Philadelphia International

Immigration was empty, several desks were open and I had only a few minutes to wait. The officer was friendly and asked some question of the purpose of my travel to the US, my job and my last journeys regarding the Immigration Stamps in my passport (“.. it seems you like Asia … ”). Customs were also empty. I followed the signs for Terminal E and the shuttle service, but was told I had to walk outside the Terminal. Strange. So I made my way along the pedestrian walkway to Terminal E. Not a nice walk, luckily it was sunny and not really cold.
As the plane was in time, I decided to try to catch an earlier flight to LGA, knowing there was a flight leaving just in half an hour or so. At US Airways Shuttle counter the two agents were not really firm of the issued ticket (“Why Lufthansa did print your boarding pass?” Stupid question …). One was unwilling to help, but the other told me there were still two seats left on this plane, but there was a rebooking fee of 50.00 USD. I decided not to take this offer and to ask again at the gate.
Security was this time more strict, no need to put off shoes, though everybody put them off. I did not notice this, but no signal as I passed the detector, so security staff seems to be fine with it. I headed to the gate 20 for the US Airways Shuttle flight and asked if it was possible to get on this flight instead of the flight two hours later. The gate agent looked at the screens, asked if I was only travelling with hand luggage and replied, sure, no problem. No additional fee.

12 January 2006
PHL – LGA
[Philadelphia – New York La Guardia]
US 4234, Dash 8
15:55 – 17:03 [16:10 – 17:15]
Economy Class
Seat 09 D

Hand luggage was collected, as this was a very small turboprop plane with propellers. I could only remember one time being in this sort of plane, this was on a flight from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh in a heavy thunderstorm back in 2001. Fortunately, this time we had fine weather conditions, but I have never become airsick since my first ever flight back in 1993.

Seat 9 D is the last seat in the middle of the last row of the Dash 8, so you have nobody in front of you. The seat configuration of this plane is 2 – 2. The plane was full, not seat remained empty. I sat between two English Men (they were some engineers who had to solve some technical problem for their company) and two teeny girls, who giggled the whole flight.

The plane was really run down, several scratches at the seats, the cushion of the seats were dirty and the switches for the reading lamp did not work or there even was no switch anymore. Also the plane was not cleaned, there were still some things lying on the floor and some cups were left in the seat pockets. Also the plane was really warm, as we had 14 ° C outside on this sunny January afternoon. There was only one female flight attendant, who informed us fellow passengers after she made the security announcement, which was hardly understandable, that there was no service on this short flight from Philadelphia to New York.

We pushed back at 16:10 with a little delay and had to wait on the rollway several minutes before it was our turn and wheels were up at 16:25. I tried to relax a little bit, but with girls giggling on the one side and the Englishmen on the other side, trying to figure out the route we were flying it was a little bit difficult, as the plane is very narrow. But the space in front of me was enormous, up to row 1 … I read a little bit in the Time Magazine about Bill Gates’ and Bono’s charity program. As we passed Manhattan one could catch some nice view of New York. We circled over Long Island and I remembered the flights I watched at Passur.com approaching La Guardia from the East flying a loop over Long Island.

We touched down at 17:10 and reached our gate five minutes later. It took some time to get out of the plane, but just in this moment the hand luggage was delivered so no waiting time. I took my trolley and headed for Ground Transportation.

New York La Guardia

I had asked at flyertalk.com about the best possible way to Manhattan at this time of the day and was told, the bus to one of the subway stops and then change to the subway would be fast and convenient, even faster than a taxi or shuttle service. Tickets and stored value cards were available the Hudson Kiosk at the belts. And so I followed the signs to Ground Transportation and Belts. I saw the kiosk at once and bought a stored value card for 10.00 USD. The bus stop was just in front of the door of the terminal. I was not addressed by one of the guys offering a taxi service to Manhattan, but noticed that some other passengers looking around were addressed. Again, I think if you go straight and did not show you are unfamiliar with the location, you will not be addressed. But that is just my impression …

The M 60 was the first bus and so I entered it. The bus was full, but still some seats left. It became full after we passed the Marine Air Terminal. As there was a lot of traffic I heard a passengers (seemed to be a Purser of Northwest) talking to his neighbour it would be faster to leave the bus at Astoria instead of heading to 125 Street and change there to subway. My original plan was to change at Astoria but sitting in the bus I had thought to remain in the bus till 125 Street. Hearing this, I decided to stay with my original plan and change at Astoria.

It is really not a big issue to change at Astoria. The subway was not very full and it was a 20 minute ride to 57 Street / 7 Avenue. My Hotel was the Holiday-Inn Midtown 57 Street, just five blocks from the subway and you could walk it in less than 10 minutes.

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