Flight review: British Airways Club World

A FULLY flat seat, lounge with spa and champagne cocktails - Lee Taylor takes to the sky in Club World and never wants to come down. 

The business-class quality seat in the Boeing 747 offers four preset positions. Picture: British Airways

I HAVE endured the epic, energy-sapping, jetlag-inducing flight from Australia to the UK six times in the past decade.

And each time I found myself again stuck in cattle-class, cramped and searching for comfort in a place where pins and needles rule.

Then everything changed.

I’m going to go out on an economy-numbed limb here and declare I have finally sat in my best airline seat ever. And here’s why:

Mr Taylor, welcome to British Airways Club World.

Where once I would count down the minutes until arrival, with “the Club” I simply soaked up the entire experience.

Flight: Sydney to London

Set-up: The business-class quality seat in the Boeing 747 offers four preset positions, along with fine adjustment buttons to create your own customised comfort.

Of the presets there’s the recommended Z shape for watching films or reading a book.

But it’s when the seat is fully flat you fully appreciate why you paid so much to sit here.

Simply pull out the footstall positioned in front, press the “fully flat” button and the seat connects the two to form the generous-sized bed.

Press the privacy screen, pull on the quilt, stretch out on the 63.5cm wide seat and lay back on the memory-foam headrest to catch some shut-eye in style.

Each seat has its own laptop locker drawer with plenty of room to store books and bottles. You also have access to an individual power socket.

Amenity kits: Luxury wash bag includes Elemis in-flight skincare products, toothbrush, toothpaste, eye mask, earplugs and flight socks.

Inflight entertainment: Audio and Video On Demand (AVOD). The 26cm touch screen has more than 100 movies and TV shows. There are more than 50 music CDs and audio books and 20 interactive games. These come with noise-cancelling headphones.

Food: Complimentary bar service, including alcoholic and soft drinks is available throughout the flight.

Meals
Entrée - Grilled crab lasagne or grilled and marinated yellow and red peppers with asparagus and pine nuts

Main - A selection of three mains including: beef bourguignon, fillet of salmon or chilled main course salad of Thai-style chicken on angel hair noodles with sesame ginger dressing

Dessert - Lemon tart, cheese or a selection of fruit

Drink: A varied range of European and Australian wines and champagne, including: 2006 Saint-Joseph Cave Saint, Rhone from France, 2009 Lovivalo Rueda from Spain and Lanson Black Label Brut champagne.

Kir Royale and Buck’s Fizz champagne cocktails also on offer.

Service: Flight crew were efficient and friendly enough to offer tips when asked how to best avoid jetlag. Drink and food were ready available and staff were more than happy to leave you alone when trying to catch those precious moments of sleep.

Lounge: Club World passenger are given access to the Qantas lounge at Sydney Airport, but it’s BA’s Terminal 5 Galleries Club in Heathrow that you get to experience true indulgence.

The Elemis Travel Spa offers a complimentary two-tier treatment menu to Club World passengers and is possibly the best way to prepare for being cooped-up in a tube with strangers from almost 24 hours.

But you have to get in quick - as I was unfortunate to find out - as bookings are snapped up quickly.

Instead, I opted for a shower suite where four shower options offered the choice of powerful jets positioned at various points around your body.

As showers go, this is up there with the best and the perfect way to wash away the wintry chills of London snow.

The lounge is lavished in Osborne & Little fabrics and a silver bar boasting champagne and fine wines. The Chef’s theatre has a variety of meals and snacks including the national dish – curry.

A 20-seat cinema is also at hand to help you pass the time as well as several computer terminals.

Value for money: I have been lucky enough to fly Qantas business before, but my experience with British Airway’s Club World was a different class.

For me, being able to sleep on a comfortable, fully flat seat was a huge advantage. I was able to arrive in London relatively human and managed to stay awake for the entire day – reducing jetlag considerably.

Sure, at $8822 and on my wages I will never be able to afford five-star air travel like this. But it’s the type of experience that belongs on your bucket-list.

Before I would never have dreamed of spending the cost of an entire holiday on a flight. But now I’m seriously considering saving up for a trip in Club World to celebrate my 40th birthday. (Ahem, I have plenty of years to save).

From start to finish, the entire journey was comfortable, convenient and entertaining.

Now that’s how the start of a holiday should be.

The writer was a guest of British Airways

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