April 28, 2004
Cathay Pacific CX 292 FCO-HKG (ticketed as QF 3860)
Scheduled: 12:45 - 06:35
Actual: 12:45 - 06:20
747-400 B-HUA seats 36A/B
After five and a half wonderful weeks it was time to start the long journey home. We took the train from Termini station to the airport for EUR 9 each. The platform for the airport train is a long way from the main station concourse, in fact the walk took us around ten minutes. Luckily we had left plenty of time so it wasn't a problem, but I'm sure many people miss it every day due to the unexpected distance. The train itself was unique among the Italian trains that we travelled on, in that it was spacious, had a large luggage rack, and plenty of overhead luggage space as well.
When we arrived at FCO we found the Cathay Pacific check-in desk quickly, and proceeded to the business class queue. There was a sign behind the desk advising people to put film in their hand luggage. I had mentioned this to
MrsStevePER2B weeks earlier, but she didn't believe me. I resisted the opportunity to say "I told you so" while she rummaged through her suitcase for films to transfer to hand luggage. Once that was done, a man checked that we were in the right place, and pointed us towards the business class queue (rather than the empty First Class queue). We only had one person in front of us, so once again check-in was rapid. Our bags were checked all the way through to PER despite the 17 hour transit in HKG. The agent commented on our business class upgrade on the HKG-PER sector, and accordingly put business class tags on our luggage. She also gave us a
map of the airport to help us find our way from the terminal C check-in desks back through security in terminal B, then back to terminal C again.
Going through security was unremarkable, but as we went through passport control we saw an Israeli man who was in a slight panic. Apparently he had remained outside the departures area until his flight was boarding, then passed through security and now had a 10 minute queue for passport control. The time was 10:56. His flight was at 11:00. He went straight to the front of the queue, but we don't know whether he made his flight or not.
We found the global tax refund place at the end of the terminal to claim back our tax from a couple of purchases in Ireland. First we had to get our forms stamped by customs, then presented them at the adjacent desk to claim the cash (a princely sum of EUR 1). To get rid of our change, I bought a Wilbur Smith book for the exorbitant price of EUR 17, while
MrsStevePER2B spent her EUR 1 refund on chocolate.
We found the BA lounge, but were told that we weren't entitled to use it if we travelling on CX. I strongly suspect that this is untrue, but it was a reasonable suggestion in any case as our gate was a substantial distance away. FCO terminal C seems quite unusual to me, since it is split into two parts with a shuttle train between them. We took the shuttle train, then wandered around a while before we found the "Le Anfore" lounge.
The desk agent was reluctant to let us in with my Qantas Silver (oneworld Ruby) card, despite the overwhelming evidence of having "oneworld Sapphire" printed on my boarding pass. She consulted with two other desk staff before eventually relenting and letting us in.
The lounge is disappointing compared with others I've been to. There's plenty of comfortable seating with a few Italian newspapers to read. The serviced bar has Coca-Cola, Coca-Cola Light, Fanta, one beer (Nastro Azzurro), wine, and spirits. The lounge also has showers which I didn't investigate. There was a small collection of mystery sandwiches at the bar.
When the monitors in the lounge showed our flight was boarding, we left the lounge and walked to the gate. The queue was fairly long at this point but was shortening rapidly. We found our seats (36A/B) and made ourselves as comfortable as possible. My impression was that there was slightly more legroom than in the BA 744 we had flown on SIN-LHR. From my window seat I could see some exotic sights (to me anyway), aircraft from Air Moldova and Albanian Airlines.
We took off on time and I explored the inflight entertainment options. I settled on half an hour of news, a world sports show, and a Discovery Channel documentary about Jordan. Dinner was served during this time, I had a very tasty chicken stir-fry dish with "oriental vegetables" consisting of carrot and brocolli.
The lights went off shortly after the dinner service was completed (around 4pm Rome time). It was at this point that I realised how horrible the timing of this flight was. I honestly can't imagine it being any worse.
We were given a fairly minimal amenties kit, the contents of which are
pictured here. It consisted of socks (these ones fitted me, unlike the tiny BA socks), toothbrush, toothpaste, and a lanyard.
A couple of hours later a slight snack serviced was served. These snacks were served in a basket to those passengers who weren't asleep (the majority I imagine). I selected a sandwich (which turned out to be ham and cheese) and some biscuits. The sandwich was good.
The lights came back on at 03:30 Hong Kong time (21:30 Rome), and breakfast was served at 04:00. I selected the breakfast cold cuts, while
MrsStevePER2B chose "Scrambled Egg with Pork Sausage, Hash Brown Potato and Baked Beans". There were no baked beans in it. Both breakfasts were served with orange juice, fruit, yoghurt (banana flavoured) and a bread roll.
We arrived in Hong Kong 15 minutes early at 06:20.
MrsStevePER2B and I headed straight through immigration since our bags were checked all the way through to Perth. The queue was very short. We got changed in the toilets, and then left some of our luggage at the left luggage counter on the ground floor, which cost HK$50 for the day. Then we found the train and took it into the centre of Hong Kong for HK$200 return. The train takes about 25 minutes, and is fast and efficient.
Our original thoughts were that 17 hours in Hong Kong would give us the chance to see another destination without the expense of a proper stopover (which our cheap fare didn't allow anyway). In hindsight the timing of our FCO-HKG flight made this a bad idea. We desperately wanted sleep, and six hours or so in a hotel would have done wonders.