Airline: Ryanair UK
Flight #: RK8746
Route: STN-LRH
Class: Economy
Seat: 27F
Date: Wednesday 27th July 2022
Almost three years since I last flew from Stansted, I was back at the airport just before 0430 to begin my next trip, 48 hours in France, exploring the cities of La Rochelle and Nantes. The flights for this trip were with ‘Europe’s Favourite Airline’, Ryanair and, as with some of my previous trips, the destination had been chosen based on the cheap fares available.
The return flights to La Rochelle had cost me just £29.98, a definite bargain considering the trip was taking place during the first week of the British school summer holidays. Given the timings, Stansted was even more chaotic than usual with security taking about 25 minutes to get through compared to my record of less than five. However, despite the sheer number of people, security was generally well managed with the queues continuing to move pretty much constantly.
With only 25 minutes before my gate would be announced, there wasn’t really time to investigate to see whether I could get into the lounge and so I settled down within the main departure lounge to wait. My plan had been to get some breakfast and a coffee, however once again the sheer number of people meant long queues for any and every coffee shop & restaurant within the terminal. Deciding not to spend most of my time queuing and having just a few minutes to down a cup of coffee, the gate was soon announced, and it was off to Stansted’s little train!
Boarding from gate 37 at the end of one of Stansted’s piers, this trip ranked quite highly in the #BoardingNotBoarding stakes, with us ‘boarding’ but not boarding on two occasions. With the usual wait in the stairwell over and done with, I was surprised to find us queuing on the apron at the bottom of the steps waiting for the cabin crew to be ready. Ah well, at least it was a nice day! An advantage of waiting on the tarmac was the opportunity to do some plane spotting and get a few photos of our aircraft for the day, G-RUKC. This 12-year-old Boeing 737-800 has been in Ryanair’s fleet since construction, originally as EI-ENB before being re-registered and transferred to the Ryanair UK fleet in October 2021.
Being one of Ryanair’s older 737s (although still relatively young in general aircraft years), our aircraft still had the older, ‘chunkier’ Ryanair interior. Unfortunately, this meant that the small amount of extra legroom provided by the newer, slim-line, seats was missing and with a pretty full flight this was sorely missed.
Pushing back at 0623, 2 minutes early, we had a scheduled flight time of 90 minutes, however our captain had stated they expected this to be closed to 70, with a cruising altitude of 31,000ft. Taking off at 0639 from Stansted’s north-easterly runway 04, we made a left turn to begin heading south-west across the west of London and towards the south coast.
With such a short flight, the cabin crew were quick to begin the onboard service once it was safe to do so, however I decided not to go for anything on this occasion, mainly due to the limited space to move in my seat. The other reason I decided not to go for anything was not really knowing what was on offer. To save weight, fuel and money, Ryanair don’t have physical onboard magazines, just a QR code on the back of the seat allowing you to download an electronic version. Unfortunately, limited signal once onboard the aircraft at Stansted meant I couldn’t download this.
Crossing the coast over Southampton and then passing between Jersey and the Cotentin peninsula, our view of the English Channel was blocked by clouds for the most part. We crossed the French coast close to the city of Saint Malo and made our way across the Bretagne and Pays de la Loire regions, starting our decent over the city of Rennes.
Having not purchased any food onboard and certainly not one to indulge in any perfume or watches from the duty-free trolley, my interactions with the crew were limited. However, they came across friendly and approachable, certainly with their greetings and farewells at the doors. Having flown a lot recently with crews who were professional but did not necessarily come across friendly, it was nice to have a crew who managed both.
Our approach into La Rochelle airport has got to be one of the most stunning I’ve experienced on my travels. With us landing on the easterly runway 09, the approach brought us out over the sea, before turning and flying over the beautiful Île de Ré. Other than the scenery there was nothing particularly different about the approach or landing, apart from the pilot’s heavy foot on the brakes once we had landed.
La Rochelle airport is a delightful airport to arrive at and is similar to how Southend was before Stobart & EasyJet, with a 100m walk from the aircraft to the terminal and a short queue for passport control. From us landing to me exiting the terminal it was less than 15-minutes and that includes the taxi and waiting to get off the aircraft.
All in all Ryanair hadn’t really changed since I last flew with them three years ago, and Stansted hasn’t really improved since I last used it. My main criticism of the flight was the e-magazine with the menu for the buy-on-board food as this relies on decent phone signal and people having smartphones. However, for the most part, Ryanair is fine as long as you consider what you actually paid and don’t expect anything extra.
Lounge 0*
Seat/Facilities 2*
Food 0*
Service 5*
Punctuality 5*
Overall Rating 12/25 (read about my rating system here!)
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