Avis du vol entre Tenerife Island et London en classe Economique avec easyJet

Flying From Tenerife South!

I had to get to the main international gateway for Tenerife, Tenerife South Airport from the town of Playa de las Américas, the location of the Hard Rock Café in Tenerife as well as various beaches, resorts & hotels. Whilst its only a 40 minute ride on a bus to the Airport, I had a slight problem in that I waited for the bus to turn up on schedule and it didn't. With a time to get to the Airport by (luckily I was checked in online & hand luggage only buying me precious time) I had to bite the bullet and hail a taxi!

A taxi stop was located by the Hard Rock, so I walked back there quickly and within 3 or 4 minutes, I hailed a taxi who seemed very happy to get an Airport run! The taxi driver spoke little English, but he was happy with me getting a few phone snaps of Tenerife as we drove back in the main traffic, there was a bit of build up from the rush hour as well as the main road being partly dug up for road works!

This last minute taxi cost me about €25 (£21), but it was worth it as I could have potentially missed my flight or been denied going through the Airport at security. Tenerife South is the busiest Airport on the island of Tenerife as its set up to take all the international traffic at the island, but I'm going to cover the other Airport in another report very shortly!

Well I made it in the nick of time with just over an hour before departure, so it was off airside and to clear the passport check point, however take note of the departure time on the left board of my easyJet flight to London Gatwick! That'll come back to haunt us later!

Getting airside at Tenerife South, I found a window in the Schengen Zone (the area before passport control) near a table with charging facilities where I charged up my power bank and GoPro whilst plane spotting some of the evening action. I found out here my flight was delayed and had only just left London Gatwick… The board had updated a new departure time… 22:15pm local time. The flight was going to be a good 3 hours late. So I opted to camp up where I was, I checked with a security guard that I could stay in the Schengen area until later as there wasn't much in the post passport control area.

The evening action was a little monotonous at times, but a few interesting movements. One highlight was seeing a Milan Bergamo bound Malta Air Boeing 737-8200 (737-8MAX) departing as well as an arriving Aer Lingus Airbus A320, I was also interested by the TUI Belgium Boeing 737-8MAX. Some more usual suspects included a Ryanair Boeing 737-8200, some easyJet Airbus A320s, a Jet2 Boeing 737-800 and a Binter Canarias ATR 72, one of a small number of inter-Island services offered at Tenerife South- most go from Los Rodeos Airport (TFN).

A Pint on easyJet's Dime!

As you can tell by this screenshot of my phone using FR24, I was going to be in Tenerife South a bit longer than planned. Our delay was so bad we'd become the second to last flight to leave Tenerife South that evening, as well as the last non-Schengen departure! A little bit of a kicker was a three hour delay wouldn't get us EU-261/EU-261 compensation…

I checked out my emails as I waited and found an email from easyJet apologising for the delay and providing a refreshment voucher I could use at various cafes & bars in Tenerife South… except by then most of them had closed up. It was cool to see the voucher showcased in various currencies of countries served by easyJet! The main thing to note is my voucher was valid for €9 or £6.

I wanted to try get a meal at Burger King, but it had closed an hour early for some reason, but the American themed Sports Bar next to it was still open. So I went in and browsed… I opted to enjoy a Pint & Crisps on easyJet's dime! I also bought a Toblerone as I had €1 outstanding from my voucher and opted to pay the few cents overdraft from it to get rid of some loose change. I was happy enough to sit back and enjoy this very quiet bar whilst I waited on the Airbus A320 to finally get here.

Eventually it came time to go through passport control, so I opted to get there before everyone decided to scrum the passport control line as it was likely going to be a minimum skeleton crew this late. I went through and waited, knowing this is where we'd be flying from as a UK bound flight. The UK flights usually go from the C-Gates for those not familiar with Tenerife South.

Eventually, our aircraft arrived into Tenerife South Airport! Rejoice and the best part of 175 passengers started lining up to board the aircraft, I don't think the ground staff worried about the Speedy Boarding process as they wanted to get the plane going as soon as possible given how late it was and get us back to Gatwick! Once the plane deboarded and the cabin crew did their checks on the turn around- it was our turn to get going at Gate C36!

easyJet EZY-8083 (TFS-LGW)

Our flight that evening would be operated by easyJet Airbus A320ceo G-EJCM, this aircraft is just over 11 years old at the time of flying having been delivered brand new from Airbus in December 2013 to… Cebu Pacific! It joined the easyJet fleet in June 2024, entering service on August 1st 2024. The airline has a small sub-fleet of second hand Airbus A320ceo, it is also currently the last Airbus A320ceo delivered to the airline!

Notably on August 19th 2024, not even 3 weeks after it began flying for easyJet, the aircraft was involved in a severe turbulence incident on a Corfu to London Gatwick flight, which resulted in a diversion to Rome FCO! It returned to service 10 days later on August 29th 2024.

