Nothing you can say can stop me going home (Italy 2025 part 16)

Yep, I've been listening to My Chemical Romance again...

Another day, another post starting at Garibaldi -- for one last time, as it's time to get on the Malpensa "Express" (which, unlike the Leonardo Express in Rome, is not actually an express service -- hence why I was able to get it at Garibaldi). The Malpensa Express currently uses older Alstom Coradia trains in a red version of the new Trenord livery, but shortly after I wrote that post criticising Trenord for formerly using double-decker TAF trains on this route, I was browsing Ferrovie.it and learned that these trains are being replaced by Hitachi Rocks (like the one on the left) in standard Trenord livery. Quite a strange choice, and I guess I have to take back the praise I gave Trenord for swapping double-decker trains with normal ones on the airport route! I suspect the reason they chose these now is the same as the reason they originally chose the TAF, which is simply that they're the shiny new toy. sigh

Malpensa is definitely my least favorite of the four Italian airports I've used so far (FCO, VCE, and BLQ being the other three), and that starts with the train out there. The Malpensa Express is expensive, slow, and infrequent in comparison with the options to FCO (where you have the choice of expensive or slow, both of which are more frequent than the Malpensa Express), and even on a Tuesday in the middle of February (not exactly a peak travel day), the train was quite full. 

Malpensa isn't all that interesting architecturally -- except for its spaceship-like control tower, which is seriously cool! 

I'm also a big fan of the escalators that go straight from the basement level where the station is, through the arrivals level, and up to check in. 

The check-in area is probably the nicest part of the airport, with a high space-frame ceiling and windows looking out over the ramp. Unfortunately, because I was flying direct to the US, I had to go to the special check-in area way down at the far end of the terminal, then come all the way back to go through security (unlike in Rome, there isn't a dedicated security area for direct flights to the US, and while there are specific lines for US flights, I was able to use the business class line and not have to go through any special security or passport checks). I was worried that I would get the dreaded SSSS security screening because of my weird itinerary (which Delta thought was a one-way flight to the US, something that normally triggers that), but I was able to check in online (from Esselunga) the day before, and I didn't have any issues at the airport either. 

After security comes the typical duty-free shops and empty luxury stores. Hey, this is Lombardy, not Veneto! I did have a couple Ferragamo bags stuffed into my suitcases, courtesy of Turkish Airlines... 

After finally getting through the slow line at exit passport control, it was time to get some breakfast at the lounge. This lounge isn't particularly impressive design-wise (and I was particularly unimpressed with the restrooms -- there was a line for the men's room so I tried to use the accessible/family restroom, only to find that the locking mechanism was completely missing), but the breakfast was quite good and it wasn't overly crowded despite how busy the airport was. Looks like my plane's here, sitting between Turkey and Serbia! 

MXP is way too boring for me to bother with a full tour, so I just got a few pictures here. One of the bus gate areas has this waiting area sign written in Comic Sans -- can't say I've seen that font on official airport signage before! 

Last time I was here, MXP had two concourses, one for international and one for Schengen flights. Since then, they've built a second international concourse and split the original one so half of the gates are flex gates that can be used for either Schengen or international. The stairs up to the lounge mezzanine look like they were designed to resemble an escalator, or perhaps a baggage chute! 

The new concourse isn't any more interesting, though the Motta Restaurant (run by Autogrill, of course) is pretty cool. Not sure what's going on with those mismatched ceiling tiles! 

So I got to the gate just as they were calling pre-boarding, with a massive pile of people hanging around the gate. But the jetbridges still aren't connected. Huh?

But it looks like they're setting up a walkway on the ramp. Could it be? 

Yep! Looks like we're boarding from the ground today. Cool!

How often do you get the chance to get a view like this? Both United and Delta tend to use their limited number of 767-400s on relatively premium routes, which generally doesn't mean ground boarding.
 

And it's even more rare to walk right under a jetbridge like this! Well, unless you're flying Ryanair or Easyjet, which tend to do ground boarding even when they're parked at jetbridge gates. Nice view of the engine, too! 

And of course I have to get the famous under-the-wing (or as close as they'll let you get) shot that's a staple of European trip reports (or at least it was back in the day when they were typically formatted like this, rather than being the video reports that are more common these days, and which I tend to like a lot less). 

