I finally had my very first experience flying first class on a plane yesterday! Happy dance! It was fabulous and I will be very happy to do it again any chance I can.
Ok, this really was not flying first class for free, but it was close enough for me. I had a flight scheduled for 3:30 Monday afternoon to come back home to St. Louis, I had been in New York City for BlogHer 2012. When I arrived at the gate yesterday a few minutes later they announced they needed one volunteer who would take the next flight instead. In return for that they would receive a meal voucher, a $200 Delta Airlines voucher for future flights, and a first class seat on the later flight! Now I knew they did this sort of thing because Tanya of Mommy Goggles had shared with me that she has done this herself in the past. I jumped at the chance and volunteered for the bump. The folks at the desk looked relieved that I volunteered and were very sweet – sadly there were a lot of delays of flights and people were yelling at them at the same time. I promised no yelling from me and just smiled and waited patiently as they updated the reservations and printed my vouchers.
I headed to a restaurant in the terminal and asked for a table out of the way because I was going to kill a few hours there. The booth was nice and comfy and I had lunch and was able to get some work done on my laptop also. Plus I had the voucher, only $12, but it paid for part of the meal at least. Then it was time to fly!
The desk agent announced that they would begin boarding and that first class passengers could come on up and get on the plane. Yay! That’s me! I was in seat 3C – THREE!!! I know it may sound silly, but I honestly was giddy about all of this. Upon reaching my seat I noticed that I had a pillow and blanket waiting in my seat and there was a small bottled water waiting in the cup holder between the seats also. Nice! I sat down in my seat – and there was plenty of room! Yes! A comfortable airplane seat with space! Now I take up a considerable amount of room to start, but even these seats had extra space for me. When the person sitting next to me sat down I did not feel the need to squish over towards the window at all. After most of the passengers were online the flight attendant came and asked if I would like a pre-flight drink. I had already had my water, but heck I wanted to experience the full experience! I really thought about ordering a drink drink, but opted for a Coke instead. He came back with my drink on a tray and was very polite. Honestly, they were super nice to all of us in first class. It did cross my mind that it is a shame that the politeness was not extended to all passengers all the time, regardless if they were in first class or economy. Usually I do not have any issue with flight attendants, but I have seen enough of them that just were not overly pleasant to notice the difference. Not long after takeoff they came by asking us about drinks again – this one came in an actual glass – not a plastic cup. That is something I loved. Then a nice little basket of snacks was brought around and we were told to take anything, and as many, as we wanted and to just ask if we needed more. I had Sun Chips and a small bag of Craisins myself.
Sadly, the in-flight Wi-Fi from GoGo was not working on this flight. It was supposed to be, but there was a problem. This made me said because in-flight Wi-Fi would have made my first class experience perfect. Instead though I decided to just relax and I actually fell asleep with my reclined seat, pillow, and blanket. I couldn’t believe I feel asleep, that does not happen for me on a plane usually. The flight ended and left my first class seat hoping to return to it soon! I plan on taking advantage of any opportunity to get bumped into first class or use my frequent flyer points or whatever I have to in the future. It is truly worth it for me!
A quick thanks again to Bumble Bee Foods who was my sponsor to BlogHer ‘12 and who actually paid for my flight. I would not have had the chance to get that first-class seat if they had not sent me on the trip to start with!
Have you flown first-class before? Do you wish you could?
© 2012, Robyn Wright. All rights reserved.
