Air Canada celebrates relaunch of Montreal Rouge service
Staff, crew and travel agents celebrated the relaunch of Air Canada’s three-times weekly seasonal Rouge service from Lisbon to Montreal’s Montréal-Trudeau airport on Friday.
The service from Lisbon to Montreal will restart on 1 June.
The official launch of the service which runs until October 2019 using a Boeing 767-300 aircraft had been celebrated in June last year at Aerporto Humberto Delgado in Lisbon, but an open-airparty was held at the Lisbon Marriott Hotel with entertainments that included a 70s disco and rodeo machine which most brave participants struggled to remain in their saddles for more than two minutes!
On hand to welcome guests was Maximiliano Campos, Country Manager for Portugal and Spain who later in the evening oversaw a prize raffle in which two tickets to Toronto were won by Ana Duarte of travel agency Top Atlântico, Avenida da Igreja branch in Lisbon.The consolation prize went to Pedro Melo of Top Atlântico, Avenida de Roma branch.
In April this year flights began on its Air Canada Rouge service (announced in February) with the reintroduction of the Rouge product with seating capacity for up to 282 passengers.
Rouge, a Leisure airline, offers two classes of service – Economy and Premium with differentiated services such as wider seats, check-in, priority boarding and on-board meals.
A subsidiary of Air Canada, Rouge was originally launched in 2012 with services beginning in 2013 and serving primarily leisure destinations in Europe, the Caribbean, South America, Central America, Mexico and the US.
Also this month, Air Canada won two top prizes at the Global Traveler 2019 Leisure Lifestyle Awards honouring the best in the world of leisure lifestyle travel. The carrier was voted ‘Best Premium Economy Class’ and ‘Best for Onboard Entertainment’ by readers of the travel magazine. It has also won the Skytrax award as Best Airline in North America and Best Business Class in North America by Trip Advisor in 2019.
It has also partnered with the Portuguese restaurant chain Montreal’s Ferreira Group to bring travel and Portuguese food together in food-centric vacations through Air Canada Vacations (ACV) with the aim of creating gastronomy vacations.
“We are very excited about our partnership with Air Canada Vacations. You can now travel to Portugal and take part in one of two distinct food-centric vacations. Upon arriving all you have to do is hit the road and follow the gastronomic adventure planned for you”, says Sandra Ferreira, Operations Director at the Ferreira Group. “Whether it’s a cooking workshop in Faro, a kayak tour in Lagos, or a Tuk Tuk through Lisbon, from one yummy stop to the next, it’s a food-centric escape you’ll never forget!”
Air Canada offers weekly flights from Canada to Portugal, including six direct flights per week from Toronto Pearson airport to Lisbon and four flights per week to Porto, as well as three seasonal flights per week from Montreal to Lisbon.