It’s early in the evening on Christmas Day and I’m back at the airport and on my way to Amsterdam again. Everywhere is eerily quiet. There’s hardly anybody on the airport bus and I don’t think I can remember the last time I saw Basel airport quite so deserted.

Check-In

The check-in area in the French sector is completely empty. There’s one guy manning the only open SkyTeam counter. He’s talking to a guy in a high-vis jacket sitting comfortably on the luggage belt, and both of them are very obviously bored to tears. They look up hopefully when they see me approaching, but quickly realise I’m only there to take a photo.

Swissport Aspire Lounge

The lounge is no different to the rest of the airport. There are just a few passengers milling about, but they disperse in the immensity of the lounge – well, except for the one pesky little kid with his incompetent parents. He’s busy running around like a blue arsed fly while his parents make a feeble attempt to stop him.

Boarding

My flight is boarding from gate 37, which appears to be the new designated KLM gate here in Basel. Originally, the flight today should have been operated by an E 175, but was switched to the larger E 190 just a few days prior. I’m not sure I fully understand why, though, given that our flight today is only about half full, so that the smaller aircraft would have sufficed.

The Cabin & Seat

There is one row of Business Class on the flight. However, the forward cabin remains empty. From what I understand, KLM has completed refurbishing the cabin on the E 1 aircraft, to align the hardware with that on the E 2. I am seated on 2F, and the seat pitch is very good.

The Service & Crew

I think I’ve finally come across the KLM equivalent of a black swan – a crappy crew. There are two young females working the cabin, and they’re very obviously not in a good mood. I’m even wondering if they were called from a standby shift to do this flight. In any case, they’re doing the absolute minimum. They’re not rude, but friendly is definitely different to the way they are behaving.

The service consists of a choice of soft drink and one of the famous KLM sandwiches. I actually forget to take a photo of the sandwich. It completely escapes my mind, and I don’t realise until I’m dabbing at the corner of my mouth with the napkin.

Arrival in Amsterdam

Our flight time to Amsterdam is one hour. As a result, we arrive in Schiphol 26 minutes early. It’s a very short taxi to our stand at gate B 16, which is quite unusual as the Basel flights tend to be assigned a remote stand.

Transfer in Amsterdam

From the B concourse I make my way to immigration on the D concourse. The airport is definitely livelier that Basel, but certainly not as crowded as it was when I passed through on my way back from Budapest.