dat4life

The only certain thing in life is change. For us here on FlyerTalk, we’ve enjoyed many years of earning and using points and miles with relative ease. Through the years, we’ve been through a devaluation or two here and there. But certainly nothing like we’ve seen over the past 12 months, when seemingly every major airline picked up an ax and gave their respective frequent flyer programs a thousand blows and then some. While I’m not happy about it, I’m not bitter either. Ultimately, airlines are businesses whose sole responsibility is providing maximum return to their shareholders. If they make a few people happy in the process, that’s great. If they piss a few people off and still churn a good profit, that’s great too. At the end of the day, shareholders don’t care if customers are happy. All they want to know is, “Where my money at?” Heck, even legacy U.S. carriers understand that now. It only took them a decade or three of hemorrhaging money to figure that out. With the “ax of devaluation” continuing to fall on programs around the world, it was high time to use up my points and miles balances.

Other than visiting relatives in Hong Kong, I really had no specific destination in mind for my trip. Naturally, as a primarily oneworld flyer, my airline of choice across the Pacific is Cathay Pacific. Cathay was historically incredibly generous with premium cabin award space, but they’ve become much stingier in the last 12 months. So when I found two First Class seats from Los Angeles to Hong Kong and returning to San Francisco on the dates I needed, I immediately ticketed those flights.

A week later, I was talking to a friend who had just gotten back from a trip from Australia. She was raving about how wonderful it was, which piqued my interest. Out of curiosity I took a look at award space to/from Australia. As expected, Qantas premium cabin award space between Australia and the U.S. was non-existent. However, there was sporadic First Class availability between Sydney and Hong Kong, on the A380 to boot. Since American does not allow awards from North America to Australia to be routed through Asia, this flight was on a separate award, thus costing me an extra 45,000 AAdvantage miles. The price tag sounds steep, but consider the distance between Sydney and Hong Kong, which is 4,581 miles to be exact. In contrast, New York JFK lies just 3,451 miles away from London Heathrow, and a First Class award between those two cities would cost a hefty 62,500 miles. Anyways, so I figured, “YOLO”, and promptly booked the award.

I left those tickets alone for a few months before finally looking for ways to piece the rest of my trip together. Despite the United’s massive devaluation last November, there are still some sweet spots on their award chart. One of these sweet spots is from Japan to Australia, which costs just 55,000 miles in First Class. Thai Airways had a ton of First Class availability from Japan to Sydney, via Bangkok. Thai is an airline I have not flown before, and after reading trip report after trip report raving about their First Class ground services at Bangkok, I really wanted to give them a whirl. So it was a no brainer. After a couple of clicks on united.com (one of the few nice things at United), my ticket was booked.

For quite some time, my grandparents had been pining to go back Indonesia, where they grew up and where many of our relatives still reside, and to China, where they have a flat not terribly far from Guangzhou. I had preemptively booked them on Cathay Business Class on the outbound to Jakarta using my AAdvantage miles, and their return on Air China using MileagePlus miles back in November 2013. But their health deteriorated a bit afterwards. Though their health has since improved significantly in the months leading up to their departure date, my family and I were apprehensive about them making the trip. But since they may never have another chance to make such a trip again, we let it go. Now that my grandparent’s trip was officially a go, I juggled around my own itinerary, including dropping a few days in Beijing, in order to spend a week with them in China. To complete the trip and pick up my Tokyo to Sydney ticket, I topped off my MileagePlus account with a few thousand Ultimate Reward points and booked an award from Guangzhou to Tokyo on Asiana.

I added a New York to Los Angeles segment on my outbound once American opened premium cabin Saver award space on their new A321T, and bought a cheap revenue ticket to New York to pick up the award ticket. But two days before departure, JAL released a First Class award seat on their daily JFK to Tokyo Narita service. While I wanted to experience American’s new transcon premium product, 14 hours in JAL First Class was far more enticing. To boot, Cathay Pacific was running a couple of three class flights between Hong Kong and Tokyo Narita, one of which timed perfectly to connect from the JFK flight. I rang American’s reservations desk, and an agent happily made the change and reissued the ticket. Simply brilliant. I love it when a great itinerary comes together!