Now for the not-so-fun part: climbing all the stairs (Europe doesn't normally have ground-boarding ramps like you see in the US) and then dragging my stuff the whole length of the plane to row 2. I like to sit right up front so I don't have to drag my suitcases too far through the plane, but that backfired here! And I had forgotten just how narrow the aisles are back in economy. But on the other hand, now I know just how long a -400 is compared to a -300! (I've walked the full length of those many times from when I always flew in economy...) 

The whole boarding process was complete chaos, but it was still pretty cool. What wasn't so cool was the rude flight attendant they had parked at the back door -- when I said hi to him as I boarded, his response was to snap at me that all he needed was my seat number, and while at first I thought he might have been mad about all of these pictures and/or treating me strangely because he thought I wasn't actually in business class (I got that a few times on Turkish last year), he seemed to be doing it to everyone. When I got to baggage claim at JFK, a few people next to me (who must have been in economy or premium economy, since I never saw that flight attendant in business class -- thankfully) were talking about how rude he was to them the entire flight, yelling at them for not ordering drinks correctly and saying bad things about them to other passengers. Definitely not a good look on Delta's part. Luckily, everyone working up front was very nice for the entire flight. 

I've heard lots of complaints about business class on the 764 being cramped and uncomfortable, but I had absolutely no problems with it. To be honest, I can't imagine complaining about any all-aisle-access flat-bed business class seat, and I think the people that do complain (about any of the products I've tried so far) are massively overprivileged and need to be taken down a peg. Sure, it's not over-the-top impressive like my seat on Air France, but I have nothing negative to say at all about the seat. (Admittedly, a lot of the people grumbling about these seats probably paid Delta's normal, excessively expensive, prices for them, whereas I got this trip for an extremely good price by business class standards.)

This flight was quite special for me for a couple reasons. For one, the 767 is by far my most-flown widebody aircraft, but until this, those flights had all been on the -300 (maybe some were on the -200, but definitely none on the -400). I'd been trying to find ways to fly on this type for ages, but both Delta and United (its only two operators) rarely have reasonably-priced business class flights, so I was super excited to find this weird multi-city itinerary that allowed me to fly it without paying a premium over other airlines. I had been booked on one on this exact same route 15-ish years ago, but that trip ended up changing into my first trip out of Bologna. For two, my first-ever business class flight was on a Delta 767, way back when business class still looked like this (though I think it was even older than that, because I distinctly remember the seats being brown), so I was excited to fly a 767 with what is probably the most modern business class cabin they will ever get. Also, my first exposure to modern 1-2-1 business class was on a Delta 767-300 (though I certainly wasn't in business class on that flight and was mostly excited to see it simply because it meant economy would have seatback entertainment back in the day before that was commonplace) --  people hate on those seats all the time for how outdated they are, but I wouldn't mind flying on one of them just for the nostalgic value. 

I had already ordered my meal (Delta's pre-order system actually worked, unlike Air France's, despite Air France being the airline I actually booked this all through!) so the menu was no surprise to me. I was glad to see that we got the new amenity kits that had just started being rolled out a few weeks before my flight -- I don't care much about the contents, but the bag looks like it will be quite useful for future trips. (I used both of the Turkish ones from last year on this trip!) I also really like the multi-color zigzag pattern on the inside! 

The IFE system is perfectly adequate, but I'm unimpressed by how Delta's music system works these days. Instead of including whole albums like most airlines, they have a series of Spotify-branded playlists. At first this seemed promising -- I miss the days of "radio channels" from the overhead TV days (something that's pretty much extinct these days with virtually every airline offering either AVOD or nothing) -- but whereas you could listen to those for the whole flight (since they were apparently just run from cassette tapes stuck in a compartment somewhere, I'm sure they looped eventually on longer flights, but I don't remember ever noticing that), these playlists were all around 5-15 songs long (Alt Now, the one that sounded closest to my musical tastes, had 7 songs, none of which I recognized), making them pretty much useless for passing the time. Considering the system has space for nearly 500 movies, I'm sure they could have spared some hard drive space for a better music selection. (The reason I'm always looking for songs I recognize, of which I eventually found 2 on the entire system, is to test the provided headphones. These were fine, similar in quality to my $20 headphones from the 00s, and had no noise cancellation that I could notice... definitely a step down from the Turkish or even Air France headphones.)

