Thomas Cook long haul

Maybe. But maybe not. I'm not a great flier and find it more reassuring to fly on a model that been going for years and has had all the minor issues ironed out, so to speak. However, for our honeymoon, we flew on the ginormous spanky-new A380 and it was ace.

Thomas Cook fly Airbus A330s on their long haul flights, and these are nice planes anyway.

I had a bad experience going long haul with Thomson last year. Ok one of the problems was a snake on the plane - which I understand was not their fault - but I had a list of other things that were unacceptable IMO. There new Dreamliner has had lots of teething problems has it not?

Definately go TC - especially if it's cheaper!!

I never really thought about it like that. Am going to have a chat with thomas cook tomorrow and see what they say. Can't understand why they are so much cheaper.

Anyway I might be pestering you for Manchester hotel recommendations next as Thomas Cook don't do any London flights

ATB seriously a snake on a plane?!

I wasn't particularly impressed with Thomson when we were booking our honeymoon so off we popped to Thomas Cook and they were great!

Thinking about it Thomson screwed my mum and dad over last year too, Thomas Cook are looking more promising then

I'msorrywhatnow? ?

I think for long haul they're probably fairly similar to Thompson. I flew TC to Egypt last year, they class it as short haul, which at 5 & 1/2 hours it probably is, but it was really uncomfortable and small for that amount of time. IMO.

I think we flew with them wheb we went to Cuba, but I can't really remember for sure, whoever we flew with it was fine.

We wnt to Playa Pesquero for our honeymoon two years ago and went with Thomson. When we go again we would pay for the upgrade to premium economy. We found it very uncomfortable and the plane had no more leg room than ones we had flown on to Egypt. We happened to meet another Hitcher who was staying there for their honeymoon and they upgraded on the way back on the same flight and said it made such a difference. I think it was about another grand for the two forthe two of them.

On long haul travel agent flights, do you get all the perks of BA/Virgin etc - free food and drinks, a little TV and so on?

You get the TV and free movies etc but have to pay for all meals and drinks..boooo ?

You get the little tv and food and stuff but its not unlimited unless you go premium.

Thomsons premium costs an extra grand which I can't really justify. Am going to find out what thomas cooks costs

And is it really that much cheaper to go with a travel agent, rather than booking flights/hotels separately?

Haha yes:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-20094435

Two hour delay because of the little bugger...

I think it definitely can be but there are lots of variables, e.g number of flights on the particular route, availability, time of year etc.

I was talking about this with the OH recently, he wants to go long haul again but I can't face it after 2 long haulers last year. I said maybe if we could go first class or on a fancy plane I would go for it. But then he told me one of his colleagues' parents just came from somewhere on the new Dreamliner and said it wasn't worth it. Food was naff and on the way home they randomly got diverted with no explanation. On the way out there had been delays due to some technical issues. Hubs has also said it has broken down and been relaunched several times already. I will steer clear after hearing that.

Both times on our long hauls we went with Thomson, upgraded to extra leg room seats but not Premium, that was way too expensive for what it was. You get a TV but have to pay for certain films and headphones unless you are Premium. I wasn't particularly impressed with them so next time would try TC or anyone else really.

I don't mind long haul flights.

But then, my knees don't touch the seat in front of me...

Ditto! Who ya gonna call? Samuel L Jackson!

Exit seats every time. But then it is draughty and extra bumpy and people like to just stand in our leg space with screaming kids and suchlike. One of the reasons I was so jet lagged after the honeymoon is because I wanted to reset my body clock and sleep during the flight but a father was trying to settle a restless crying baby. He did this by carrying her up and down the plane the entire flight, disturbing everyone and stopping right in front of us in the exit space each time. It didn't work to stop her crying for the first hour, why would you think it would work for the remaining 8?

Grr I hate flying even more now I think about this.

Footlong you smug begger!

PB I'm not as tall as you so I'm normally ok.

We are off to speak to thomas cook tomorrow with a view to booking with them I think.

We are going to the sol rio in 2 weeks with first choice (Thomson flight). I refused to pay an extra £60 to pre book seats, when we had already paid £3k for the holiday, we are just going to check in as early as poss to get seats together. The premium seats couldn't be priced as there were none left anyway.

Doesnt really bother me too much, we flew economy Sri Lanka airways on honeymoon, the plane was very old and knackered but it wasn't all that bad.

We got free extra legroom seats when we went to Egypt last as we were the last to check in and that was all that was left!!

