables, served with rice cakes and fruit salad. Marilyn has also managed to acquire two Tiramisu icecreams which were served to the less healthy passengers and they were delicious.