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Virgin Atlantic's Big News: Sexy New Clubhouse, Sexy New Seats, Sexy New S & P Shakers

When some sweet airline news comes down the pipeline, we get a little shiver of a thrill. The latest carrier to give us those goosebumps of expectation is Virgin Atlantic, as they've got a slew of updates hitting the sky later this year:

· New Upper Class seats, coming Spring 2012.

100 million GBP. That's how much Virgin Atlantic is laying out to get you all laid out in "enhanced" Upper Class seats and enjoying all their spring 2012 upgrades. While we don't yet know specifics like seat width, gadgets or even the design, we do know that the seats will debut on the airline's London-New York route in just a few months. Following this, VS planes will get the Upper Class refresh throughout the world, over a period of three years. Stay tuned, since details can't be kept secret much longer.

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Which Airlines Will Be Getting Which Upgrades in 2012

It seems that a good number of airlines have decided to use this brand-spanking new year to freshen up their cabins and revamp service offerings. With a few recent announcements from various global carriers such as Cathay Pacific, Brussels Airlines and Virgin Australia, 2012 will be the year to make air travel look snappy and smell fresh...again. Here's who's doing what:

· AirBerlin:
As the second largest German air carrier and a member of Oneworld, Air Berlin will be upgrading the entire long-haul fleet of Airbus 330s. New business class seats that recline to just about flat and thinner, more user friendly economy seats will be aboard their planes. The new interiors will be ready for the summer travel season.

· British Airways:
With all our hoopla from recent BA flights, it seems that the airline is not only upgrading service. Starting at the front of the plane a few years ago, overhauls have finally made it to World Traveler Plus and World Traveler. That's premium economy and economy for the uninitiated.

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In-Flight Cocktail of the Month: Virgin Atlantic's 'Virgin Kiss'

As many already know, we have a serious obsession with airline cocktails, and so much is our passion that we've created a whole first-Friday-of-the-month feature called In-Flight Cocktail of the Month, which highlights the special concoctions that flight attendants whip up with only a cocktail shaker, some tiny liquor bottles and a whole lot of hope that it won't make you drunk and unruly.

Up until now, Virgin Atlantic's In-Flight Cocktail of the Month accolades have been the liquidy soundtrack to our past two summers. But a cocktail is for life, not just the hot months, so for December we're warming up with the SFO Clubhouse's signature cocktail: the Virgin Kiss.

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Shocker! Virgin Atlantic's Economy Food is Actually Pretty Decent

You may remember we told you a little while back about a rather underwhelming experience in Virgin Atlantic's economy class from London to Vegas. Luckily, we're pleased to report the food was much, much better.

First, a bit of background. This member of Jaunted is not a fan of airline food—even in business class. We were also seriously unimpressed with the meals consumed in premium economy a couple of years back, with the exception of a recent excellent Full English Breakfast. Alas, we still didn't have much hope for economy.

But what do you know...for economy, it was actually very decent.

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Lufthansa, United and Virgin Atlantic Bring Plenty of New Routes to New Places

Sometimes it’s hard to stay on top of all the new route announcements that come our way, so we’ve complied a little bit of a rundown below. As long as you can afford the fares, this should definitely help add to your passport stamp collection.

· Virgin Atlantic:
Sir Richard Branson and his airline are coming to Canada, so you better get ready for a party filled with Mounties and maple syrup. Virgin Atlantic is adding its very first Canadian destination, as the airline is going to link up London-Heathrow with Vancouver beginning on May 24 of next year.

The idea is to utilize some of their Airbus A340s four times per week with the capacity to send around 240 passengers back and forth. Right now the plan is to just keep the option around until like the middle of October, as the airline is trying to get as many people as possible into the United Kingdom for next year’s Olympics. Hopefully—for Canadians and Londoners—the route will do well and Sir Richard will let it stick around.

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Virgin Atlantic's Complimentary Welcome Cocktails Finally Hit Economy

For a year and a half, we've featured an In-Flight Cocktail of the Month and managed to get mighty tipsy in the process. Over the course the last 18+ months, one airline has had the most stand-out cocktails worthy of the feature and that is Virgin Atlantic with their Virgin Redhead, "New" New York Sour and Indian Summer.

Free drinks on flights? Awesome, right? Well, not so awesome if you're flying economy because the free cocktails were limited to meal service. A change in the economy menu, announced this week, now brings a complimentary welcome cocktail to those in the back of the plane.

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The Little Virgin Galactic Surprise in Virgin Atlantic's Heathrow Clubhouse

Where in the world is Richard Branson? He's in the Mojave Desert today, for the official dedication of Spaceport America, the base and building for all the fun of Virgin Galactic.

