Den Haag 2011

[RWO]

First of all, I'm, not very sure that I'm posting in the right section, as this is more of a trip-report than a travelogue, but here it goes anyway.
This was my fourth time in The Netherlands, and this time I've chosen to fly with Lufthansa via Frankfurt and the return leg via Hamburg and Frankfurt. So 5 new flights to make a grand total of 26 so far.

So day 1, 24.08.2011
leg 1 OTP -FRA
LH1421
B737-304 D-ABEI Bamberg
first flight 24.10.1991
Load factor 80%
ETD 18h15 ATD 18h25
ETA 19h45 ATA 20h10

As usuall, I got to Otopeni some 4 hours before the flight and took some pictures around. Security and immigrations were a breeze, I had already check-in online from home, a day before, so i only printed out my boarding passes at the nice Lufthansa self-service kiosk.

So i went to the airside. The panorama terrace or whatever it's called is still not open, but there are some others spots from where one can watch the runaway and apron action. And a tip, the cheapest beer is available at Burger King, 8 RON for a 0,33 bottle of Ursus.

So this is the "spotting" position.



First an old RoAF Herc landing on 08R and then taxiing to it's base.





a Malev 737 being serviced.



And the first Lufthansa of the day, an A320 from MUC






After disembarking , crew change and embarking, it went back to, well, Munich.



A BA from London



A fire truck (a couple of years ago they were painted red a spotted "Prague Airport" under that red livery. These look brand new)



And the Flying Dutchman from AMS



some Tarom birds









and a close-up on the A318 engine



Pegasus, bound for Turkey





and the greeks, Aegean, the guys who made headlines a couple of months ago, when they disregarded ATC instructions...



and a lovely Turbolet, not sure what it was doing here





Austrian Airlines, probably going to Vienna



And Tarom again, this time YR-BGA "Alba Iulia" the only plane I flew on two times, two years ago (OTP-CDG-OTP)





And here comes my ride, LH1420 from Frankfurt, after landing on 08L...



it's getting closer



and closer



and finally it's here



In the mean time, Alitalia is here too (Airbus, but fortunately I did manage to fly on their MD82's back in 2007)



Lufthansa has recently begun to change the seats on their planes, with a slim version, made by Recaro. They are surprisingly comfortable and the leg-room is good, as well





The rest of the cabin is quite old, whatsoever (actually this is the oldest plane I've flew on)



Our bags are loaded too...



and after push-back we begin to taxi towards RWY08R.




















And we take-off, straight out departure, just the way i like it .http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3g9eftvrY90

After take-off, we start turning left, the usual procedure














a close-up on the non-existent winglet



And some more pictures over Hungary, Austria and Czech Republic..











Speed and altitude..



It's dinner time, a kind of ciabatta or something, tasted real good



And of course, beer. Lufthansa is the only company in the world that still serves beer in bottles instead of cans. And damn good beer, too.



Then some bad news from the front office. Due to some thunderstorms, Frankfurt airport is currently not accepting any planes, but there's plenty of fuel so we'll just continue in a holding pattern, until the weather clears up.
I only had some 80 minutes connection time, so I was really hopping we'll make it, but then again, the prospect of a spending a night at a nice Frankfurt Airport Hotel, on Lufthansa's expense wasn't that bad.



Finally, after some 20 minutes, the weather clears up and we begin our descent and approach to FRA









German infrastructure, probably the best in the world





And the city of Frankfurt, or Meinhattan or Bankfurt, whatever suits you..









and we touch-down very smoothly on RWY25L http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfvTcM3ocPo

behind us, a lot of planes, on final approach



and a lot of planes on the ground too...




















Our gate is actually a bus gate









Here's Nikki, I flew with them only a month ago



Finally, we rush through FRA, which is damn huge, wait a while in order to pass security and the using the underground tunnel between terminals B and A, make to our next flight barely in time. (actually I had time to smoke a cigarette too )



Second flight of the day

FRA-AMS
LH1002
A320-214 D-AIZF first flight 22.04.2010
ETD 21h10 ATD 21h25
ETA 22h15 ATA 22h28
load factor 70%



the same Recaro slim seats but a fresh interior on this Airbus.





we wait a while thill all the bags are loaded and some ULD, as well



and then taxi to the active, 25L

we take off and get a great overview of FRA and it's surroundings

A snack and the same lovely Warsteiner..



Flight time was around 55 minutes, actually it was only 45 or so, but we landed on the Polderbann, which is located far far away from the terminal building at AMS so we did taxi for a while.

the plane next to us, at AMS, an Austrian, probably, from Vienna



and Amsterdam Schiphol Airport, a bit deserted at that time

img]http://i366.photobucket.com/albums/oo105/rwo29/DSCF9454.jpg[/img]





And after picking up the bags, loading some euros on the OV Chipkaart, we go down stairs, at the train station, to get on board the train for Den Haag.



To be continued...

[AlexisMD]

Nice report

[Cristi.]

Keep'em coming

[ThunderTM]

Very nice report, thanks for sharing .

