Tweet
I took this flight during the March Break of 2008, from the 12-17 (Basically a week when most people get out of school and work and go down to Florida or other Sun destinations). The reason that my dad and I were going was because he did some consulting for them and they had a conference down in
We stayed in the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress, which was a wonderful hotel and flew on jetBlue.
*BTW I am mostly relying on what I wrote down for the flight information and it may not be exact.*
Buffalo-Orlando B6 320
Orlando-Buffalo B6 320
Routing: Buffalo-Orlando B6663/Seat 8A
Cruise: FL360
Aircraft: jetBlue A320 N659JB “Simply Blue”
Flight Duration: 2:34
Pushback/Rotation/Touchdown/Arrival: 15:41/15:48/18:22/18:36
January:
I looked around for fares and found that Air Canada from
. I had never I had never flown on jetBlue and I was quite excited, as I have heard some nice things about them. My dad however, is fine with Southwest as he doesn’t really care about very much service, as long as it gets him from point A to point B efficiently and for a little amount of money.
March 12:
So fast forward two months later. The flight was at 15:40 and
I woke up and packed my bag. I got all the stuff that was needed for the trip and basically got ready.
We left at around 11:30 for
Once that was done we crossed the border and as Canadians stopped at the first Tim Hortans that we saw. I usually get a medium sized drink, but in the
Well after that we proceeded directly to the airport. Once we got to the parking lot that had a sign saying that it was the only one with spaces, we found out after driving endlessly for 10 minutes that there were no spaces there. So we ended up going to the parking lot that is right in front of the terminal building.
Once we parked there, we got onto a bus and it took us to the departures level. Once we got to the terminal, an airport representative told us that if we were on jetBlue or Southwest we had to check in outside, so we stood in a ridiculously long line for about five minutes, before I noticed that the people at the jetBlue counter inside was empty, so we went in there and used one of the check in machines there.
Once we had checked in with the easy to use kiosk, we handed our bags over to a friendly agent at the desk. From there we proceeded to security.
The line for security was LONG, this is partially due to the fact that there was only three machines for scanning and the fact that it was march break.
It took us about 15-20 minutes to clear security and then we were off. Anyone who knows the Buffalo airport, it is basically a long narrow concourse and at the end buy the Continental and Southwest gates there is a spot that you can view planes on. This place is basically a glass promenade. I waited there for a bit and saw an A320 come in and knew that it was our plane as there was already an E-190 at the other jetBlue gate going to New York JFK.
When I got back to the gate, it was announced that since our plane arrived a bit late, we were going to be delayed a bit, so that they could clean the plane and re-stock it.
During the boarding process they were telling us that we had to buy the headphones for about $1 which I thought was odd, but didn’t mind as it is saving some waste, by making people bring their own re-usable things.
At about 15:30 we began boarding about 20 minute late. My dad and I were one of the last people to board as we were sitting close to the front.
.
Once we settled down the Captain told us the routing, the cruise that we were expecting and all the other things that they would usually tell you. Then the Flight attendants did the safety briefing while we were taxing to runway 23 for take off.
We proceeded onto the runway and since we were number one for takoff, we rocketed out of cold
Once we took off the Direct TV’s started to work and I checked it out.
The TV
I must say that though jetBlue’s idea is good, I think that Lufthansa and Air Canada’s PTV’s are a bit better as they have AVOD on them allowing you to view what you want and not what is on TV. I basically passed the time by watching the TV, looking at the in-flight map and looking out the window trying to figure out where we were.
A few minutes after we reached our cruise altitude the flight attendants came around with a meal service that included a whole can of a drink and a snack. Being on jetBlue I took a Coke and their signature Terra Blue Chips.
The Engine......With an interesting reflection
A320 wing
Another Wing Shot
Getting Closer to MCO
The food was pretty good and they came around with seconds for the passengers as they had a whole lot of extras.
Other then that it was a pretty smooth flight down to
We came over the SAV VOR and started our descent just to the east of
One funny thing happened while we were taxing. One of the FA’s came on the PA system and said “Welcome to the house of Mickey Mouse,….. now it comes to my attention that half of this plane isn’t wearing seatbelts. Our little indicator is telling me that. Now get those seatbelts fastened before I come back there.”
