Hello everyone and welcome to the third part of this series covering my recent family trip to Portugal. This part will cover the first flight of the return trip which is flight AF1225 from Lisbon to Paris CDG before connecting to flight AF1062 to Stockholm ARN.
Background:
My family usually travels somewhere outside of Sweden during the summer months. We had nothing planned for Summer 2016 but my mom repeatedly told me she had to go somewhere outside of Sweden. Finally things materialized and we booked a trip to Portugal from July 12 to July 19. The fares and timings weren't excellent as we were late to the booking party but my family would get away from Sweden and that was what mattered for my family. Air France was the cheapest option for flights from Stockholm to Lisbon around these dates, Air France had to be choice. We stayed in Lisbon and Algarve for a few days each before going back to Stockholm via CDG. This was my first trip with Air France, three out of four flights were scheduled to be operated by A320s with the last one by an A321.
NOTE: Pictures used in these report were taken with my phone and camera
Part 1 - ARN-CDG AF1263, Air France, Airbus A320-200, F-GKXR - Here!
Part 2 - CDG-LIS AF1124, Air France, Airbus A320-200, F-GKXV - Here!
Part 3 - LIS-CDG AF1225, Air France, Airbus A320-200, F-GKXT - You are here
Part 4 - CDG-ARN AF1062, Air France, Airbus A321-200, F-GTAT - Here!
Every holiday getaway comes to an end one day and it was time for ours to end, it was time to return to Stockholm after a pleasant stay in Portugal. Our first flight back to Paris CDG was scheduled to depart from Lisbon at 10:50 AM local time. My dad thought about leaving our hotel at 08:20 AM was a reasonable time for our 10:50 flight. I woke up at 06:30 AM, showered and went to have some breakfast. The rest of the family didn't have anything in the hotel, they told me they hadn't got any apetite at this time of the day. I don't have any issues with eating in the morning so I went down to have my breakfast at 07:05 AM. I later went back to my room to do some final checks before finally heading down to the reception to check-out.
We grabbed a random cab on the street at 08:20 AM local time, an old Mercedes-Benz C-Class would take us to Aeroporto de Lisboa today.
Driving to Terminal 1 at Lisbon International Airport. Our driver was very friendly and chatted a lot with my dad.
We made it to the airport in 15 minutes, arriving at 08:35 AM local time.
Landside.
I went to a check-in kiosk in order to issue spare BPs for our flights to Paris CDG and then to Stockholm ARN.
The rest of my family decided to have some breakfast before going through security, I was full from the breakfast earlier in the morning and just walked around to kill some time.
We then went to security after my family was done with breakfast, boarding passes were checked with these machines before heading to security, I checked if my mobile BP would work and it did.
Security. It took us roughly 10 minutes to clear security.
Our gate hadn't been assigned yet, it would be shown at 09:35 AM local time according to this FIDS.
Your usual duty-free stores after clearing security.
We still had no clue where to go after clearing security as our gate hadn't been assigned yet.
The gate for flight AF1225 to Paris CDG came up as gate 16 a little bit later on, I walked to the gate while my family said they'd come to gate 16 later on.
I had a lot of issues connecting to LIS' free Wi-Fi, I was finally connected a few minutes before boarding commenced…
Walking to gate 16.
TAP A320.
Wide-bodies resting in the distance.
TAP A319.
The gate area was sparsely filled, it didn't look like we were going to have a full flight today. A breeze for me if true.
My ride to Paris. An A320 delivered to Air France in May 2009.
Flight information:
Airline: Air France
Flight no & route: AF1225 LIS-CDG
Aircraft type and registration: Airbus A320 F-GKXT
Scheduled time of departure (actual): 10:50 AM (11:04 AM) UTC +1
Scheduled time of arrival (actual) : 14:20 (13:56), 2:20 PM (1:56 PM) UTC +2
Scheduled flight time (actual): 2h 30 min (1h 52 min)
Boarding was scheduled to begin at 10:20 AM, 30 minutes before departure. The gate area was still pretty empty at 10:16 AM local time.
Boarding commenced precisely at 10:20 AM, kudos to AF for being able to begin the boarding process on-time this time around. This is a thing I rarely experience on most of my flights. Priorities were respected as usual.
Walking to the jetbridge.
This A320 featured the older cabin once again, no complaints as the cabin is pretty comfortable from previous experience.
Window view from seat 16F.
Good seat pitch, I apologize for having my camera bag on the picture.
Overhead bins.
The smaller seat pocket for the safety card is seen on this picture.
There were a good amount of empty seats, load factor was around 65% on this flight today.
Pushback taking place at 10:48 AM local time.
TAP Express AT76.
Taxiing to the active runway for departures which turned out to be runway 03 today.
DT 77W, TP 332 and TP 319.
YU 763.
S4 310s.
6O (Orbest) 333 and AD 332.
AA B752 heading out to Philadelphia.
TP 332 lining up for a flight to Miami.
Martin1405 tracked my flight once again, thank you very much! All FR24 screenshots are provided by him.
Lined up and ready to go.
Climbing out, we took off from LIS at 11:04 AM local time.
Leaving Lisbon.
The safety card of this A320.
Air France's inflight magazine.
This aircraft was delivered to Air France in 2009 and features in-seat ashtrays but smoking has been forbidden in AF aircraft since 2000, why does it have in-seat ashtrays then? Apparently AF added ashtrays to their seats even after 2000 just to have a safe place for passengers to extinguish their cigarettes in case anyone lighted one. (All information about this provided by Marathon. thanks to him!). I had no clue about this.
