Review of Tunisair flight from London to Tunis in Economy

Between getting to London and then having to be in Italy there were a few weeks to travel around. After spending quite a while trying to work out a trip to Morocco it became clear that wouldn't work. The morning after figuring that out I checked London to Tunis flights, not really seriously looking to go there, but fares were quite reasonable and from Tunis to Italy or Malta was also decent. Aligning the dates and everything meant having to fly out of London on the 18th, which was a bit more expensive than the 19th but had better timings and worked better with Malta.
Nouvelair Tunisie also flies on this route but they weren't substantially cheaper and I wanted to fly Tunisair.
This flight was booked for around $130 on booking.com, +$43 for a checked bag. Total was around $20 cheaper than on the Tunisair website.

Somehow I'd never flown through Gatwick before, usually Heathrow and then a couple of times City and once Lutton.
It look longer than I expected to get up to the check-in area and it was getting a bit late by then. I think most people had already gone through so there was no line.

They were extremely strict about carry-on weight, and not too friendly about it either. 
Security didn't take too long luckily, since everything stayed in the bag and liquids were allowed (though they did have to take a couple of minutes to test bottles with liquids in them). No outbound immigration in the UK so from there it was straight to the gate.
After the duty free area the airport wasn't very nice, a bit dark and nothing to see or anything.
At the gate, documents were checked and then everyone was sent into a small waiting area. The screen had said boarding started but everyone was just waiting. The airport free wi-fi didn't work.

Boarding started with rows 20-27, then a couple of minutes later everyone could board. It was quite slow: people were just standing in the doorway area and the line was basically not moving 

It took a while just to get onto the jetbridge.

And here's our plane, الجمهورية (El Joumhouria, "the republic") or TS-IMZ, one of Tunisair's newer A320neos at 2.9 years old.

A look at the business class seats.

And economy.

Here's my seat.

There were two sets of two USB-A charging ports for each row of seats.

And lights and vents.

There wasn't a headrest, though. Fairly standard seat. Most reviews of Tunisair mentioned that the planes were extremely dirty but this one seemed to have fairly average cleanliness.
The seatback pocket had a lot of things in it: a Tunisair magazine, shopping magazine, shopping deals card, sickness bag and safety card.

The magazine included what looks like a slightly incorrect route map.

While Gatwick may not have the diversity of airlines that Heathrow has, there were some interesting planes, such as a Kenya Airways 787 (and less interestingly, a TUI one as well).

And I  something which I'm not sure I've ever seen before, an Air Peace 777 which was just pushing back on its way to Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos.

We pushed back while people were still getting seated and had a very, very fast safety announcement, letting us be pretty much on time, although Tunisair does often struggle with punctuality.

Tunisair's streaming entertainment didn't work, there was a wi-fi network to connect to and access the entertainment, but it didn't connect.
The meal service began soon afterwards. While Tunsair impressively offers a full meal service on these flights, what's less impressive is that they don't have special meals. There's no mention of them on their website, no way to select one after booking, and calling them didn't help either so since I'm vegetarian I wasn't able to get a meal for myself.
For everyone else, there was only one option but it looked like decent quality and is so much better than anything European airlines offer. The flight attendent serving the meals said that vegetarian meals needed to be pre-ordered, but there was no way to do that! He asked if I wanted any of the sides, but even like the salad looked like it had meat on it.

The flight attendent who came with drinks a few minutes later seemed quite sad that I couldn't eat anything (I was too!) and again offered some of the sides. He spoke French and didn't seem to really know English. Interestingly enough on a flight from the UK, only one of them seemed to be fluent in English.
I got pineapple juice.

A little while later the crew served tea and coffee. It took some time to clear the trays. When they did that, the cart had a bottle of water and some cups but they didn't offer anyone water, at least not in my row. Still, having a full meal and multiple beverage services was quite a good offering.
Some time into the flight I looked out and happened to see the Alps right next to us.

Cabin view on the way to the bathroom.

Inside was generally clean, though the sink was stained brown. There are also weren't any paper towels, just toilet paper.
I asked the crew about the entertainment, in broken English one of them said that it didn't work on this plane and yes, it's the same issue on all their flights.
I may have understood better if he explained in French but I'm not confident with speaking French so it took me until I got back to the seat to figure out how to word the question 😅
I've seen recent reviews with entertainment, including on this exact flight from last year, so I'm not sure how widespread the issue is. The plane still had stickers for instructions for how to use the entertainment as well and the wi-fi network did show up, it just didn't connect.

There were great views, though!

I saw a few planes in the air.

And lots of interesting islands.

And then, Tunisia.

And the city of Tunis itself.

The pre-landing safety announcement (put your seats upright, etc) was just a couple of minutes before landing and the crew didn't do a check of the cabin.

Passing an Iraqi Airways 737-8 during the landing.

Tunisair A330, Nouvelair Tunisie A320 and one of Emirates' new A350s.

The main terminal of "Aeroport Tunis Carthage."

A large fleet of parked Tunisair aircraft, probably equal to their active fleet.

We turned, heading back toward the terminal and passing a Libyan Airlines A320 coming in from Tripoli-Mitiga. That's not something you see everyday!

And a bit further away, the more ordinary Royal Jordanian.

Tunisair A330

And A319.

Qatar and Nouvelair at the terminal with the Emirates A350 moving out.

We parked at a remote stand next to the A319 and many people jumped up immediately while the seatbelt sign was on.

As another A320neo went by, deplaning began.

And from the way out, here are the economy seats.

And business.

The good thing about the remote stand was that there were great views of the plane, which I didn't get in London.

It was a short bus trip to the terminal, which wasn't the fanciest, but at least immigration was quite efficient. On the way into the terminal I saw one of Tunisair's A320s in an Olympics special livery.

The arrivals area was very plain design wise.

 It took around 10 minutes after immigration for bags to start arriving.

I was surprised at how many flights there were coming in from Libya, not even including the Libyan Airlines plane I saw.

The departures area, at least what I saw from downstairs in arrivals, looked much nicer.

Outside of the airport as well.

I'll end this one here. Thanks for reading.