We exited off the runway on the first high-speed taxiway and then taxied up to the jetBlue airside. On our way I saw a Virgin Atlantic 747-400, that probably came in from London Gatwick an hour earlier and a whole lot of Delta wide bodies. There was a 764 and 2 763’s sitting there and a couple 752’s going to various places. There we only a few RJ’s and narrow bodied aircraft sitting at the Delta gates, but I am guessing that is because of the time that I came.
We taxied up to gate 103 and the captain turned off the seatbelt sign and most people started to leave. I stayed back a bit and visited the flight deck. The captain was standing there and he was surprised at what I knew about the flight deck of the A320. I quickly exited the plane and met up with my dad. I quickly took a picture of the planes registration as I didn’t get it in
The Plane we Took N659JB
We took the train to the baggage claim and got our bags. We then went to go pick up our rental car. Pretty funny actually, we arrived at the time when most people go down to
After laughing at that we quickly went to our hotel and then went for dinner at the hotel.
I won’t go into too much detail of
The fist day that we were there my dad had to do his presentation so I did stuff around the hotel. The next day we went to Universal and then the last two days we went to Kennedy’s Space Centre. This was at the time when the Space Shuttle was in Orbit, so there were some interesting things going on. We also went on an up close tour that took you within 100m of the launch pads, so that was pretty cool.
Here are some pictures of the Kennedy's Space Centre
CANADA!
We don't get these in Canada...
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Routing: Orlando-Buffalo/Seat 6F
Cruise: FL370
Aircraft: jetBlue A320 N588JB “Hopelessly Devoted to Blue”
Flight Duration: 2:23
Pushback/Rotation/Touchdown/Arrival: 12:15/12:31/14:54/15:01
So after a good few days in
We got up and packed up all our belongings before we left. Our flight was scheduled to leave at around 12:20, so we left at around 09:00. We got to the airport at around 09:30, but it took us about half an hour to get the rental car back, so it wasn’t until about 10:00 until we entered the queue for checking in.
Just like in
After that we went to the opening in the main terminal building that is before the security machines. We went and picked up some breakfast from there and then around 10:45 we headed towards the airside.
Security was pretty bad, considering it was when everyone was heading back home after March break and it took us about 30 minute to clear. Once we cleared it though, we headed out onto the tram to our gate.
We got onto the tram and it was a fairly short ride to the airside. Once we got near to the airside you could see the main dominater in the airside which was Southwest, jetBlue then Air Tran. That will probably change soon though if jetBlue moves airsides.
I did a little bit of spotting of jetBlue birds, Southwest birds and a few Air Tran birds. After a bit of watching those planes it got sort of boring. I guess you can only watch Southwest for so long.
A Long 757
Won't see too many of these anymore
I did see the Southwest “California One” bird which came in from somewhere our west and I spotted a few jetBlue E190’s going to Newark (KEWR) and Syracuse (KSYR). There was also an abundance of A320 heading to Boston (KBOS), New York Kennedy (KJFK) and LaGuardia (KLGA).
California On arriving
California One
I saw our plane coming in so I got some lunch and headed to our gate for boarding. Once again we were one of the last people to board the aircraft as we were sitting in the front of the plane.
Our Plane
EMBRAER, with a basketball hoop?
On this flight I found it quite odd that they gave us headsets for free, while in
We departed a bit early and made our way for departure off of runway 17R. We didn’t have to wait for much traffic as there was only a Spirit A319 taking off in front of us. After the departure we headed north towards
We followed to coast until the SAV VOR then we basically flew a similar route to the way down to
Interesting Weather
Closeup of the Winglet
On this flight then offered the same snacks and drinks as before. I got a Coke with the Tera Blue chips again; I also had a sandwich that I bought in
The flight was pretty quick, I passed my time looking at the inflight map and watching some TV. Soon enough the Captain came on the over head and announced our descent into
Almost There
It was sort of bumpy on the way down, but it cleared up when we passed 10’000 feet. We then made a quick approach to runway 05 at
I was going to go to the Flight Deck and get a picture, but they had closed the door and I didn’t want to hold them up as they were probably doing something important.
It took about 10 to 15 minutes for bags to start to come out, and another 5 for ours to come our. This is probably because
Once we got out, there was a huge line waiting for the bus to the parking lots. We waited about 30 minutes and we were still quite far from getting onto a bus, so we just decided to walk. About 10 minutes later we were on our way back home to
Overall I liked jetBlue, there service and product is quite enjoyable, I hope to fly them again and maybe try their Embraer 190, as the Embraer is a very comfortable aircraft.
Thanks Nehal
.
Lucky to see an AA A300
Comment