My final itinerary looked like this:

American Airlines 1172 Houston Intercontinental to Dallas/Fort Worth McDonnell Douglas MD-83
American Airlines 64 Dallas/Fort Worth to New York JFK Boeing 737-800 Economy
Japan Airlines 5 New York JFK to Tokyo Narita Boeing 777-300ER First Class
Cathay Pacific Airways 505 Tokyo Narita to Hong Kong 747-400 First Class
Dragonair 782 Hong Kong to Guangzhou Airbus A330-300 Economy Class
Asiana Airways 356 Guangzhou to Seoul Incheon Airbus A321-100 Business Class
Asiana Airways 106 Seoul Incheon to Tokyo Narita Boeing 747-400 Combi Business Class
Thai Airways 683 Tokyo Haneda to Bangkok Boeing 747-400 First Class
Thai Airways 475 Bangkok to Sydney Boeing 747-400 First Class
Qantas Airways 127 Sydney to Hong Kong Airbus A380-800 First Class
Cathay Pacific Airways 882 Hong Kong to Los Angeles Boeing 777-300ER First Class
American Eagle 3650 Los Angeles to Houston Intercontinental Bombardier CRJ-700 First Class

All of this for 160,000 AAdvantage miles, 75,000 MileagePlus miles, 4,500 Avios, and ~$300 for the aforementioned revenue ticket as well as taxes and fees

I booked my hotels using a combination of points and certificates from Marriott Rewards and Hilton HHonors. Rather than lengthen this already rambling introductory post even more, I’ll just detail that in each individual section.

So sit back, relax, and grab a drink. And come join me on this 33,047 mile journey to celebrate the golden age of frequent flyer programs one last time.


Here I Go Again: American Airlines First Class IAH-DFW and Economy DFW-JFK; Hyatt Place New York Midtown South
Something New: JAL First Class Lounge JFK; JAL First Class JFK-NRT
Paying Homage to the Queen: Cathay Pacific Airways First Class NRT-HKG
It’s Always a Good Time: Holiday Inn Express Soho; Exploring Hong Kong
Family Detour: Cathay Pacific The Bridge Lounge HKG; Dragon Air Economy Class HKG-CAN
Faster Than a Speeding Bullet: My First Bullet Train; Renaissance Wuhan
Chaos Central: Exploring Wuhan
Seoul Searching: Asiana Airlines Business Class CAN-ICN-NRT; Asiana Airlines Business Class Lounge Seoul; Exploring Seoul
Fast and Furious Tokyo: Conrad Tokyo; Exploring Tokyo
Thai Hospitality: Thai Airways First Class HND-BKK-SYD; BKK First Class Lounge
An Adventure Down Under: Sydney Harbour Marriott at Circular Quay; Exploring Sydney
The Whale: Qantas Airways First Class Lounge SYD; Qantas Airways A380 First Class SYD-HKG
Hong Kong Again: Conrad Hong Kong
Saying Goodbye: Cathay Pacific Airways First Class HKG-LAX
This Is It: LAX Flagship Lounge; American Eagle First Class LAX-IAH

Previous Trip Reports
2014: A Tale of Two Cities (AA 77W J BA Y IB Y AF J)
2013: It’s The Most Wonderful Time of The Year (AA/MQ F AS Y)
2013: Geeking Out Across America (AA F)
2012: Around The World and From Sea to Shining Sea (AA F/Y, CX F, SQ F, UA F, DL F, WN Y)
2011: Everybody look at me because I'm sailing on a boat (KL J and DL Y)

dat4life

As usual, things were crazy in the months leading up to my trip. I was rather busy at work with several major assignments. Also, I had applied for and was offered a position at my company’s Houston office. It was a bittersweet moment for me. While I was happy to be closer to my family and thankful for the promotion to my new position, leaving Dallas was rather difficult. I have been living in Dallas since I graduated college 5 years ago, moving there to take a job with my current employer. Well, “living” might be a bit of stretch, as my job requires me to be on the road about 80 percent of the time. Nevertheless, I grew to really love Dallas. It’s a vibrant and exciting city, and I’ve developed great friendships with many people over the years. Furthermore, I couldn’t ask for a better situation at work. My boss is absolutely fantastic, and I could not ask for better team to work with. But overall, it’s better situation for me to be closer to family and not having to worry about going back and forth to Houston on average 3 times per month to visit my ailing grandparents.

I completed the move the weekend before my trip, so I didn’t have to worry about it when I got back as my start day in Houston was the Monday after I returned. The move went smoothly for the most part, and I was back in Dallas Sunday night for my last couple of days there. My friends threw me a going away part one of those nights. It was a great night, but I won’t go into the sordid details here. I will say though, if any of y’all are ever in Dallas, The Rustic, located Uptown, is not a bad place to hang with a solid selection of beer, good food, and decent live music. Now, I’m not a fan of anything Budweiser, but embrace the awesomeness of the piece of Budweiser art on display at The Rustic.


My boss cut me loose early on my last work day in Dallas. I wasn’t about to argue, so I said my final good byes and headed out. Minutes later, I was turning to heading 180 on I-45 and leaving the beautiful Dallas skyline behind me.

