Confused about planes/comfort

The problem with going with Air Canada is if you have a non-stop YYZ-BCN or YUL-BCN flight, it will actually be on Air Canada Rouge, their low-cost, sardine-can carrier. 29" seat pitch. To be avoided like the plague in your situation...

I should have known. Guess I was fooled by their marketing to think it would be a good way to travel. I must have been looking at the E prem in error.

Meg,

When I read changing table I thought the same thing. Phew!

If you're looking at having to come up through Toronto anyway, you might want to take a minute and look at Air Transat. Their economy is pretty standard, but their higher level seats (Club class) are great. We flew to Gatwick using them and it was one of the best flights we had ever had (albeit in our limited experience) and at the time, it was about the same price as a regular economy flight on AC.

Of course, that doesn't guarantee anything in your case, but it might be worth a look see. One thing to bear in mind, AT only flies to BCN on certain days and in only certain months (tourist season) and you may have to switch terminals at Toronto, depending on your flight.

The last transatlantic flight we did was on BA, which had good service and the new Dreamliner is a nice plane, but we had to get exit row seats (DH is tall, too). So the seats are narrower than standard economy seats as the armrests don't move, which was a real problem for me. I'm a little hippy and have an old hip injury to boot so it was a very uncomfortable flight for me. We're just lucky we looked at SeatGuru, so we knew not to get the seat right next to the door, it had no legroom at all due to the jut out for the door frame. It did work very nicely for the petite little woman who sat next to me for our flight. She curled up and slept wedged between her seat and door frame the whole way across :rolleyes:.

While the differences between economy class on long-haul flights many not be as substantial as it is in Business class, it's definitely there. I've only flown 4 airlines in business class across the Atlantic (Air India, Air France, Austrian, and Iberia) and yes, Austrian (OS) is by far the best.

For Economy, there are still some real differences. For example, Swiss (LX) has 32" seat pitch and seats that recline quite a bit so you can sleep. Austrian (OS) on the other hand, has some B763s flying which only have 30" pitch and it's rather tight with poor recline. I've flown Air Berlin (AB) too and while the inflight service was wonderful, I couldn't catch a wink of sleep on an overnight flight.

Most US-based airlines (except US Airways) offer extra-legroom products on most of their Transatlantic flights. American has Main Cabin Extra (MCE), Delta has Economy Comfort (EC), and United has Economy Plus (E+). I have not flown in EC but am generally quite happy in MCE or E+. If you can snag an exit row or bulkhead (infant in bassinet notwithstanding), you can often have a lot of legroom and be even more comfortable than the extra-legroom seats. The upgrade prices for these seats are often quite reasonable (e.g. $100 each way). Of the US legacies, Delta probably offers the best service in Economy. Personally, while I have both AA and US long-haul flights coming up later this year and have status so I get really good seats for free, I still end up on European and Middle Eastern airlines a lot because they offer competitive fares and have better Economy class service than US-based airlines.

Many European airlines have Premium Economy products (BA's World Traveller Plus, Air France on some flights, Lufthansa on some flights, etc., SAS Economy Comfort, KLM Economy Comfort) which are a separate class of service between Economy and Business. Personally, I don't find the pricing for these products to be worthwhile but some people do.

You've been offered some good advice in this thread but for most people who travel the world in Economy, there is a difference.