Hey everybody and welcome to my FR! This time, I'll be reporting flight AZU2470 between Porto Alegre and Guarulhos.
NEXT FRs:
AZU2470 POA-GRU - E195 (YOU ARE HERE)
ONE6178 GRU-PFB - A318 (COMING SOON)
AZU2754 POA-GEL - AT76 (COMING SOON)
In the beggining of this year, I read on the internet that Avianca Brasil was ending its operations in Passo Fundo, a city in northwestern Rio Grande do Sul state. As this flight was operated by the A318 and I had never flown on the BabyBus, I thought that being on the last one would be nice, either because of the aircraft, but also because of the important but sad happening to the city.
Anyway, on this trip I would go from Porto Alegre to Guarulhos with Azul, and then from GRU to Passo Fundo on the A318. After that, I would photograph Avianca's last take-off from PFB and then I would go back to Porto Alegre by bus on a 4-hour roadtrip. And if necessary, I'd do even crazier trips! :D
I bought the tickets directly on the airlines' websites. Azul has updated its website, along with Avianca.
The ticket to GRU was bought with TudoAzul points; the ticket to Passo Fundo was bought only with money. I have an account in Programa Amigo, but I don't have as many points as I have in TudoAzul.
The prices were:
POA-GRU by Azul - 5000 TudoAzul points + BRL49,90/USD15,77 in taxes.
GRU-PFB by Avianca Brasil - BRL199,00/USD62,90 + BRL28,63/USD9,06 in taxes. Total: BRL227,63/USD72,04.
Passo Fundo-Porto Alegre by UneSul bus - BRL78,65/USD24,87.
Total: 5000 TudoAzul points+BRL356,18/USD112,63 by March 11.
I made the check-in by Azul's app, which was good, as always.
I arrived at the airport early. Saturday is the calmest day at POA, so it was not that crowded. But it's important to say that only Azul operates on POA's Terminal 2; as their operations are growing day by day, the airside is getting more and more crowded, mainly on the rush hour. The check-in counters, though, never have many people.
As I said on my last FR, Porto Alegre is a focus city for Azul. So POA has flights to smaller cities as Uruguaiana, Pelotas and Santa Maria, feeding flights to Campinas (Azul's main hub), Guarulhos, Rio and other cities.
By the way, Azul started operations in Guarulhos in 2013, when they merged with TRIP Linhas Aéreas, then South America's biggest regional airline. Flights between GRU and POA started in April 27, 2013 with three daily operations. By 2014 the operations got to 40 weekly, but due to the huge crisis that fell over Brazil, now AD operates about 21 flights per week.
Our flight was the third operated by Azul on that day - the first would go to Campinas, operated by the A320neo, and the other to Rio.
Later they called our flight.
I would fly on the Embraer 195 PR-AYK, named "Diamante Azul" (Blue Diamond). That was amazing, because I flew on it almost exactly five years before, when I was invited to visit Azulville, Azul's headquarters. Very nostalgic :D
On our side, PR-AYC, named "A Liberdade é Azul" (Liberty is Blue).
Stairway to heaven :)
The flight attendant greeted me. I was given Azul's headphones and also asked for some water - she promptly gave me a cup.
Our flight was almost full - 107 of the 118 seats were occupied, which means 90,7% of them.
Near us, A320neo PR-YRA "Vida Azul" (Blue Life) leaving delayed to Campinas. YRA was AD's first neo. The weather was foggy, but this wasn't the reason for the delay, I think.
Later we started our pushback.
At 06:44AM, twelve minutes delayed, we took-off.
The sky over the clouds was beautiful!
Flight map via the LiveTV just after taking-off.
Soon flight attendants Tássia, Carina and Jonathan prepared to serve us snacks and drinks. Drink options were the common ones: Coke, Guaraná, Coke Zero, water and juice.
Snacks were orange cake, nuts, jelly beans and also goiabinha, a snack filled with guava.
Now Azul started to put some different things in the napkins. Promoting Azul Cargo Express, the airline or wishing the passenger a good flight. This one showed the airline's last advertising campaign, "Sua alegria faz a gente voar" (Your joy makes us fly).
Love these snacks!
In morning flights, Azul serves coffee. It's always awesome, maybe because I'm the biggest coffee fan in the world, haha!
I wasn't in the mood for watching Live TV, so I saw the flight map for the whole flight. But I can state and assure that Azul puts a lot of channels in the flights. There are good options for everybody. And if you wanna listen to Brazilian musics, just put in Rádio Azul and enjoy. By the way, I think the screens are smaller than the ones you're used to see in Avianca's A320neo - of course, cos' they're the same since 2008. The A320neo has larger screens but still doesn't have LiveTV available.
By the way, AzulMagazine talked about Buenos Aires, Azul's newest destination at that time. They started with one flight between Belo Horizonte and BsAs and increased it to twice a day, both with the E195. I heard that soon some of these will be operated by the A320neo! AzulMagazine is quite full of content, but I never pay too much attention to it - personnaly, I prefer reading the part which talks about the airline.
In some minutes we were descending.
Huge São Paulo city
Guarulhos was also foggy. This messed up the photos I took later, but that's alright!
At 08:01PM we landed, totalizing one hour and seventeen minutes of fun.
An overview of the aircraft interior.
The leather seats are very comfortable! Also, space is pretty good.
I asked FAs Carina and Tássia to take a photo of them, which they promptly agreed. FAs in Brazil, mainly those who fly for Azul, are mostly polite and funny, and in this flight it wasn't different.
Bye bye Diamante Azul! It was very nice flying with you five years older.
My flight to Passo Fundo was just at noon, so I had some time to outside the airport for catching some aircrafts coming from the USA, which arrive in the morning. Unfortunately the weather spoiled the photos, but it's better than nothing!
Yes, I know the photos are terrible: after all, I didn't edit the photos very well :P
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Stay tuned, cos' later I will post the flight report between Guarulhos and Passo Fundo.
