With my family having ditched me for Family Day weekend here in Ontario (they went to Florida...which I joined later- next TR) I decided to go visit a friend who had moved back home to Vancouver. Having somehow been given 25K status from signing up for the Amex Aeroplan Reserve card (some sort of promo), I for the first time in my life had status and e-upgrades. I put them to use by redeeming latitude reward seats and upgrading to business class both ways.
Date of Departure: February 18, 2022
Flight: AC 2123 (prev AC 123)
Departure: 18:00
Arrival: 20:05
Aircraft: Boeing 777-200LR
Seat: 4A
I get a notification that my flight is canceled, but not a notification that it was just an aircraft swap + flight number change- concern for nothing:
I stopped in at the Maple Leaf Lounge and had some wine and delicious mac'n'cheese (these served items are now gone since "reopening"):
Nice views along the way as i headed to the gate:
After negotiating through the crowd of "not Zone 1", I boarded and made a left to settle into 4A. I missed the AC business class seat, which I had not occupied since Jan 2020 when I flew YYZ-LAX, on a day where it was announced that Los Angeles "has three known cases of Coronavirus"; how naive we all were lol.
One thing I immediately noticed- no pre-departure beverage, but there was a water bottle at each seat as well as headphones. It was a smooth take-off and dinner was served. My apologies for not having more photos, but my mind wasn't in "trip report" mode- call it Covid travel rust. I had the beef which tasted far better than it looks:
AC service was fairly good. Cabin crew were a bit zealous with the masks, but they were enforcing a policy they have control over- everyone did behave.
Dessert was delicious- I can eat a tray of Nanaimo bars if given the opportunity; the cheese was nice and the coffee was to help me last to landing:
Nothing else eventful- routine flight and a smooth arrival into YVR.
Date of Departure: February 21, 2022
Flight: AC 118
Departure: 14:00
Arrival: 21:21
Aircraft: Boeing 777-300ER
Seat: 2A
I decided to time my arrival to YVR so that I didn't spend much time there- I arrived about 1-hour before departure and was the gate for boarding to begin. Boarded through L1 this time as they were using a dual-bridge gate (I noticed throughout my many YYZ-YVR travel in 2022 that YYZ rarely used the dual-bridge but YVR used it every time). I settled into 2A. Quick pushback and we were off.
Views are always amazing flying in and out of YVR:
Service started with almonds and beverage(s) (bless these generous cabin crew folks):
And more views as we flew before it got dark:
Slightly late arrival into YYZ but nothing to fuss about- it was nice flying wide-body again (my travels in 2021 were all narrow-body).
Hope you enjoyed the report. I am going to work through the rest of travels as I have time the next few weeks. These were the first 2 flights out of 19 for the year- it was a spectacular year of returning to fly!