Last straight before arriving in Croatia, an Austrian flight between Vienna and Croatia in business class.

As a reminder, here is the list of articles related to this trip.

And the visualization of the aerial part:

Ground experience

As I explained in my review of the flight from Paris to Vienna, the connection proved more difficult than expected. Is this an effect of the COVID and a specific circuit set up, but instead of going directly into the non-Shengen zone we had to return to the other end of the airport where the health passes were checked before being able to resume the connecting circuit…the said circuit taking us back to the generic security checks at the terminal entrance instead of staying “airside” and going straight to the border controls.

The lines are quite full, but luckily there’s no one in the priority queue. The problem is that a barrier prevents me from getting there! Technically, you can’t get to the priority checkpoint via the connection circuit. Weird.

That’s when an agent asks me why I’m not moving forward and even going against the flow. I explain and he opens the gate with a big smile.

That’s a good 10 minutes lost on top of the 10 to walk to get here. But still better than 15 more in the other queue.

I hurry towards the “non Shenghen” zone. Arriving at the police checkpoint, I ask an officer if the lounge is located after the checkpoint. She answers yes and tells me “but as you’re in business, go through the priority lane”. And then she opened a barrier leading to a dedicated checkpoint… We were 3 passengers altogether, so it wasn’t too useful, but the attention was appreciated.

So I make my way to the lounge, and my connection, which was supposed to be “comfortable”, has melted away as I wander through the corridors and checks In short, I have 25 minutes maximum.

The lounge

This is the Austrian non-Shengen Business Lounge, which I’ve already presented to you. A pleasant, brightly colored lounge, with a beautiful view and a very acceptable food offer…when you have time to eat.

Boarding in Vienna

My gate is just a few minutes from the lounge and I arrived just before boarding. There’s no time to dawdle at the duty free shop, which we have to get through.

Everywhere the screens indicate that you need a FFP2 mask, but as on my morning flight, we’ll see a dit of everything…and especially FFP1.

The room is packed, so the flight must be full or close to it.

That’s it, I’m on board.

Austrian Airlines A321 business cabin

At first glance, it’s the same cabin as this morning…

I’m thinking it looks a little more faded, but it’s not..it’s just the cabin with the old NEK seat in place on most of the fleet, whereas this morning I was entitled to the brand new Geven ESSENZA seat which will gradually be introduced on all Lufthansa Group medium-haul aircraft.

A seat that immediately looks less premium than the other, and unsurprisingly less comfortable too. Until now, I hadn’t had the chance to test the NEK and Geven back-to-back, which distorted my judgment a little, but now I have.

On the pitch side, the space between the seats is much smaller.

Boarding ends on schedule. There are two rows in business.

Well, it’s time to go.

The flight in business class on Austrian and on-board service

We leave our parking stand and head for the runway. No waiting, we leave right away and after a few minutes the service begins.

I wasn’t expecting an elaborate service given the length of the flight…so I wasn’t disappointed.

Assuming there’s absolutely no sophistication, let’s say this meal was “correct”. The mousse wasn’t bad and the sandwich…neither good nor bad. But despite the short duration of the flight, it’s still very basic for a business class…

A few glasses of water and a coffee later, we start the descent.

The Austrian crew

Professional and friendly. Once again, on a short flight, if mistakes are quickly visible, you can’t really judge qualities.

Arrival in Split

This is undoubtedly the most interesting part of the trip, because of the scenery visible on the approach.

Once on the ground, the taxi to the terminal is short…

And we’ll be parked at a remote stand….

On the other hand, we’ll walk to the terminal, and after a bit of walking through the corridors, we’ll get to the police checkpoints.

Now I’m thinking we’re not out of the woods yet… these passengers are from a flight that arrived before us, so imagine when everyone will be here…

The queues move at very different speeds, and for a simple reason: in addition to passport control, there is a health check based on a form to be submitted online before departure, the receipt for which, in my case, was checked at check-in in Paris in the morning…

But obviously not everyone does, and some take forever to pass the checkpoint.

My turn arrives I hand over my passport, it passes through the reader, the link is made with the form filled in online with my proof of vaccination and 10 seconds later I’m through.

Just goes to show that doing your “homework” before you leave is always useful!

I quickly collect my suitcases and head for the next stop: the Le Meridien Lav Split hotel. But that’s another story.

Bottom line

A decent flight, but in stark contrast to my Paris-Vienna in the morning. No disappointment, but not a great memory either. Add to that the complicated connection…

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