We flew to Cuba with Thomas Cook in march this year and stayed at the Playa Pesquero. Flew from Manchester because it was cheaper. They don't class the Premium Economy seats as such on outbound or inbound - I think this is for Cuba only. Therefore even if you pay for the upgrade you don't get the perks, still pay for drinks etc. so in effect you're paying solely for the extra legroom, and the fact that the seat is bigger than normal economy.

You can reserve your seats 3 months prior to dept date - for which economy is £10 p/p, £40 for emergency exit seat.

However, for outbound flights you can't reserve these bigger seats, (aka premium economy) they're first come, first served, upon check in, apparently its something to do with the departure tax. our flight left at 0915, so we used the twilight check in, the night before. But in the normal economy cabin, there's actually plenty of legroom, so we didn't mind. You just get the normal TV on the back of the seat, with a choice of about 4/5 movies, but they're on a loop, so you can't view when you want. The food was very good though.

Inbound you can upgrade to PE seats, £50 per person - but as above no perks, just bigger seat - again, you can do this 3months in advance.

as for the hotel, Playa Pesquero was good, loads of restaurants, lovely beach, food ok. Premium drinks also included in AI price whereas a lot of the other hotels don't. However, if you can afford it stay at the Paradiso (think that's the name). The Playa Pesquero is huge and whilst good, I think the Paradiso is better.

Let me know if you want to know anything more

Ooh thanks navychick thats all good to know!

We've looked at the paradisus but its at least a grand more than what we're looking at so I don't think we can sstretch to it if we also want ti do a few trips etc

Hope it helps. , I think the Playa Pesquero is the second best in the area, after the Paradisus, so I would choose the PP over your other choice of hotel - they have a Mojito Bar!

Mojito bar! That's that decided then!

We're flying with Thomson for our honeymoon; part of a package dealy so can't really change it. I am SO glad that we're not on a route which has Dreamliners though; I'm scared enough of flying without being on a (potentially) dodgy plane to boot. We're going to try and wrangle an upgrade on the day / when we check in. Has anyone actually tried this with any success, or is it something that just happens on TV?

I was so excited to go there to have a 'proper' Mojito. On our first morning after the welcome meeting we had some Pina Coladas in the lobby bar then decided to go and find the Mojito bar....well I can only say I must have never experieced a real Mojito as these were so strong OH had to take me back to the room and this was only 11am!

I still don't see how they can justify almost double the cost for the Paradisus. Playa Pesquero was lovely and I cannot imagine Paradisus would be twice as good. That is a lot of money. I thought the food eas excellent. Imported booze all included, Gordon's gin etc, lobster, what more could anyone want

Haha trixylou that sounds like something I'd do! I think we're settled on playa pesquera now and we're going to thomas cook tonight to see what they can do.

At the moment they are 600 quid cheaper than Thomson for the same holiday. Only difference is we would fly from manchester with tc and Gatwick with Thomson but as we're in the Midlands it actually doesn't make much difference

It sounds like a "no brainer" to me Holey. I'm very jealous, I'd love to go back to Cuba.

I've just flown Thomas Cook to Florida and back and had quite a few issues from the flight booking to delays. The actual plane was fine and comfortable enough though.

At this point in time I wouldn't recommend them.

I've always had very good experiences with Thomson long haul - have flown with them a few times and found them comfortable and fairly roomy - especially if there's two of you as they're usually in 2-4-2 formation, which means you can book two seats and not have to worry about the third person. Food's not great but ok. The only problem we had on one journey was the tv didn't work. It costs £5 (it was £5) to upgrade to more movies and have play and pause. Haven't flown with TC before but apparently they have a much smaller seat pitch than Thomson (31" compared to Thomson's 33") and there were rumours they were going to make them smaller. Worth researching/seeing what plane you'll have for your route and going from there.

Don't know what the Dreamliner is like though, I think we have the Dreamliner on the way to mexico in Nov this year - little nervous about it because of the bad press and I'm not keen on flying! Not all flights are the Dreamliner though so you may get the other planes, which I quite like!

Have you looked on https://www.hayesandjarvis.co.uk/ I usually book through them, they don't have charter planes and you can usually have a choice of airlines depending on the route.

I'm going on a Dreamliner to Mexico in march/april, I figure (hope) all the hoo-hah has died down by then and it'll be fine.

Cant wait as we have decided to upgrade to premium economy fr the extra leg room (tall OH), complimentary drinks and nicer food. Whether its worth the extra money or not I don't know but I thought we'd give it a go for our honeymoon.

Oh and on hotels agree with others on good reviews on Playa Pesquero - it's a really nice hotel and the beach there is gorgeous too