Thanks to my early dismissal, I made it back to Houston much earlier than planned, allowing me time to run with my dog (one of the many perks of moving back to Houston), finish packing, and made it to bed at a decent hour. As my flight was at 7AM, I was up well before the crack of dawn and was ready to go shortly before 5. With mobile boarding passes obtained, light traffic expected, and Pre Check, I didn’t feel the need to get to the airport any earlier, despite my mom’s admonitions of cutting it close. Turns out I was right, and we pulled up to Terminal A of George Bush Intercontinental Airport smack dab at 6AM. After saying good bye, I made my way into the ever familiar terminal.

With the summer travel season beginning ramp up, there was a much larger crowd in the terminal than usual for a Wednesday morning. There was just one person ahead of me in the Priority Access line, so I was beckoned to come forward by a friendly agent just a minute or two after I got in line. My bags were tagged to New York, and the agent confirmed I was numero uno on upgrade list for my Dallas to New York leg with two seats available. Sounds promising! I breezed through security thanks to Pre Check, and even had time to hit up the Starbucks kiosk before heading to the gate.

I am a staunch Starbucks loyalist, only drinking the competition if there is a good local coffee shop available or if there isn’t a Starbucks within a 30 mile radius when I’m desperate for a jolt. My loyalty to the Siren’s Eye isn’t blind, but more of an unspoken quid pro quo arrangement. You see, I worked for Starbucks while I was in college, starting out as a barista and eventually becoming a supervisor. While the pay certainly wasn’t great, but combined with the benefits (stock options, health insurance, and (partial) tutition reimbursement in particular), I was able to put myself through college with very little debt at graduation. And for that, I am truly grateful and my patronization is the least I can do to give back.

Sipping on my delicious double tall non-fat one raw sugar extra foam latte, I leisurely made my way to Gate A27. I got to the gate just boarding began, which was fortunate as the gate area was a crowded mad house. Despite the chaotic environment, the agent manning the boarding lane was all smiles as she scanned my boarding pass and wished me a pleasant flight. And I was off to the first leg of my long journey.

American Airlines 1172
Houston (IAH) – Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW)
Depart: 7:00 AM
Arrive: 8:10 AM
Aircraft: McDonnell Douglas DC-9-83
Seat: 4F (First Class)

Waiting for me at the end of the jet bridge was a MD-83, which is my favorite narrow body aircraft in American’s fleet. Affectionately referred to as the Mad Dog, the McDonnell Douglas MD-80 family served as the backbone of many an airline’s short haul fleet for many decades. Its numbers worldwide have dwindled in recent years, but interestingly its numbers are still quite strong in North America, which is traditionally where aging aircraft are first retired, thanks to American’s large fleet and Delta’s penchant for buying used aircraft. However, as part of its current fleet modernization plan, American plans to retire all of its MD-80s by the end of the decade. I’ll certainly be sorry to see it go, and will miss its comfortable seats and quiet ride.

A rather chipper flight attendant greeted me as I stepped onto the aircraft, and I was soon settling in to my favorite seat on the MD-83, 4F. Normally, I would not have requested upgrade on such a short flight since American requires 500 mile upgrade instruments to do so for all but their top tier Executive Platinum, which I lost in March. But with the vast majority of my itinerary for this trip in First or Business class, I decided to splurge and upgrade this short segment too.


As boarding wound down, the flight attendant came around to offer pre-departure beverages of choice. I went with an orange juice, and sipped on that as the final preparations were made for take-off. Pushback was on time, and the taxi to the active runway 33R was rather quick. Traffic was still rather light at that hour, so there was no need to hold short of the runway. Our pilots lined ‘er up, goosed up those ol’ smoky Pratt & Whitney JT8Ds, and we were off!


Drinks of choice along with packages of Biscoff cookies were served after leveling off at 26,000 feet. I ordered another orange juice. The thick overcast layer gave way to clear skies just north of Houston. I enjoyed my juice and cookie while watching the piney woods of East Texas pass by below. After a round of refills, we began to descent into Dallas. On the way down to terra firma, I struck up a conversation with my seatmate, who was continuing on to Santiago that evening. She was ethnically Japanese but was born and grew up in Chile. So while she spoke Spanish, she did not speak Japanese. After we landed, it was quite funny to see the look on the face of the Spanish speaker sitting in front of us, when my seatmate addressed him in perfect Spanish.


We arrived at gate A14, which was just a short walk from the gate my JFK flight was departing from. While walking, I used the American app to pull up the upgrade list for the flight. Ugh. Two more people who checked in while I was enroute to Dallas leaped frogged me on the list. With just two seats remaining upfront, I was out of luck. But I still had a pretty decent Main Cabin Extra seat, so that eased my pain a bit.

