I am sitting in window seat 18A on this Air Canada ‘Rouge’ (Budget offshoot) Airbus A321 aircraft bound for Toronto from Havana. Similar to an earlier flight on this carrier, there are no AV screens, limited legroom, and no included meals except coffee or juice. But today’s flight is reasonably empty so I am able to spread out quite comfortably.

We take-off about 20 mins behind schedule  whilst waiting for the catering to be loaded but the captain decides to leave ASAP resulting in only half the alloted catering onboard.

When the pay-for-meal service comes around, we are shown the limited menu, and being early in the morning, I choose the omelette plate which comes with red-dyed sausages and soggy potato wedges. The cost is CAD 11, is pretty bad, and I end up leaving half the meal.

I decide against watching anything from my iPad, and instead look at the view of the USA far below (its as close as I will get to physically entering the USA having no desire to do so….), whilst flicking through a Jeffrey Archer novel I picked up from the laundry at the Ashram in the Bahamas.

We manage to land a few minutes ahead of schedule.

Rating: 7.5/10