The lack of a jetbridge was fun for me, but for passengers using wheelchairs, it meant they had to board using this scissor lift thing, which seems like a bit of a hassle. Though it does mean they had the rare chance to board using one of the right-hand doors! 

During the standard pre-flight announcement, the captain apologized for the crazy boarding process, saying that the jetbridge was broken at our gate, but then said something about how he hoped we all enjoyed the rare chance to board the rare 767-400 from the ground. It definitely seemed like he was a bit of an avgeek himself! I definitely should have asked the pilots for one of those trading cards Delta gives out, but everything was just crazy during boarding and I didn't see the pilots when I got off the plane, plus I just feel awkward with things like that. To be honest, I'm probably too socially awkward for business class overall (a thought I've had many times while on these flights), but I'm not willing to go back to uncomfortable seats just to avoid some social interactions.

It was nice to see this 100th-anniversary addition to the start of the safety video. 

It's neat to look from one of the smallest widebody aircraft around these days to the world's largest passenger aircraft right next door! Depending on configuration, the Emirates A380 has between nearly two and nearly three times as many seats as this plane.

During the taxi, this gasket or trim piece or whatever fell down from above row 1. I could make a joke about old planes, but to be honest, this 25-year-old plane with a 5-year-old interior was in better shape than either of the 1-year-old planes I flew on Air France. Air France seriously needs to step up their cabin maintenance. 

And we're off! I'm just glad I was up here in this comfy seat, not down there on Easyjet's torture benches. I don't care how cheap they are -- if all I can afford is a low-cost airline like Easyjet or Ryanair, I'd rather stay home. (At least the low-cost airlines in the US are starting to introduce premium seating, which I would actually consider for short haul.)

Northern Italy was completely overcast (unsurprisingly for mid-February), so there weren't any good views at first. But as we got towards the Alps, it turned out the clouds were low enough to provide a rather stunning view of them sticking through the sea of clouds. I was quite impressed! 

And so was the person across the aisle from me, in 1C (the staggered rows on this plane mean the middle seats are roughly a row behind the window seats). This lady was the complete model of an entitled American, except I don't think she was actually an American -- her passport was the wrong color (maroon instead of blue) and she had French subtitles on the IFE, though she was talking to her husband in English. Anyway, she boarded last, and proceeded to throw a fit about not being able to put her stuff in the bins above her seat (due to the first row always being filled with crew and emergency equipment), then (after I told her she couldn't kick the crew stuff out like she was trying to) proceeded to try to throw my stuff and the stuff belonging to the person in 1D out of the bins above my seat because I guess she was just more important than us (she said something about how she should have priority because she had a big suitcase whereas I had my coat and a couple smaller bags -- maybe she's just not used to flying business class despite her better-than-everyone attitude, but there's no underseat storage to put smaller bags in most modern flatbed seats, and even in economy class, there's no way all of my stuff would have fit under the seat). Eventually, her husband came around to our side of the plane and found that there was an entire overhead bin empty between 1C and 2C, which I probably would have pointed out if not for how rude she was. Anyway, when we got to the mountains, she must have seen how excited I was looking out the window, so she decided to get out of her seat and lean over the person in 1D (who she did not know -- remember, she was trying to kick their stuff out of the overhead bins too) to take pictures out the window herself. Overhead bin disputes are nothing new, but I've never seen anything like that before! At least she apparently learned not to mess with me, and I certainly would have made a fuss if she had tried to invade my space like that. 

The view was absolutely stunning, and I would have been sad if I missed it, but that's why I booked the window seat. Delta doesn't charge for seat reservations in business class (unlike British), so if you chose the middle instead of the window, that's on you. 

Sadly, we didn't fly over any of the parts of the Alps I had actually visited on this trip (towards the right-hand side of the map), instead sticking to the French-Italian-Swiss border area further west. 

