New York La Guardia

I took the Airport Shuttle of the Sheraton LaGuardia East at 06:00 in the morning. There were also a Delta pilot with his co-pilot in the shuttle and two other passengers. It was a nice but cold at this morning and traffic was low and we needed less than ten minutes till we reach the exit La Guardia and headed first to Delta where the two other passengers left the van and then headed to US Airways Terminal, where I got off. If I have known that traffic was that low, I think I would have taken a later shuttle to the airport and enjoyed breakfast in the executive lounge of the Sheraton La Guardia East Hotel.
The Terminal was not really full, the most passengers used the self-check-in facilities, but I had now an additional small back with me due to my shopping in New York. I thought it might be problematic to get both pieces of luggage in the cabin and decided to check the small bag. The US Airways agent told me regarding my ticket she could only check the luggage to Dulles and I had to recheck it there. Knowing, that I had only 33 minutes to connect, I told her to try to check it all the way to Midway. Again I was told this was impossible, as the segment IAD –MDW was by United. I pointed out, that already PHL – IAD was by United and therefore I did not really understand her argumentation, but it would be than better only to check it to PHL. This was also not possible. I asked, if I could than take it as hand luggage, but this was also not allowed. I gave up, checked the bag to IAD and decided to try it in PHL with United. I also noticed there was no Gate printed on my boarding pass for the United Flights. Do they have not data exchange?
Security was full and my boarding pass was marked for additional screening. There were some other foreigners queuing for security and only foreigners got marked by the lady at security. Hm, strange sort of random screening …. So after my luggage was screened I get an additional screening beside the line, was asked about my luggage, which was searched manually. After three minutes I got my carry on back and could walk to the Gate. They are strict, but really fast in concerns of security at LGA. But I could imagine as there are many shuttle flights departing at LGA and therefore they must be fast.
I watched the passengers at the other terminals, the crews appearing for the flight and the gate agents. At the scheduled boarding time at 07:00 there was an announcement that the plane was late and therefore boarding was not begin to start for another 20 minutes. Finally at 07:25 we were allowed to board the aircraft.

16 January 2006
LGA – PHL
[New York La Guardia – Philadelphia]
UA 3116 (operated by US Airways Express), Canadair Regional Jet
07:30 – 08:42 [07:50 – 09:05]
Economy Class
Seat 15 D

Again, hand luggage was collected at the doorsteps of the plane. The plane had an 1 – 2 configuration and was not fully booked. I had a seat neighbour, a young guy, who relaxed by using the space in front of my seat. I thought about switching to another seat, but there was not aisle seat near my seat available. There was again only one female flight attendant. The security was done by playing an audio tape and showing the instructions by the flight attendant. She also informed us about flying time to Philadelphia.

Push back was at 07:50, but due to the heavy morning traffic it took 20 minutes until we were finally airborne at 08:10.
This time, there was a beverage service. Soft drinks and coffee were available and one got a small packet of pretzels. The flight attendant was friendly and one got the whole can again if one opted of Sprits, Coke, etc. I tried to relax, but the guy in the seat beside me needed a lot of space. Okay, I could have asked him to stay at his side of the seat, but I was not in the mood of this sort of conversation in the morning.
The flight is really a short hop and we touched down after our cups, cans were collected as seat belt signs were turned on at 08:55 at Philadelphia and were at our gate at 09:05.

Hand luggage was brought to the jet bridge after some minutes.

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