I’ve never been a big fan of Southwest Airlines because of the whole open seating thing, and this trip was no different. I love taking pictures of the view out of the window in-flight, and I’m always a bit anxious before getting on any Southwest flight with a boarding position anywhere higher than B-20. That’s the point where I find that most of the window seats become occupied, and it makes me uneasy not to know ahead of time where I’m going to be sitting on the airplane.
WN455
San Diego (SAN) – Las Vegas (LAS)
Thursday February 20 2014
Aircraft: Boeing 737-700
Seat: 23A
We arrived at the airport about two hours before our flight. I have heard horror stories about how long the lines can get in terminal one here at SAN, and since we had bags to check, I didn’t want to take any chances! But as is usually the case when planning for the worst, check in was quick and took all of 5 minutes. The lines were very short this morning, and the whole process was very efficient. Not what I was expecting at all, but I was happy.
Going through security was just as easy – there were no lines, and we were able to walk right up to the checkpoint after having our ID’s and boarding documents checked. I wish it was always this easy…
Unfortunately, our flight would be boarding from gate 1, which meant that once through security, there is very little in terms of shopping or refreshments available. There are only three gates in this concourse (1, 1A, and 2) so it’s very small and confined from the rest of the airport.
Boarding was called about 15 minutes late due to late arrival of the aircraft from OAK, but they were able to get all those passengers off and the aircraft cleaned in less than 15 minutes. I’m always impressed by how fast Southwest can turn an airplane around, and this was no exception.
My wife and I had boarding cards for B30 and B31, which is basically right in the middle of the boarding queue. For those not familiar with the Southwest Airlines boarding process, each passenger is given a boarding position number when checking in for the flight. There are three groups: A, B, and C, with 60 positions within each one. So basically, they board A 1-30 first, A 30-60 second, B 1-30 next, B 30-60 after that, and so on. To make the process as simple as possible, there are signs or poles at each gate with numbers on them. All you have to do is queue up next to the number that is on your boarding pass and they’ll will call the entire group at once. To me, it’s a very efficient way to board an airplane – and it totally eliminates other passengers crowding the gate while they wait to board.
As mentioned above, I was hoping to get a window seat. My wife prefers aisle seats, so we wished each other good luck as we boarded the plane and scouted out somewhere good to sit. It’s a process I dislike very much! Once onboard, I saw that seat 5A was open. Score! I politely asked the older couple who were in 5B and C if they would mind letting me in, and the lady gave me the biggest eye-roll that it made me chuckle. She was mad that I wanted that seat, and it was totally obvious.
How mad? She wouldn’t even get up to let me in. Her husband said I could crawl over her if I wanted that seat, and by this time I was holding up the line so I said “sorry” and continued on down the aisle. “Sorry” was not exactly what I wanted to say, but I’m not for confrontation, so I brushed it off. My wife was lucky enough to find an open aisle seat about halfway back, but I had to go all the way back to the second to last row for an open window seat. That was close!
The flight was about 75% full today, and I was thankful that the middle seat next to me was unoccupied.
After departing runway 27, we turned north over the Pacific Ocean and didn’t turn inland again until crossing right over top of Los Angeles. From there it was a direct shot over to LAS.
One of the things that I do like about Southwest Airlines is the fact that they offer free beverages and snacks no matter how short the flight. This flight to LAS was only 50 minutes, but they managed to serve a drink and peanuts to everyone on board. Other major airlines take note – Southwest knows how to do it!
We approached LAS from the west, which is something I can never get tired of. The scenery and landscape around the Las Vegas area is other-worldy – the rocks and dirt make it look like we are landing on planet Mars.
After a smooth landing on runway 1L, we made a short taxi over to gate C22 that would eventually dump us into a very crowded airport terminal where we would have to wait two hours for our flight up to RNO.
