Review of El Al Israel Airlines flight from Tel Aviv to Budapest in Economy

Introduction

Hello and welcome for my flight report about my experience with Elal, from TLV to BUD.
The flight was operated by Boeing 737-800, which I'll write about later.
The flight was quite expensive, around 600$ (round trip) per person, but you should consider we booked a flight on Sukkot holiday and we also paid for preferred seats on both ways. Otherwise, the flight price could be cheaper by 110$ (USD).

TLV Airport - Terminal 3

We arrived to the airport 3 hours before the flight.
Since this was our first flight with our baby, we didn't check in in the self check in counters. We had to send a stroller and a baby car seat, so we let the ground crew handle it.

Since it was holiday time, the queues were pretty long, we also had to send the baby car seat in other place.
The whole process of sending the baggage took almost an hour.

We made our way to the hand baggage security check:

Since we flew with a baby, our biometric passports were useless, since families with babies need to wait for passport check with security officer. 
Both processes (hand baggage check and passport control) took 25 minutes.

Finally we made our way to the duty free area:

Some duty free shops, on our way to the lounge:

We decided to skip the duty free this time and stay in the lounge.

Dan Lounge

I already reviewed this lounge in the past.
This time we didn't pay for the entrance, and I wouldn't pay for entrance more than 30-40 ILS (10-13$ USD). 

The lounge:

View from the lounge - Elal newest Boeing 737-800 in the fleet, 4X-EKK:

The coffee machine in the lounge (there is one more coffee machine, but it's the same model):

The food:

As you can see, the food is pretty basic, some salads, olives, cheese, yogurt and on the other side of the bar you can find some cereals and cookies.

The lounge toilets:

As you can see, the toilets were clean and in good condition.


More spotting from the lounge - Electra airways A320, wet leased to Arkia:

In my opinion - it doesn't worth the official price.
It's a nice place to sit before the flight, but the food is pretty basic and nothing special.

After one hour in the lounge, we made our way to the gate.

Luckily, it was a jet bridge gate

This jet bridge got an upgrade some time ago, since in the past, D concourse jet bridges were without windows.

Our aircraft for today, Boeing 737-800:

Aircraft information:
Boeing 737-858(WL)
4X-EKA
Delivered to Elal in Ferbruary 1999, meaning it was 26 years old on our flight

Flight experience - TLV to BUD

Business class in the front:

The window view from our seat:

Overhead TV:

They used the overhead TV only for the safety video, which I found strange, since in my past flights with Elal, they used it for the flight map or for some TV shows and movies.

Spotting on our way to the runway.
Elal Boeing 787-9 (4X-EDD):

Sundor wet leased Boeing 737-800 (from KlasJet):

The retrofitted PSU, with LED lights:

Take off video:

Shortly after take off, over Tel Aviv:

20 minutes into the flight, the flight attendants handed out water bottles: 

Approximately 45 minutes into the flight, we received sandwiches. 

I chose the left one and my wife chose the right one.
Both of them were tasty.

2 hours into the flight, I went to the rear toilets:

Old style toilets, maintenance and clean could be better.

Cabin view during flight:

Legroom on our row was pretty good, in my opinion it worth the 70$ addition.

15-20 minutes before the landing, we received this snack, cacao and coconut snack.

In my past flights with Elal, they didn't hand out those snacks.
It was a nice gesture.

Starting decent over Budapest:

Landing video in Budapest airport:

After landing:

ATC tower:

Ryanair Boeing 737-800 and Wizz A321:

Trade air Airbus A320 (9A-BTM), wet leased to Israir:

Business class view during deboarding:

BUD Airport - Terminal 2B

Our aircraft parked in jetbridge.

Goodbye 4X-EKA!

We made our way into the terminal, the passport control process was pretty fast, since there was a priority for families.
We had to wait pretty long time for our baggage.

I went to the toilets in the baggage claim area:

As you can see, the toilets were clean and in pretty good condition.
After we received all our baggage, we made our way to the car rental area in BUD airport, as usual I rented a car from SIXT.

Similar to OTP airport in Romania, I had to take a shuttle to the car rental parking.
It's a short hope, I could walk if I was alone. but with 3 suitcases, baby seat and baby in a stroller, we decided to take the shuttle, which we took from the taxi area:

Thanks for reading!