Soon it was food time, and I went for the chicken, as always. Delta's business class meals don't have the fancy presentation or drawn-out multi-course delivery as you'd find on Air France or Turkish, but I'm always a substance-over-style kind of person, and this was absolutely my favorite airplane meal I've had to date. The chicken and mashed potatoes were both cooked absolutely perfectly (something I can't say about the chicken I've had on any other flight, including Turkish and Air France), but more to the point, it's simply my sort of taste, the kind of meal I would cook for myself or order at a restaurant rather than just the option that sounds the best out of the 3 or 4 available on the plane. Which means I can't really say that Delta's meals are necessarily better than the other airlines -- I just lucked out that something I really liked was on the menu on my exact flight. 

Speaking of things I would cook at home, they came around with warm chocolate chip cookies for a snack in the middle of the flight. I've never met a warm chocolate chip cookie I didn't like, but it definitely wasn't as good as the ones I make for myself. 

I tried to get a bit of sleep, but it didn't go all that well since I hadn't been able to use the restroom beforehand since the seat belt sign was on. Annoyingly, the seat belt sign stayed on the entire flight, so I (and everyone else on the plane) ended up just ignoring it and going to use the restroom (or just walk around) regardless of what it said. That doesn't seem like a particularly safe way to operate, but it seems to be Delta's standard practice from what my parents (who fly them a lot) told me. To be honest, this is the one and only thing that makes me hesitant to book with Delta going forward. Maybe it sounds like a small thing, but it really ticks me off (to the point that my parents refuse to listen to me complaining about it any more, and you probably don't want to listen to that either). Anyway, people love to complain about the small footwell on these seats, and it is a bit small to the point that I couldn't turn my feet sideways with my giant shoes on, but once I took them off it was perfectly comfortable even for someone with oversized feet. 

After the Alps, it was all clouds and ocean until somewhere over northern Canada. 

For the second meal service, I decided to get the pizza. I was a little hesitant since I've had a lot of bad airplane pizzas over the years, but of course that was all in economy class. I wouldn't call this pizza good, but it was perfectly fine, which makes it better than any other airplane pizza I've had. Just like with the cookie earlier, I have fairly high standards for pizza simply because what I make at home is much better than most of what I get elsewhere (outside of Italy itself, of course).

Then it was time to head down into a rather frozen-looking New York. 

I would have liked to know what we were flying over, but these interactive maps have the annoying quirk that when you try to zoom in, the airplane icon gets bigger too, blocking you from seeing where you actually are! This annoyed me way back when these interactive maps started rolling out over a decade ago, and they still haven't fixed that. At least on flights with free wifi (like this one), I could follow along with Google Maps on my phone, though that wouldn't work if I turned on airplane mode like I was supposed to (not that that actually matters these days). 

I love when businesses near airports paint their logo on the roof! Though in this case, it's so close to the airport that we were low enough to read the regular signs on the building. I wonder if Party City was still open at that time -- this trip was during their big liquidation. 

And we're on the ground, with the famous New York skyline in the distance. 

On the way into Terminal 4, we passed another Emirates A380, right next to a line of little tiny regional jets. Off to the right, you can just about see the highlight of the next (and -- hopefully --final) post in this travel series! 

Between terminal 4 and the future terminal 1 (for some reason, JFK decided to replace T1 with a whole new terminal despite the existing one being under 30 years old), it's a sea of Delta jets with one AeroMexico interloper. 

Speaking of interlopers, we were assigned gate 32 (the pilot had announced that so I knew this was our gate that I was looking at), but there was a slight problem: A semi truck driver had decided to pull into the gate just before we could get there! Then it just sat there, for a few minutes, with the driver presumably unaware of the problems they were causing. 

Then once the semi finally wandered on to block the next gate over, they still had to find someone to drive the baggage cart that was parked where it shouldn't be. 🤦‍♂️ Come on, this is New York, not Italy! 

And then finally, we were able to pull into the gate, with the random flatbed truck still just sitting there. Presumably the driver had to wait for the regional jet next door to finish pushing back, but I have no idea what they were doing over here at all. 

And that's it for now -- just one more flight to go, and therefore just one more post to go! I thought I would be able to finish up this series this weekend, but unfortunately it's still taking me two days per travel blog. At least we're nearly done!