London and Toronto on BA's 77W and 787 Dreamliner

[yflyer]

I recently travelled to London and Toronto. I took the opportunity to fly BA, on their 777-300ER (i.e. 77W) from SIN-LHR, then their 787 Dreamliner on their new LHR-YYZ service.

Both these flights had BA's newest cabin products, but they were not identical, though, with the 787 J cabin even further improved from the 77W in several subtle, and not-so-subtle ways.

I was booked in premium Y on both flights, but was upgraded to J on both sectors. A trip to remember indeed!

I was tempted to just do the TR on the 787 leg, as this would probably be of most interest, but then I figured most folks would also be interested in checking out the BA 77W from SIN-LHR, especially since the new SQ 77W will be launched soon. And also since flying on QF's superb A380's from SIN-LHR is longer an option.

A lot of photos to be posted, so it may take a few days before I get to the 787...

[yflyer]

My outbound flight was SIN-LHR on BA16 scheduled for an 11.05pm departure.

I arrived at Changi Airport T1 fairly early, on a cool, clear evening.



When I checked in, I noticed that the premium Y seat I had been assigned on my boarding pass was not the one I had selected online. I had selected the first row emergency aisle seat, but was given another premium Y seat further back. When I asked (politely) why this was so, the reply was "operational reasons". I smiled and thanked the lady at the counter. No further questions from me...on QF/BA in the past, when they shift seats like this, usually something good happens...



And true enough, when I got to the BA Lounge in T1, the lounge receptionist scanned my pass, and issued me a new one in J. Why does this happen to me so much more often on QF and BA than on SQ?

This was my first time in the BA Lounge in T1.

It is a spacious and fairly new lounge, though obviously not as large, nor as luxuriously appointed, as SQ's.



There was a reasonable selection of both cold and hot food and beverages. Again not the lavish spread you see in SQ's lounge in Singapore, but better than many other lounges outside Singapore.











I quite liked their coffee machine, although it was too late in the day for me to make myself a cup.



There were some nice touches to the food service, including ice cream...



...and freshly prepared small plates offered up by the lounge staff.

[yflyer]

There was a smallish work area.



There were also showers, although I did not use them.



Close to departure time, I strolled to the gate, which was fairly close by. They had a special lane for F / J and premium pax to clear security and enter the holding area.

[yflyer]

Boarding started on time, and I was one of the first to board, iPhone in hand, where I snapped a few pics of First Class.







Not the widest F seats I have seen, but a very elegant and tasteful design, with a unique window design. I have never flown in SQ's current (soon to be old...) 77W F but I found the look of BA's F cabin far superior to current SQ 77W F, which is a wholly uninspired design in terms of hard product. I hope SQ's new 77W will change things for the better in F.

[yflyer]

Walking quickly through, I settled into my seat in Club World.



BA Club World on their 77W is laid out in a unique 2-4-2 layout with fully flat seats alternately facing forward and backward. The two middle seats are paired and face the same direction (i.e. backwards). No other airline does this, and the seats are not that wide, but in practice this layout seems to work quite well. I was in the middle seat, facing backwards, but it did not feel claustrophobic at all.



The seat had a footrest that could be stowed when not needed. With the footrest of the adjacent seats lowered, you had to climb over them to reach the aisle, but as the foot rest was not overly wide, this was possible without waking the pax in the adjacent seat, and also did not require too large a stretch.



The aisle seat on my left faced forwards, and if the privacy screen was down, you could see and converse with your seatmate by the aisle. However, with the translucent privacy screen raised, you had a good amount of privacy on that side.

There was no screen separating the two backward facing middle seats.



The foot rest folds out flat, to become part of the flat bed, or can also be adjusted to an angle to support your legs if you partially recline your seat.

[yflyer]

Overall cabin ambience in the Club World cabin was good, with some nice cosmetic touches that were unique to BA, such as the lighting and the BA logo and panel at the front of the cabin (Maybe that is there to help J pax determine which direction the front of the plane is...).







Although the 2-4-2 seating and the high partitions make the overall J cabin look a little "office cubicle"-like in the photo, in practice when you are sitting down at your seat, it does not feel claustrophobic, and you do have sufficient personal space.

