Manchester to Palma de Mallorca with Monarch *Pics to follow later*

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18 years 7 months

Posts: 171

First a bit of background info, we booked this holiday in March to Mallorca to stay in Puerto Soller, because my parents stayed there about 20 years ago and it is completely different to Alcudia and Magaluf where most tourist head to. We searched around for flights and found the cheapest option was to fly out on Monarch and return with Thomas Cook Airlines. So after 2 other holidays to Croatia and Italy, it was time for my final holiday of 2006. We normally only have one holiday abroad but this year Ive been lucky!

So, I woke up at 02:45am on Sunday the 27th of August, quite excited even though this would be my 5th flight this year. After getting all the cases in my dads car, me, my mum, dad and sister headed to my grandmas house at other side of Bradford at aboute 3:30am. At 3:50am we arrived at my grans,and as she lives near the M606, we were soon speeding down the motorway to MAN. After a swift journy down the M62 and M25 we arrived at the departures level of Terminal 1 at 0430. I was quite excited as I havn't been to T1 since flying to Kos 2002 with jmc and I couldnt remember much of it.

Me, my mum, sis and gran went into the check area whilst my dad dropped the car off at Premier parking. I exprcted queues and chaos but T1 check in was very quiet and calm, apart from a large queue for the Lufthansa check in. The Monarch desks were fairly quiet, but I thought they would be busy as Monarch had flights to Palma, Malaga, Faro, alicante, Preveza and Cancun all within 1 hour of each other. Whilst waiting, I suggested using self check in. My mum agreed so we made our way to one of the lime green machines. Firstly, you select your airline-Monarch, then the flightyou are travelling on. Then we had to scan one of our passports, so all of our itinery came up. Then you had to select your seats, we had already selected seats 15BCDEF online. Finally you anwer the relevent security questions and print off your boarding cards. It was very simple and easy to use, I reccomend using them.

My dad shortly turned up so we headed to the fast bag drop off, desk 32. No one else had used the self check in so we went straight to the desk. The lady tagged our bags and gave us stickers to place on hand baggage saying "No liquids or gels". It was now about 04:50am so we had 2 hours to kill. We went into the retail area before security, I looked at WHSmiths whilst my sister and mum went to River Island and other clothes shops. I think T1 is alot nicer than T2, it was more calm and had a spacious feel to it. Everytime we use T2 its always a rush and busy.

We decided to head through to security before the queues at about 05:10am. Within 2 minutes our baggage and shoes had been scanned and we entered depatures. After browsing a few shops for 10 minutes or so, we got a few coffees from Est Bar Est. Then me and my dad had a walk down pier B, which had nobody in. Parked along the pier was an Air Class 733 which would be off to Kefalonia, 2 Thomas Cook 752's, one of which was pushing back for Kefalonia. Jet2's G-LSAC 752, Monarch A321-200 G-MARA for Malaga, A Mytravel A321-200 to reus and a Monarch A320-200 G-OZBB. I wondered if this onarch plane could be ours. Another MON A320 arrived from Malaga, G-OZBJ. We also saw a 772 of SQ land, a klm 739 depart and an Etihad A330 arrive.

Flight Number: ZB532 Manchester to Palma de Mallorca
STD: 0705
ATD: 0717
STA: 1050
Ata: 1008
Flight Time: 1 hour 51 minutes
Aircarft: Airbus A320-232 cn 389
Seats: 15 B/C/D/E/F

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/0979664/M/
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/0957305/M/

The time was now 0630 so boarding would begin soon. I looked on the departure boards and we were told to go to Gate 10, so I knew we would be on G-OZBB. At 0635, we all went down to the gate, which was slowly filling up. At 0640, special needs passenger were boarded, and at 0645, boarding was announced for rows 20-30. The gate agent also announced that we were only allowed 1 piece of hand luggage and what not to have-liquids etc. At 0650 rows 10 to 13 were called for boarding, and finally at 0655, all remaining passengers were asked to board. After a quick tear of the boarding pass and check of the passport, we headed down the airbridge to the Airbus. At the end of the airbridge was a trolley with newspapers which were free. We were greeted by 2 flight attendants who directed us to our seats. The seats on this planes were cloth, and a dark purple colour with light blue square patterns on them. The first 8 rows of theis A320 were extra legroom and had 34" seat pitch, these seats had purple head mats, whilst the normal seats had gold head mats. I think Monarch must have made economy legroom even tighter because the A320 still had the usual 30 rows.

The Legroom was ok, just standard for a lowcost/charter airline. The seats were comfy, but a little messy. Out of my window seat I had a view of the flaps at the back of the wing. The flight wasnt full, about 90% i'd guess. The cabin crew welcomed us and told us that there were a few extra legroom seats available for those whishing to pay the £15 upgrade cost. The purser told us we would be flying at 35000ft and our flight would last 1 hour and 55 minutes. I thought this was odd as usually the flight deck tell you this info. Before pushback, the captain spoke to us, saying all the paperwork had been complete and bags loading and we were awaiting pushback clearence. His name was Steven Day and the FO was called Keith, I cant remember his surname.

