Virgin Trains First Class - Morning
Travelled: January 2018.
Where: Euston to Glasgow Ctrl
Stock: Class 390 Pendolino
Many positive reviews of the Virgin Pendolino breakfast service had me bursting with curiosity and desperate to try this apparently wonderful service for myself. So, as you can imagine, when I found weekday first class return tickets down to Glasgow Central from London Euston for £35 (under 16s ticket) in the sale, I was pretty delighted.
London Euston is where I started my journey with Virgin. As most of you will know if you have a VTWC booking your journey from the capital city, it is almost definitely going to start from London Euston.
The concourse was fairly busy, but the first class lounge was not. There was plenty on offer at 7am, pastries, almond croissants, gigantic flapjacks, fresh fruit and muffins. Hot and cold drinks were on offer, as were cans of R Whites Lemonade and Pepsi Max. They had orange and apple juice and I believe after midday the bar sells heavily discounted alcohol.
Virgin Trains send you a text update when your train is about to board. They did not fail to do so today and I went to my eleven coach Pendolino which was to form the 0743 to Glasgow Central via Birmingham New Street, journey time expected to be just over five and a half hours. I chose the two hourly service via Birmingham as I like my journeys to stretch out - but if you like to get there A.S.A.P. then the hourly Glasgow express does the job in just four point five hours
That is often much busier though...
The train was four minutes late departing but it did so with a fairly empty load. Less than a quarter of the seats were taken.
Speaking of seats, I’ll describe one. Nice and large with comically fat armrests and a very decent recline. Leg room is brilliant. Plug socket on the table.
I did enjoy Virgin’s weekend service five times last year but you notice the difference between weekday and weekend massively right from the start.
As soon as I had boarded a customer service assistant marched through the train offering tea, closely followed by one offering coffee. Then a third one follows them taking orders for breakfast. I ordered Eggs Benedict. My brother ordered the full English breakfast.
The train crept out silently of Euston, before I had even lost sight of the long winding platforms two more hosts arrived. One poured me juice, another placed two slices of toast on a designated toast plate and proffer a large basked of spreads.
There is a cloth napkin wrapped around a nice little stainless steel cutlery set consisting of knife, fork, tablespoon and teaspoon. It’s a nice gesture, especially as I’m all to familiar with plastic cutlery from CrossCountry First Class
The toast was quite chewy I won’t lie - but pleasant all the same. Having had the toast as well as a banana and pastry in the lounge I was starting to feel rather full, but shortly before we came into Milton Keynes Central the breakfasts arrived.
This was mine.
I was extremely impressed at the presentation and quality. I was very relieved to say that the bacon was wonderfully lean and not fatty. It was very nice as well.
This is the full English.
I was stuffed by the time I had eaten this, and declined the offer of additional light snacks.
Tea, coffee and juice were refilled every time a member of staff saw a mug empty. After each station the full trolley would swing by and offer a range of cold drinks too. Pepsi (not a favourite of mine as it tastes like a cheap alternative to Coca-Cola), Lemonade, Ginger Ale, etc.
Each first class carriage (4 on 11 car trains, 3 on 9 car trains) has a shelf loaded with bottles of sparkling and still water. You can help yourself.
The Wi-Fi is a pain. You have to sign up twice for it to work I always find. But after you’ve done that it’s reliable (and free in first class)
After departure from Birmingham New Street orders were taken again. I didn’t want anything heavy so I asked if they had any fruit. I had an apple or orange in mind but they went off and came back with a massive fruit salad, alongside a random but nice gesture of Greek yoghurt and honey. I gave my brother the yoghurt because I don’t like dairy products very much. The fruit salad was delicious. Very hard to finish though because an hour ago I’d just had my filling hot meal!
Tea and coffee were offered again twice between Birmingham and Preston. We were delayed by about twenty minutes outside Stafford due to overhead line issues, but I didn’t mind as the seat I was in was so comfortable, I wanted the journey to last as long as possible!
At Lancaster the crew who had changed at Preston offered bacon rolls, toasties or tomato soup. I chose a bacon roll. The bacon was quite fatty to my disgust, so I left most of it.
All passengers were also given nice little chocolate cookies with their light brunches. They also offered further tea and coffee multiple times while we sped through the Lakes. Wow, the scenery is nice. Not as nice as Scotland and it doesn’t touch anywhere like Switzerland or Canada, but considering it’s at 125mph and in England the views through the Lakes are certainly very good!!! The train tilts A LOT though, I enjoy it when my beloved Pendolinos do this but it may cause motion sickness in some people, I don’t know. It is an extremely noticeable tilt - but then again that’s going to happen trademark of my favourite class of train.
The drinks trolley came through after Carlisle. My brother ordered a Pepsi, I had a Ginger Ale. The hostesses dished out pretzels and before we knew it the journey was sadly concluding.
You can check out the Virgin Trains (West Coast) first class menu using the link below.
https://www.virgintrains.co.uk/experience/first-class/menu
So - what were my thoughts this time?
Well, the Pendolino never fails to impress me. I like the first class seats very much, love the train class to bits and don’t mind the smaller windows. But I was really impressed with how quickly food was served and the quality! It was so quick that a passenger going to Milton Keynes enjoyed an Eggs Florentine. Drinks were ridiculously regular, tea and coffee and juice offered a total of nine times during the journey. Obviously I didn’t accept every time, haha. I had two teas over the 5.75 hour journey.
To summarise - breakfast is hot, good quality and comes quickly. It’s fairly small though. Hot drinks flow freely. Cold drinks are regular (about every half hour they come through with the full trolley). Brunch is quite nice, but nothing massively impressive. As for the accommodation, I find it hard to fault it. Personally I find the seat very comfortable, seat is not as hard as on VTEC or GWR first even if it does look less swish. I’ve always found the recline to be good and the moquette traditional and easy on the eye.
That’s today’s trip report. Tomorrow I’ll be criticising the Evening meal service that I received today. I was pleasantly surprised
I am sorry for the lack of photos. I have plenty but some won’t upload
Want to earn a fiver?” Shudder. What a creep...
“I can’t eat that!” I protested, but he suggested putting it in my bag for later.