London Heathrow

I left the hotel around 09:00 in the morning and took the tube to Heathrow. I had already checked in the evening before using the web check in but did not print the boarding pass, so I used the self check in machines to print it and head for security and border control. There were short to no lines at border control, though the lines at security were a bit longer, but I waited less than five minutes and soon later I was on my way to the lounge.

London has a shared Star Alliance Lounge, which was still busy from the morning arrivals with connecting passengers and also of those passengers, leaving to the US. But I was able to get a seat, took something to eat and read in one of the German Sunday Papers available in the lounge.

At 11.45 our gate was indicated on the screen and after a quick visit of the restrooms I slowly walked to gate 2, where boarding had not yet started.

After a few minutes the boarding announcement was and I was on the way to the plane

02 May 2010
LHR – DUS
[London Heathrow – Düsseldorf International]
LH 4773 (Lufthansa); CRJ 700 (D-ACPE / 'Belzig')
Gate 2
12:20 – 14:40 [effective 12:25 – 14:34)
Economy Class
Seat 14 F

We had to walk to our plane parked at the gate and let the bigger carry on items on the tarmac. I had a exit row seat and stored my belongings in the overhead compartment and my notebook in the seat pocket of the seat in front of me.

I slept a little bit during take off and for the first minutes in flight before I decided to start my notebook and use the short flight for an update of my trip report and also for some additional things like editing pictures I took in London. The crew did a beverage round and beside the usual sandwich a beverage round was done on this short one hour flight to Düsseldorf.

The flight was full in Economy, but not in Business Class. Like on many flight, the curtain was set back and so Business had more open seat than necessary and Economy was full and therefore seat blocking did not work on this short flight.

The crew was in particular not very friendly, they did their job and nothing else. I was already shutting my laptop down which the flight attendant noticed, nevertheless I got a harsh comment I should shut down my laptop and the speech that all electronic devices must switched off was made less than a minute ago.

We approached Düsseldorf via Essen and touched down at 14:33 and taxied for our bus gate.

In the bus, I had placed me near the doors and therefore was in a good position to reach for the doors of the terminal quite fast and was the third person arriving at border control and on my way to the skytrain station to board the next available skytrain and catch my train to Duisburg and then on to Moers, where my parents picked me up.

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