Writers note: really hope all the views and lack of replies are due to yall being so stunned you can't actually formulate a response, and not due to me sucking at writing a TR. If it's the latter, please let me know and I won't bore you all in the future.
The next morning and Phuket Airport (HKT)
I woke up pretty sleepily and was happy I had packed the night before. I threw on some clothes I’d wind up wearing for far too long and headed to the lobby. I was checked out in a fraction of the time it took to check in. I handed over all the Thai Baht I could find and charged the balance to my new Hilton CC. Once I had finished check out, the woman directed me to the waiting Toyota to take me to the airport. We loaded up straight from the check in lobby (as opposed to having to take the shuttle van/bus/trolley/whatever to the front arrivals lobby) and were off! The driver was anti-chatty which was fine by me at a pre 6 am time. I was dropped at HKT right around the time Silk Air opened their check in counters.
Thoughts on HKT
The first thought that comes to mind is “dump”. There is a Burger King and Subway landside, and a bunch of trinket shops airside. Once airside, the seats aren’t comfortable and the carpet and everything looks absolutely ancient. Thankfully I had access to the lounge though Priority Pass.
Donation box....for what??
Coral Lounge @ HKT
This is one of the crappier lounges I’ve been to in the PP system, which is fitting given the airport its in. It’s tucked in the corner of the departures area, and feels moderately like a fish bowl since the walls on 2 sides are glass and allow you to watch the people deplane from international flights.
The biggest annoyance was a screaming kid and its bigger brother that their parents didn't pay any attention to. Thankfully their flight was shortly after I entered, and my headphones and Spotify helped bridge the time.
Food is pretty meh. Lots of fruit and other things of non-substance. There was fried rice. I remember that. There were also cans of Chang, Tiger, and Coke. I stuck to coffee from the machine given the early hour. That and it was pretty good.
See the arriving passengers...
Dumpy terminal
MI749, HKT-SIN
In contrast to the full flight we had down here, the load factor on the return was probably 20%. I think there was all of 1 person in business class. They handed out Singaporean newspapers to people on request.
Similar to the flight down, breakfast, inflight PDE, and power plugs. I had a bloody mary to go along with my breakfast and it was all pretty tasty. Beyond that, there is very little to say. It was a very pleasant, virtually empty flight.
Transit in SIN
Having just been here, I headed straight to the lounge for more food and some cans of Tiger. This time I hit up the SATS lounge since I didn’t want to change terminals to go to Skyview Lounge. The hot food was pretty good and I spent much of the time using a real computer.
SQ916, SIN-MNL
Our ride!
In contrast to my prior SQ flight, this was on an Airbus A350 compared with a Boeing. I thought the A330 seat was way more comfortable as the Boeing one was a bit hard. Similar to the flight from HKT, loads were incredibly light on this flight. There were probably 10 pax in the economy mini-cabin I was in. Lunch was a shrimp salad, with wok fried beef and rice with veggies. It was very good.
Load in the front economy cabin (taken post-take off)
Lunch, which was very tasty.
IFE setup on the A330
Transit at MNL
Since SQ uses T3 at NAIA, while UA uses T1, I got to clear customs/immigration and get another stamp, collect my bag and go to the terminal transfer area. NAIA runs a shuttle bus on some undefined schedule between the terminals that runs airside compared with outside the airport. I had to wait 20-30 minutes for it to show up at T3, and then it was another 15 minutes to get to T1. It drops you at the departures drop off. You need an itinerary to get into the terminal building and then they put your bag through the xray machine.
The UA line was out of control. Between the flights to Koror and Guam, and the fact that the lines weren’t open yet, it took about 45 minutes to get my bag checked and get BPs. I went to the terminal fee desk and based on a tip from
BangkokFlyer understood that you are no longer required to pay the fee if you are a transit pax with <24 hrs. I said this to the fee dude, handed over my inbound SQ BP, he looked really confused for a moment, stapled the old BP to my outgoing BP, and I was off without paying the fee.
