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Taken May 2000 from London Gatwick to Dalaman

As often happens with UK charter airlines, the Air Atlanta plane was subcontracted because of routine maintenance or operational problems with their own fleet. It was a surprise to be flown the three and a half hours to Turkey on a massive Boeing 747, but two LGW/Dalaman flights were combined on it with no problems.

Seating was charter-pitch (3-4-3 across the main part of the plane, which is not great for fat bums), but everything was clean and in good order, for a 30-year old aircraft.

It was the CREW that made the difference - bright, outgoing, fully fluent in English and completely helpful. Compare that to the two crew members of the actual British Charter airline (shan't name it for fear of libel) who were on board to 'supervise and provide consistency', but ignored the whole proceedings and sat upstairs in the business cabin throughout the flight.

Food and drink had been supplied by the original charter carrier, and were fine.

On the return leg, the two narrow-bodied flights combined aboard the AIA 747 were from different airports, the passengers due to fly from Bodrum had been bussed to join us at Dalaman, and were not best pleased about it - but the flight, food, service and punctuality (they were using the Dalaman and Gatwick slots planned for our original flight) were fine.