Here's the thing, though—Spaceport America has already been "open" now since May, when their three-hour tours began. Today was just all the official pomp and circumstance, plus a little show-off flight from SpaceShipTwo and WhiteKnightTwo.

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Virgin Atlantic Tries This Biofuel Thing Again, But Without a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts

Branson and Al Gore at a past eco-event in 2007

Virgin CEO Richard Branson has had a busy day. Earlier in London, he gathered Virgin employees together at Battersea Power Station to announce that a new low-carbon fuel was being developed for use in powering Virgin Atlantic planes. It'd be "just half the carbon footprint of the standard fossil fuel alternative" and hopefully pushing planes through the sky from Shanghai and Delhi to London as soon as 2014.

It's kind of a big deal, and it means that Branson has given up on his earlier idea of creating jet fuel from coconut oil. This new stuff will be made from "waste gases from industrial steel production being captured, fermented and chemically converted using Swedish Biofuels technology." Intense! It's not just throwing garbage into the flux capacitor!

Alas, Virgin Atlantic isn't anywhere near alone on the Biofuels technology front...

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Inside the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse at SFO

There are airport lounges, and then there are Virgin Atlantic Clubhouses—the type of lounge that makes you pray for a flight delay. Happily, when we scored access to the Clubhouse at San Francisco International Airport the other week, we were early for our flight. Unhappily, it left on time. Here’s what we found.

The room is bright and airy, overlooking the runway like most lounges. But unlike most, it’s sexy. Take the vast bar, for example—it’s colored an icy blue, and takes up about half the length of the (lengthy) room. Propping up the bar is even more appealing when there’s a shelf of travel guides to flick through, too. Over by the window, facing the bar, is a row of armchairs.

There aren’t many snacks scattered around—just a plate of fruit and cookies at the bar—but, instead, the end section of the lounge works as a restaurant, with a cluster of TVs to watch while you wait for your table service, and pictures of pinups if you’re bored by the telly. By the window down that end are sofas, which also get table service. Windows have blue and pink-tinted filters over them, which is weird at first but quite soothing.

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Inside the Virgin Holidays V-Room Lounge at London's Gatwick Airport

It’s not often that we fly business class these days so it’s not often that we get the chance to hit up an airport lounge. But when we flew to Vegas last week, we were on a package with Virgin Holidays – the UK package company that’s part of the Virgin group. And Virgin Holidays is all about the little people – so it has its own lounge for economy passengers at Gatwick airport, the v-room.

Any Virgin Holidays customer can purchase a pass to the lounge for £20 (£12 for kids). For that price, you get free food, WiFi, seating, newspapers, a games room and telescopes to gawk at the runway (the floor to ceiling windows help with that too). Or, if you’ve booked a package staying in one of their Platinum (premium) hotels, your access is free.

We toured the v-room when it opened a couple of years ago, and were very impressed – so we were looking forward to seeing how it’s withstood the test of time. The answer? Extremely well.

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Virgin Atlantic Doesn't Always Bring the Sexy Back to Economy Class

Some things, sometimes, we take for granted when we travel longhaul. That we will over-indulge on sub-par food. That we will overimbibe so that we snore a little when we finally drop off. And that we will inevitably be sat next to an armrest grabber with an aversion to showers. But at least we will catch up on all the movies we meant to see over the past couple of months on our on-demand seatback TV.

So far, so predictable. Until we boarded our 10.5-hour flight from London-Gatwick to Las Vegas last week and realized that, yes, there were seatback TVs, but no, they were not on demand. There were 10 channels, with each one continually screening the same film on repeat. There were also about four music channels.

How very 1998! In this day and age, if you’re going to subject yourself to the indignities of patdowns, immigration lines and flatulent neighbors, the very least an airline can do is take your mind off it with your own TV set. But who was the culprit? Useless Continental? Snooty British Airways? Please-don’t-let-my-booking-be-with-them US Airways?

No, it was Virgin Atlantic.

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In-Flight Cocktail of the Month: Virgin Atlantic's 'Indian Summer'

As many already know, we have a serious obsession with airline cocktails, and so much is our passion that we've created a whole first-Friday-of-the-month feature called In-Flight Cocktail of the Month, which highlights the special concoctions that flight attendants whip up with only a cocktail shaker, some tiny liquor bottles and a whole lot of hope that it won't make you drunk and unruly.

You can probably guess this, but the lushes at Virgin Atlantic have one of the best airline cocktails menus out there, with some 15-ish choices and and even full bars at their airport Clubhouses. If you just happen to hop the pond on Virgin, you can toast and tipple with a "New" New York Sour, but London gets to join in on the fun as well.

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