[yflyer]

Let's now take a tour of the seat and amenities...

You get a crisp white pillow and a thick blanket at each seat.



The translucent privacy filter is motorised, just a press of a button and it goes up and down.



There is an adjustable (both direction and brightness) reading light mounted high on the partition, which I found more usable and less gimmicky than the SQ J reading light.



Seat controls are intuitive, and allows you to both raise and recline the seat across all possible positions, including fully flat, angled, takeoff/landing and an improbable fully upright setting (ramrod straight up)...

[yflyer]

The seat also had a handy drawer near ground level (near the A/C power) to stow books and a computer/ipad. Very useful, although the drawer was too small to hold a 15" MacBook.



Noise-cancelling headphones...


A very nice amenity kit in a sleek navy blue bag.

[yflyer]

The menu...









With a separate wine list...

[yflyer]

A fairly short wine list, but the wines I had were very good....the BA sommelier knows a thing or two about selecting ideal wines for consumption at 35,000 feet.

I started with the French Viognier / Chardonnay, which was excellent...

[yflyer]

The inevitable nut pic...



Deserves a post on its own

[yflyer]

For my starter, I ordered the mozzarella.



Dinner was served on trays, with the tablecloth not set on the fold-out table, but on the tray itself. This was probably necessitated by the seat layout, where the inner seats are not that easily accessible by the cabin crew, so they just hand you the tray after lowering the privacy screen.

In fact, this was one quirk (and minor disadvantage) of the backwards-forwards layout. Each time the cabin crew served you something or took your order, they had to press a button to lower the privacy screen, pass you the food / drink / tray, then raise the screen again. They also had to pass the tray/item in front of the other pax sitting in the aisle seat as well, interrupting his/her dinner for a few seconds.

The starter, and accompanying salad were very good. There was also a selection of bread which you could choose from a bread basket.



My seatmate had the shrimp and crab salad.



For my main course, I had the fillet steak with green peppercorns. I tend to order the beef main if one is available, mainly because I see steak as one of the most difficult dishes to prepare well inflight, and I am always curious to see if an airline has been able to get it right (SQ have got it right more than once. So has Qantas.).

British Airways main courses are served from a pre-plated casserole (i.e. not individually plated). The quality of the ingredients was good, but the casserole was fairly small, not much larger than a Y casserole, and everything was reheated to a uniform temperature.



Steak was cooked well done (my preference is medium rare, which is probably impossible to do inflight). The vegetables were soft and mushy, as you would expect them to be if they were heated together with the steak in a casserole.



Although the fillet steak tasted quite good, overall the main course was less impressive than the J main courses on SQ, which are individually plated and more substantial. I found QF's J class main courses better than BA's as well.

There was a good selection of cheese (better than SQ's low-brow cheese selection), and dessert was delicious too.







Overall impressions of the meal service: Starter, cheese and dessert were superb, as was the wine. However, the main course, while tasty, was small and not individually plated, and not a match for SQ J. Overall, I thought the catering was good, rather than great.

[yflyer]

It was then time to rest.

The seat reclines to a fully flat bed, which was quite comfortable to sleep in.

[yflyer]

Prior to landing, I awoke for breakfast, feeling very refreshed.

I was offered a choice of either fruit or birchen muesli. I opted for the muesli, which was delicious.



My "Classic British breakfast" main came on a smallish casserole.



Again, the quality of ingredients, and flavours, were good, but this really could not be compared to the J breakfasts on SQ.

[yflyer]

After breakfast, I took a stroll back to the back of the plane to check out Premium Y and Economy cabins.





The premium Y seats looked great, and a step up from the old premium Y seats that I tried previously on BA's 744. (I have a TR which covers Premium Y on BA's 744 here.)

Notice that PY is in 2-4-2 layout, which effectively means you get the same seatwidth in Premium Y as in J (although the J seats recline fully into long, full flat, beds).



The Y cabin looked very comfortable as well, in a convention 3-3-3 layout.



Seat recline in Y looked pretty good as well, although I did not actually try the seat.