Pshback commenced at 0710, and a safety demo was shown on the Tvs, It was english with spanish subtitles. The TV's were located in the aisle. During the Taxi to 24L the cabin crew came round with complimentry headsets which was nice, and offered magazines such as Hello and Ok for £1. There were 6 cabin crew, which I thought was rather alot for an unfull flight, 4 females-Geraldine, Sally, Natalie and another, 2 Males-Steven and another who was a spanish speaker. One of the crew sat in a passenger seat for Takeoff and Landing.

We taxied behing a Dash 8 of BA Connect and behind us was G-OZBJ, another MON A320 heading to Malaga. At 0717, the aircraft turned toward the runway centre line and acclerated to engine stabilisation, then takeoff power was applied. The takeoff wasn't very powerful, and about half way down the runway, we rotated. The aircraft followed the HON1R departure, so after takeoff, a right turn was made followed by a wide bank to the left. the aircraft levelled off a bit at 3000ft but sonn climbed up, with flaps being retracted. It was a very cloudy day, so not much to be seen. The crew where soon released and handed out menus for breakfast. After another 10 minutes, seatbelt signs were switched off and the bar service commenced, aswell as the IFE being switched on. The programmes shown were: 20 Top Holiday Islands, Entertainment Now and the Ryhder cup, aswell as various music channels.

We were flying over Southampton and the Isle of wight, offering some nice views of all the little boats. Once over France, the meal service commenced. the choice were: A hot breakfast, Light Breakfast, healthy Breakfast and a Panini. My mum, dad and I got a hot Breakfast for £5, whilst my gran got the breakfats panini. With the hot breakfass was: a muffin, a samll dish of fruit, an orange juice carton and free tea and coffee. the breakfast was very tasty and filling, and the crew came round twice with tea and coffe. (The menu can be viewed here: http://www.flymonarch.com/cnt/scheduled/menu/Monarch_menu.pdf). After the meal service, hot towels where handed out which is also a nice touch.

The flight was now over the pyrennes, and heading down the Spanish Coast. A duty free service commenced, one thing scheduled carriers seem to do is advertise all the time on the tannoy, which is slightly annoying. The pilot spoke to us again over Barcelona, saying we were about to start our descent and we were currently at 37000ft. The descent shortly began, with slight speed brakes used to keep us from being too fast. The crew began their preperations to land, and the seat belt signs were switched on. We flew over the North Of Mallorca at 7000ft on the LORES1P STAR, I could see Alcudica and the rugged mountainous northern coast. It was quite cloudy and hazy, with visibility at 10km. We flew over the centre of the island, descending to 4500ft, and flaps 1 beging selected. We then turned onto a heading of 239, and we were heading staright for 24L. the approach offered good views of the island, I could see the town of Inca, aswell as many little villages. Full landing configuration was selected about 6 miles out. At 1008, 42 minutes early, we landed on 24L. Speedbrakes were deployed and a fair ammount of reverse thrust was used, to help us exit on the first high speed taxiway, as another plane was behind on final. The crew welcomed us to Palma and said the time was 1005 and temperature was 25 degrees. We taxied the short way to the "C" gates and parked on stand C60. The "C" gates are used mainly by British airlines, there were 2 Thomsonfly 757's, G-BYAN and AW, an Easyjet A319 and a few others. There were many Air Berlin aircraft on remote stands as well as a bmi baby 733. We disembarked at 1015.

Palma airport is quite unusual as arriving passengers walk through departures to baggage reclaim. The walk is very long, along travelators down corridors. After a quick passport check, we walked further down to baggage reclaim. Our flight was belt 14, and our bags were first off. We were out of the airport at 1045.

I think Monarch are a brilliant Scheduled airline, the fares are very good, and the service is excellent. I would definatly fly with them again. I'll give them 8/10.

Thanks for reading, a return report with Thomas Cook will be posted soon.
Astraeus471

(I have a couple of wing shots I'll post later when I upload them)

Original post

Member for

17 years 9 months

Posts: 234

great report
when did u go

Member for

19 years 11 months

Posts: 10,160

when did u go
Sunday the 27th of August, of course.

Can ye no' read, laddie? :rolleyes:

Member for

24 years 2 months

Posts: 6,503

An excellent report there. Well done. :)

I think it is a bit tight that the airline had spare seats with extra legroom and still insisted offering them at a fee, even at the last minute. When I was upgraded from Premium Economy to Business Class with EVA Air, I understand that a tall gentlemen and his wife were moved into our seats - and at no extra cost. I guess being a low cost flight, I shouldn't really complain.