Sorry for the blurry pic, this is the UA line.
Miascor Lounge
So as you can tell, T1 is a dump compared to T3. Many of the international airlines have abandoned T1 for T3. I assume UA hasn’t because of cost reasons, but maybe I’m wrong. I got into the lounge and they kept my BP and handed me a numbered card with a United logo taped to it to reclaim my BP when I left. This was a new one for me, but after an hour of trying to check in I was so thirsty I didn’t care to figure it out.
Thankfully they had my good friend Jack Daniels and his buddy Coke Light in ready supply. With one of those in hand I took time to survey the lounge. Holy packed. And without sufficient AC. After a few minutes somebody turned on a couple of fans, and even better, once the Saudia flight was called, about 2/3 of the people cleared out. The boarding announcements in the lounge are made by one of the employees who walks in a circle calling out “United flight XX, now boarding”. Her voice was far nicer than the normal PA.
The interesting part was going to the bathroom. It is located just outside to the left as you exit the lounge. There wasn’t any running water, anywhere, due to a "temporary water interruption". If you wanted water, there was a barrel with scoops available.
#fancybathrooms #notatChangianymore
I decided to grab some dinner from the buffet and chose the chicken of some kind with rice. It was actually pretty good. Since I had a good 3 hrs in the lounge I was busy googling what to do with a 7 hr layover at NRT, and chatted with a dude continuing on with Royal Brunei. He had recently come from NYC in SQ Business, so I was just a little jealous.
After that I got to chatting to a gentleman on my flight to GUM, but he was going to HNL to connect back to SFO. After spending quite a while in the lounge, our boarding time came and went, but since they announced in the lounge I didn’t worry about it. A little bit later, the woman walked in a circle announcing “United flight XXX to Guam, now boarding”
Food. The thing on the left is an attempt at a mini-pizza (not very good) while the chicken and rice was pretty tasty.
A half full lounge
At the gate, it was like TSA theater gone moronic. Despite having already gone through security, they wanted to look through all carry on bags, and then passing that, you went to the shoe dude where you sit in a chair, he takes off your shoes and looks in them before putting them back on. Low cost of labor countries sure find interesting tasks…
We boarded probably 30 minutes late due to a medical passenger taking longer than scheduled to board.
UA184, MNL-GUM
I slept pretty much the whole flight, since I’d been up for some unknown number of hours and had a few whisky beverages in the lounge. They served a meal. I slept through it. Aforementioned buddy going to SFO said it wasn’t very good, when we crossed paths deplaning.
Guam. Again.
Seeing as how I did the whole GUM transit thing a week before, I quickly got through immigration and customs, all while collecting yet another visa code that I don’t understand. Time was important since I originally had a 70 minute connection, which had been cut given our late departure. Thankfully Precheck was open at TSA and I got to the gate with boarding already underway.
#whatdoesthismean?
UA828, GUM-NRT
Arriving mid boarding, I went down the Group 2 lane and boarded quickly. I really hoped for an empty seat next to me in this 2-5-2 layout 777. Alas it didn’t happen, but at least my seatmate was a semi-normal American who worked teaching English in Japan. For this flight, I was awake long enough to eat breakfast and go back to sleep. It’s not like there was anything else to do.
UA Y breakfast: scrambled eggs with fried rice and fruit
Arrival at NRT
We arrived at NRT on time and at this point I realized a fault in my packing. I’d packed for the beach and warm weather, since Manila, Singapore, and Thailand are all warm. Japan…isn’t warm. At all. Looking back right now, the high on Feb 7 was approx. 50 degrees F. Now keep in mind I’m wearing jeans and a t-shirt. I realize I’m going to be cold. But what kind of insane traveler would I be if I let being cold stand in my way of visiting Japan for a few hours?!?!
I only had a few minute wait to get through immigration and then I was on the other side. I converted a little bit of USD to Yen since I’d read the machines are cash only (which was then confirmed at the machine!).
Up next: Narita City, me looking like an unprepared idiot in a t-shirt, and some eel for lunch!