[RWO]

Here's the second part
AMS-HAM-FRA-OTP
29.08.2011

first of all, some pictures from the famous Panorama Terrace of Schiphol. Bad weather, as usual in The Netherlands. The receptionist at the hotel told me it
was the wettest and coldest summer since 1966.

some heavies











quite a rare sight, a visitor from Iran



planes (what else) at Schiphol







a CRJ200 from Belavia, to Minsk, most likely,



Fokker still active




...and another Fokker, no longer active, but installed at the panorama terrace, earlier this year. It's a sort of museum



details with the Fokker 100 cu PH-OFP (I was lucky enough to fly a similar plane, 4 years ago, on MXP-AMS and I swear I will never forget the sound of

those magnificent Rolls Royce Tay engines)





















On 29 august, early in the morning I've left my hotel in Zoetermeer and left for Schiphol. Things didn't go exactly as I expected.I was supposed to take
a tram from Zoetermeer to Den Haag Central railway station and from then a train to Schiphol, but the tram never showed up, so I went for plan B and took

another train to Utrecht and then another one to Schiphol. It's like going from Bucuresti to Ploiesti via Slobozia.

I've checked-in online the night before, so I took my Boardin Passes from a kiosk at Schiphol (btw, the Lufthansa kiosks at OTP are much better then the ones at AMS), I've turned in my luggage to a lovely young lady who was very surprised that I was going to "Biucareshti" and then went through security where I had a nice chat with a young black man, who was also very surprised that I didn't had a belt, so I explained to him that I don't wear one when I fly just so I don't have to remove it when going through the security check. He wasn't very happy with my answer so he went on to to disassemble my laptop. He opened it, removed the battery and was going to go even deeper but couldn't find a suitable screwdriver. I was quite in a hurry cause I needed to use the rest rooms so

I offered to just leave the damn thing there in order for him to play with it, but he turned down my offer. And off I go.

There were some 40 minutes till my flight was leaving so I took more shots in Schiphol (guess it's my favorite airport)













KLM, no doubts, were are at Schiphol





So i smoked a couple of cigarettes and then walked slowly to Pier B, GateB03, which was a bus gate and waited for boarding which was supposed to start at 08h05.



It started at 08H25, because, even if the plane was already here, they couldn't refuel it. (something like this, the lady in charge of boarding said something like "the plane is already here but it can't get fuel").

AMS-HAM
LH3335 operated by Eurowings
Canadair CRJ900 NextGen
D-ACND first flight 04.06.2009
loadfactor 100% (full plane, including bussines)
ETD 08h35 ATD 08H50
ETA 09h30 ATA 09h45

Our plane, from the terminal. All those people around it were trying to "get fuel"



An italian look-alike



Finally, boarding is starting, by bus. (The Cobus buses they use at OTP are much better then what they had here)

We reach the plane and wait on the tarmac to get inside. (it was like 12 degrees, I was wearing a short sleeve shirt and was the to board the plane, so not a

really nice experience)



A Fokker at AMS (nothing unusual)





Finally inside, my first CRJ

Decent legroom.



taxi to Rwy 24 (Kagbaan) and we can see the panorama terrace and the Fokker too..



take-off, at last http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZjN6EmGSUw

















zoom on the winglet



and we hit the clouds



breakfast, some cookie or something



coffe and orange juice , way to early for beer (actually it's never to early for beer, but I didn't want those people to think I'm an alcoholic )



speed and height (I think the captain was going a bit too fast)



and we are approaching Hamburg. The weather was lovely, as well, some 12 degrees and rain. Just like Amsterdam. Yeah.



App to Hamburg....









Quite a bumpy landing on RWY 23 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDrDsaj0kEo

and taxi to the gate



Hamburg Airport, with a nice font




summer in Germany





Air Berlin at the gate



and landing...



A northern fellow



Lufthansa too has some routes from Hamburg



yeah, right, where is the sun? . (you can also get to see the bus, older than the one at AMS, I guess this one will reach Baneasa soon, it will blend-in well

with the rest of shitty buses there )



some other pictures from HAM, including a 707 which was a museum or something






bye-bye November Delta



and the terminal, looks nice, not much bigger than OTP but with dfouble the traffic.



and a great summer day can't be complete without rain





my ride is here, Gate C16, a jetway, so at least I won't get wet..



D-AIDJ (or a piece of it)



HAM-FRA
LH013
A321-231
D-AIDJ first flight 18.07.2011 (the newest plane I ever flew with, when I bought the tickets this beauty wasn't even delivered)
ETD 11h15 ATD 11h25
ETA 12h25 ATA 12h36

es regnet es (it's raining in German)



these Germans, they even provided cover for the luggage.



legroom, just like the A320, and the same Recaro slim seats.

and the same modern interior



a BaE from BRU



and a B737 from Rossia to Skt Petersburg



taxi to the active, RWY23...





but we wait a bit more



for this felow, who's a bit older.



and this fellow...




and this fellow...



and a few arrivals, one from...Amsterdam.



and another one...



finally we take off, some 15 minutes late http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9-XPyGECZ4







an ICE maintenance facility near Hamburg



clouds



winglet



lunch....or not



and beer, but the bottle got smaller, it's only 0,25. Damn...




some more measurements



over the clouds



getting near Frankfurt













the Swedish brand, from above




a little flaps



and the same approach to FRA as last week, but with better weather.





Frankfurt-am-Mein







and we land , again, on 25L http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ph4NK40bTgQ







we pass again over RWY 07C/25C




and you can see who's in charge here









work in progress



we reach the jetway




and Delta Juliet, seen from the terminal. Auf Wiedersehn...



And now some 15 minutes between Terminal A and Terminal B plus some 5 minutes, extra, at passport control, cause I was leaving Schengen




face to face with the big boys...










other heavy's at Frankfurt






To be continued...

(thanks for the nice words