This is the 2nd leg of my journey from the Azores back to London, having arrived earlier from Ponta Delgada.
Online check-in opened 36 hours before departure and it was easy enough. A seat has already been pre-selected for me and changing it would cost money. Both flights on my ticket back to London were loaded and I was given an exit row for the first leg to Lisbon, which I kept, and I paid an extra 26 euros for a right window seat on the next leg to London.
After a mediocre light lunch at the lounge, I browsed around the shops to see what they've got. The air-side area is a good shopping mall and I could've gotten better food here than at the lounge.
I then rushed to passport control to exit Europe. There was a small line even for the automated kiosks. However, afterwards, I still have to visit a manned counter to get stamped out.
Emerging into the N gates area, there are more windows to observe the tarmac activity, but otherwise I had to briskly walk to my gate at the end of the pier as boarding has started. Today, we're given a bus gate, and the agent has asked to check in my hand carry. However, I would still need to wheel it onto the bus and drop it off at the plane.
This would be the 2nd time today I would board by stairs. It was a brilliantly sunny day in Lisbon as well and not too hot so it was a pleasant walk up the back staircase. The 40C extreme heat has left the area for now.
I settled into the paid window seat at the back of the plane. Observing the previous few days' flight paths, I was betting on a final approach from the east so the right side of the plane would get a grand city tour on arrival. Despite the bus gate and a fairly full A321, the back door closed at 4:07pm and we pushed back at 4:19pm. It looks like Lisbon is a single runway airport as we waited quite some time at the end of the runway before we could depart at 4:40pm.
We took off towards the south and looped around south of the Tagus to continue north towards London. With beautiful weather, Lisbon unfolded beneath me.
For more aerial photos during take-off, visit my aerials photo gallery.
The weather continued to be beautiful as we headed north. However, the plane doesn't have any IFE so I couldn't track our progress, so I was a bit surprised when the coastline appeared not long after and it looked like Porto down below with its bridges and city layout.
The crew first came with a free chocolate run followed by the food for purchase cart. There was no shortage of great views and I got a bit tired not long after as we entered the Bay of Biscay. I dozed off a bit and when I woke up skies were clear over western France as well.
As we entered the English Channel, I switched to my zoom lens and the descent started, flying over Portsmouth and then going east before looping back west for final approach .
After a few more turns, I spotted Canary Wharf and the grand tour of London began. For the full set of aerials, visit this page.
We landed at 6:57pm and slowly taxied to the gate at Terminal 2. I wasn't sure why we made such a slow crawl, but at least we exited right into the immigration hall. However, despite not too many people waiting in line to the counters, and the screens showing a <10 minute wait, I ended up stuck here for about 40 minutes. I was lucky though, since another widebody arrived after us and the whole hall filled up.
TAP is a perfectly fine airline to take but be prepared for fare unbundling to the max. I paid less than 200 pounds for the roundtrip to Ponta Delgada via Lisbon, so adding a little extra for seat selection still made this trip fairly affordable.