Once I got on the aircraft I made my way to my seat for the next 4 hours, Seat 11A which I chose as it was right by the engine and during a night flight makes filming a bit easier during take off & landing!

Once we got on board the captain gave his announcement and the reason for our delay became clear… Our original aircraft for tonight had gone tech and a new plane had to be sourced at London Gatwick, but the delay in getting a new plane prepared caused the original crew to risk timing out, so a standby crew was put together and that is how we ended up on this arrangement! But kudos to easyJet for sorting this out in 3 hours… did I also mention I got a beer on easyJet's penny? Not bad for a £22 one-way flight!

We got boarded and turned around quickly, and we were off out of Tenerife South pretty sharp! We left finally at 10:20pm local time, 3 hours and 15 minutes later than we were scheduled to! We got a brief look at Tenerife on departure as we flew North along the island as it was on the left side, where I was seated.

Once we left the Island of Tenerife it was a night flight over water the most of the entire way to the UK, we briefly crossed land over North-West Spain between the cities of Vigo and A Coruna then we crossed the Bay of Biscay completely over water before crossing Brittany, Western France. We would begin our descent over the Island of Jersey several hours later… but I'll cover that later.

Once we were underway with our delayed flight, the crew began the buy on board service, aka the easyJet Bistro. As the restaurants were closed and our flight was stupidly delayed, I opted to enjoy myself the Chicken Korma that the airline had introduced in 2024, but I'd not had a long enough flight to enjoy this until now! I sided it off with a cola. I don't think this curry item is part of any meal deals offered by easyJet. As we passed along the great North Atlantic Ocean, the clear skies above the clouds showcased a full moon shining brightly, I managed to get a very grainy picture of it through my phone as my GoPro wouldn't cut it.

I fell asleep for an hour or so during the flight, try to boost my sleep after a long day trip in Tenerife which had become slightly longer! I had a hotel booked at London Gatwick, but the delay meant I'd miss the free shuttles and be stung for a taxi, more on that later!

I eventually woke as we passed over Brittany, the rest of the hour passed quickly as one could hope for. We eventually began our decent over Jersey in the Channel Islands, we descended over the open waters of the English Channel, barr a brief passing over Cherbourg, France. Before making our arrival into London Gatwick passing the UK shorelines over Brighton, coming in from the East with our arrival pattern bringing us over Burgess Hill, Crowborough and East Grinsted. 

We would touch down on Runway 26L at 02:05am on February 5th 2025… A whopping 2hr 40 minutes later than our scheduled arrival of 23:25pm on February 4th 2025! We then taxied to a remote stand which then required a bus gate over to the South Terminal. But we finally made it to London Gatwick!

I was not expecting to rush off, so I grabbed a few final shots of the easyJet aircraft cabin, or should I say Cebu Pacific cabin! I then proceeded to leave the aircraft as one of the last passengers off, I thanked the cabin crew and wished them a nice night (or morning) and boarded the bus that would take us to the South Terminal. As the last person on the bus, I was also able to get a final shot of our Airbus A320ceo!

I had booked a stay at the Radisson Red with my dad, who came up that afternoon to eventually meet me. He checked in at a sensible time and that meant I wouldn't rock up at this place late if there was delay (case in point) and be denied check in. The hotel shuttle buses had run their course for the day, so I turned up just before 03am, the 12 minute ride from London Gatwick South Terminal was a whopping £33! Absolutely disgraceful! 

Despite that though, it was a nice hotel and just a shame I hadn't more time there due to the delay as it was decent and we skipped breakfast service as I wanted to sleep in after the previous night's events!

I was pretty happy with finding out how good this place could be a spotting hotel! Especially if you can get a good price on this and can guarantee a good length of stay! By the time I crawled out of bed and washed down a decent coffee from the hotel room's coffee/tea supply I was able to enjoy a bit of plane spotting before the domination of British Airways & easyJet flights occurred, it was nice to see a Boeing 767-300ER of Azerbaijan Airlines again and the pair of ex-Avianca ATR-72 being flown by Aurigny Air Service made it feel like I was spotting at Bogota Airport and not London Gatwick!

Overall this flight was a good experience on the flight front, the big weakness being the delay of three hours, but it was nice to get a working refreshment voucher of £6/9EUR to use- despite most of the TFS Airport bars & restaurants closing early! I was more mad with the Taxi Fare from Gatwick to the Radisson Red than I was the Three Hour delay with easyJet! It was pretty cool from an AvGeek perspective to get a plane with the Cebu Pacific cabin given I've never been to the Philippines. I can't fault this easyJet flight on the bargain factor given I paid £22!

I submitted a complaint form to easyJet and enquired with compensation, but I was told that I wasn't eligible for compensation (EU-261/UK-261 comes in after 4 hours late arrival) or any good will, but was given an apology for the delayed service I experienced.