A United Airlines 737-900. Photo / Creative Commons image by Flickr user flydolce
Winston Aldworth flies UA1507 across the USA.
The plane: A 737-900. The hardworking Toyota Corolla of the busy US domestic market.
Class: Economy. And it felt every inch of it.
Price: You can get on board this route for around $335.
On time? We were scheduled to fly at 4.45pm. This got bumped to 5.15pm and then 5.41pm. We finally rolled away at 5.45pm. I was transferring at LAX to head for Auckland, and that's an hour of Koru Lounge time I lost right there.
The delays weren't explained or announced. New times simply arrived on the LED information board at the boarding gate. Once on board, the pilot apologised for the delays and explained the plane had been held up getting out of San Francisco.
Once in LA, I found a bunch of automated emails announcing the delays. A nifty service if you know about it and don't mind using up your data.
This is a long, grim haul - scheduled for 5hrs 36mins. Too short to settle in, too long to breeze through it.
My seat: I was in C32 (an aisle seat), but pounced on the one immediately behind it, C34, where the row had three empty seats so I could lie down and snooze.
Observant readers will be wondering what happened to C33. Well, the last seats in a United 737 are always in row 38 (mid-cabin exits are always at row 21). This helps staff find their way to the exits in an emergency.
"They always adjust the row numbers to make sure the exits are at those points," a hostee tells me.
Fellow passengers: Yanks. All of whom seemed to be regulars.
How full? About 80 per cent of the seats were occupied. But I still had to pounce fast to hog that row to myself.
Entertainment: There were no in-flight entertainment screens in Economy, which was frankly a blessing, as you need to pay extra to use them or suffer through ads and the occasional flash of a lousy sitcom. As the seats around me didn't have them, the cabin was actually very dark and restful. On the first flight (UA1117 from LAX to NYC), we had glorious views of desert landscapes. The magazine, Hemispheres, is pretty engaging and should fill half an hour of your time.
The service: They wanted to be somewhere else. We did too.
Food and drink: Water and fizzy drinks are free.
The toilets: Cramped. The tap runs only when the button is pushed, meaning you have to somehow wash one hand at a time. Or bring a friend.
Luggage: Read up on the charges.
The airport experience: At Newark, I couldn't charm my way into the United lounge, so settled into the Garden State Diner for a burger and chips - sorry, fries. A beer was drunk. It's an excellent spot.
Would I fly this again? You want to get home from New York? Step aboard.
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