AC 868 YYZ - LHR in the Economic Downturn

Morning Flight

Most flights across the Atlantic to London leave in the evening, and arrive in Europe by morning. I didn't want to do another red-eye flight, and wanted to arrive in London in one piece, walk a bit, then rest for the night. This usually gets rid of my jet lag pretty quickly. So I picked Air Canada's morning flight out of Toronto at around 9am.

Having been spoiled by the luxuries of Asian travel, it has been a while since I met such incompetence at check-in. The international counters were open, but the actual check-in had to take place at self-serve machines. With a boarding pass on hand, I would then had to line up to drop off my baggage at the counter. To make things worse, everyone had to weigh their baggage at the end of the line before where there was only one scale. So a line quickly formed and extended around the quiet terminal. There were scales at the check-in counter, by the way.















After a needlessly long check-in process, I was ready to go and spot some planes. Terminal 1 is the main Air Canada hub, so I didn't expect to see many other types of airlines besides AC - Terminal 3 should offer more opportunities for those.











It was a long walk to the departure gate.







































Quick Boarding - I checked the schedules beforehand, and found out it was going to be a 767 flight. Normally, this jet should seat some 200 people. But the loading was so light, the flight opened to everyone in no order.













We taxied not too far away and took off towards the north, then made a quick turn east to cross Toronto. I purposely chose a right-side window seat hoping we would take off towards the east so I can capture the skyline.











Notice downtown and CN Tower in the distance?



















North York Centre



















































Montreal!





















Breakfast is served ...

The pancakes with fruit sauce was actually quite good. The portions were filling. North American meals tend to be larger than on the Asian carriers.

























Confederation Bridge





















St Pierre & Miquelon



















St. John's, Newfoundland















Transatlantic Crossing Begins

With St. John's behind me, we begin the Atlantic crossing towards Europe. With only about 1/3 loading, I wandered around the plane's two sides some more, and then took a break.











Another snack arrived before landing. The bread and cookie were nothing too special, but the pasta salad was quite delicious. I saved the cloth covering as well. It would make a good placemat one day.





























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We're nearing London!









I was hoping we'd land from the east and loop around the city. With sunset approaching, I could barely squeeze in some city aerials. However, we landed from the west, and descended through the countryside.























The sun had set in London. I wasn't in a hurry to go anywhere, and I didn't expect the luggage to come out so quickly, so I took my time exploring the cabin and taking pictures of this renovated old 767 with mood lighting.

















Service Summary

Although each seat has its own PTV, the selection of movies and TV programming was mediocre. While there was a lot of 'Canadiana' content, it lacked Hollywood movies and overseas programming. At least the air show was working.

I noticed a USB port next to the PTV. With so little entertainment, it was good to have a place to hook up my media player.

Flight attendants were very experienced, and did their work as they were required to do so. Smiles were not always there, but the lead FA was very nice when approached. She was pro-active in giving us more snacks at the beginning of the flight given the low loading.

There were only about 60 passengers on this flight. We pretty much had rows of empty seats in Y class to roam about. I thought I saw only 2 people in J class ... I picked the right not-so-popular morning flight.

Full Report : http://www.globalphotos.org/yyz-lhr.htm