One side of the adjustable headrest.
Charging my phone with my powerbank as usual.
Service was made 50 minutes after departure and consisted of a small Portuguese tart followed with a drink service. Catering was done by Cateringpor in LIS. This was definitely a disappointment, the flight is scheduled at 2h 30 min and all they hand out is a tiny Portuguese tart? The CDG-ARN flight is also scheduled at 2h 30 min but gets a much better offering. I wouldn't have complained if this flight was scheduled at 1h or 1,5h. Anyway, the Portuguese tart was pretty decent. I went with OJ and coffee as always. The crew on this flight was pretty standard, they did their job efficiently and that was about it.
Lavatory.
Window view from the last row.
The load wasn't very high today, there were a few empty rows including this last one.
I wasn't too happy with the offering on this flight so I went back to the galley 30 min before landing and asked the FAs if they had any more snacks to offer, one FA handed me some French snacks and I walked back to my seat.
Descending into Aéroport de Paris-Charles-de-Gaulle.
Bienvenue à Paris!
We would land on runway 09L today.
Welcome to CDG.
Slowing down on runway 09L at 13:56 local time (1:56 PM).
Taxiing to terminal 2F.
Middle East Airlines A332.
Air France A321.
Luxair Q400.
Air France A343.
Air Mauritius A343.
KLM B738.
We came to a final stop at 14:05 local time (2:05 PM)
Disembarking by 14:14 local time (2:14 PM).
We had a connection of 1h 40 min before our flight to Stockholm was scheduled to depart. Thank you for taking your time to read this FR, have a good one and see you later :).
Nice report buddy! Great pictures to go alongside, too.
Looks like a fairly industry standard offering from Air France, however I will express my surprise in such a small catering amount too. Maybe a sandwich would've sufficed.
The A340-300 engines look smaller than they already are ;)
Looking forward to more!
Cheers.
Thank you for your very nice comment :).
A sandwich would've indeed been nice, got one on the inbound leg. It's interesting how small the catering offering is on this flight compared to the CDG-ARN flight even though both are scheduled at 2h 30 min.
Hahaha.
Thank you so much, I appreciate the positivity!
Have a good one and see you later!
AF's older seats are indeed more comfortable.
I see nothing wrong in the camera bag being in the seat pitch picture - it shows how much space is left for the legs with an actual hand luggage.
Nice plane spotting while taxiing ! The Angola Airlines 77W parked in the distance is noteworthy in that Portugal is the only European country served by this airline.
Nice shots of the SATA A320 - I find the livery very attractive
There are ashtrays in aircraft built long after all flights became non-smoking (roughly in Year 2000). The purpose is apparently to have a safe place to extinguish a cigarette in the unlikely case a passenger lights one.
I had exactly the same catering last year - 70g total weight vs. 20g of cookies for a French domestic flight, and indeed more on the ARN route.
Nice views of Paris ! Many buildings and places are easily recognizable.
Thanks for sharing this good report !
Thank you very much for your nice comment :).
"I see nothing wrong in the camera bag being in the seat pitch picture - it shows how much space is left for the legs with an actual hand luggage."
- I guess you have a point and thanks for making me feel better about it!
Thank you so much, I'm glad you liked the shots! That's true, OPO and LIS are the only destinations served by D2. It was definitely nice catching it :).
Thank you! I have to agree with you on that.
Thank you so much for the information, I appreciate it a lot :). I have added the information to the report with reference to you.
Thank you, I appreciate it :).
Have a good one and see you later!
Thank you for your great FR! :)
"I apologize for having my camera bag on the picture."
- There's nothing to apologize. Don't worry about it!
Great spotting while taxiing!! Love your spotting pics!
No problem for tracking your flight! It was a pleasure!
Catering by Cateringpor is really disappointing in comparison to you ARN-CDG flight. I wish you had more than a tiny Portuguese tart. At least you got more snack after asking the FAs.
Seat pitch seems pretty good and I am glad you still liked the Cabin.
Thanks again! See you!
Thank you for your very nice comment :).
Thank you so much for your feedback! Appreciated.
Thanks!
Yep, catering on the ARN flight is definitely more extensive satisfying than the catering on the LIS flights despite both having similar flight times.
The older cabin is pretty comfortable!
Thanks for stopping by, have a good one and see you later!
Thanks for sharing this FR with us!
LIS is a really convenient airport to access and is really quick to get to from any part of town. Why did they eat before security? Isn’t there a lot more places inside the terminal?
Great spotting at LIS, they always have an interesting mix of heavies there since they get a lot of charter airlines and some African carriers.
“why does it have in-seat ashtrays then?”
For what Marathon said, as well as the fact that these seats were taken from other aircraft and reused in the newer plane.
The tart is pretty light for catering standards, but at least the FAs were nice enough to give you more snacks from the galley when you asked for food. I wonder why they even had them back there.
Overall a pretty good flight on AF, the old cabin doesn't look that bad. It looks more comfortable than the LH ironing boards!
Thank you for your very nice comment :).
It definitely is, agreed! I have absolutely no idea and never thought about it, there probable were more cafés/restaurants after security haha.
Thank you very much, glad you liked them :).
Did not know that, thank you for that information!
That is true, good point. I have absolutely no idea why but those other snacks must have been loaded in CDG as they were French.
The old cabin is indeed pretty nice. Thank you for stopping by, have a good one!