Once a dark and dreary place, (parts of) Terminal A sport a more bright, airy, and modern look thanks to a multiphase improvement project, which will be completed later this year. As part of the aforementioned project, the DART light rail system will be expanded all the way to the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport with the station opening in Terminal A, a boon to both residents of the Metroplex and tourists alike. The DART rail station will be opening well ahead of schedule in August instead of the originate estimate of December 2014. The improvement project also brought many new eating options to the DFW airport, including Salt Lick Barbeque. The airport location is quite as good as the original in Austin, but it’s quite good for airport food. While I had planned to grab a little brisket on my layover, I ended up not being very hungry. So I just went to the gate area to take care of a few administrative things while waiting to board.


American Airlines 64
Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW) – New York John F. Kennedy (JFK)
Depart: 10:10 AM
Arrive: 2:50 AM
Aircraft: Boeing 737-800
Seat: 8F (Main Cabin Extra)

Just before boarding commenced, the gate agent made an announcement looking for a volunteer as the flight was oversold. The initial offer was for $300 voucher and a confirmed seat on the afternoon departure to JFK. My plans just consisted of drinks with friends that evening so I was quite flexible, and it’s been quite a while since I’ve heard such a high initial offer. I jumped at the offer, literally. Alas, my services weren’t needed as someone else no showed/misconnected/cancelled at the last minute.

Despite being among the last to board, there was still a sliver of overhead bin space left for my laptop bag as the flight attendants were saving it for me thanks to my bulkhead seat. My seatmates were already seated when I arrived, but graciously got up to let me in. I managed to squeeze my iPad into the small magazine/safety information card holder, before settling into my seat. American’s economy (or Main Cabin in Americanese) seats on the 737-800 aren’t the most comfortable in the world, but they’ll do for this medium-ish length flight. And of course, I appreciated the extra legroom room found in Main Cabin Extra seats, which I was able to select for free thanks to thanks to my AAdvantage Platinum status.

The inflight entertainment system, a good book, and a loaded (and fully charged if you’re flying United) iPad/tablet/smartphone are all excellent ways to pass time on a flight. But the best form of entertainment of all on shorter flights is an interesting seatmate. Mind you, I’m not one of those chatter box seatmates. If you don’t want to talk, which is pretty much 99% of my flights, that’s fine. If you want to talk, I’d be more than happy to oblige unless I’m working on something. I lucked out on my previous flight with the Chilean/Japanese woman. On this flight, occupying the middle and aisle seats were two sisters, who had grown up in Germany but moved to the U.S. after marrying American servicemen. The younger sister, who was seated in the middle seat, had just received her doctorate in psychology from the University of Texas at El Paso. We had a great time chatting about our respective fields, and of course travel. While they had traveled extensively in their younger years, they had not traveled in the last couple of years. Today, they were heading to Cairo for their first overseas holiday in years.

Before I knew it, the flight attendants were asked to prepare the cabin for landing. During the latter stages of our decent, the older sister had asked me about their connection to Egypt Air later that evening. They were unsure if the agent in El Paso, where they originated, had checked their bags through to Cairo. I took a look at their claim checks, and indeed their bags were only checked to New York. After I explained they would have to pick up their bags and bring them over to the Egypt Air themselves, they seemed even more confused. So I offered to walk them over to Terminal 2, where Egypt Air departs from, since I had plenty of time before meeting my friends. They readily accepted. About twenty minutes later, we touched down smoothly at JFK and arrived at the gate just a couple of minutes late.

Our aircraft had pulled into gate 44, which meant it was a hike to baggage claim. But it wasn’t so bad with a couple of friends in tow. We ended up waiting about 20 minutes for our respective bags to hit the belt. Naturally, their non-priority bags were among the first to arrive and my priority tagged bags were the very last bags to hit the belt. C’mon man! I then led them up a maze of hallways and escalators to the Sky Train, which we took to Terminal 2. I bade my new friends farewell at the Egypt Air ticket counter, satisfied they were in good hands. I then headed back up to the Air Train and took it to Jamaica Station.


I consider myself to be a savvy and experienced traveler, but what happened when I got to Jamaica Station might just get that card revoked. After buying a ticket at a kiosk, I headed down to the platforms to catch a train. Somehow, I got a little disoriented and I couldn’t find which platform the train I needed was leaving from. So I asked a passing employee, who directed me to a platform. The train arrived a few minutes later, I boarded a found a set of seats to myself. As the train was pulling out of the station, a conductor came into my car to check tickets. That was when I first noticed something might be amiss. The conductor was using a hole puncher on the tickets. That’s strange… I’m pretty sure the ticket I bought had a magnetic stripe. I looked at my “ticket” once more, and realized I was in possession of a MTA pass (for the subway). What I needed to ride this particular train was a Long Island Railroad ticket. In my haste to get on the train, I forgot to ask the rail employee I talked to on the platform what type of ticket I needed. Visions of being tackled by the NYPD and hauled off to central lockup began dancing in my head. I was sweating quite profusely, from a combination of humidity and nervousness, as the said conductor approached. I was more than prepared to come clean about my little faux pas to avoid any sort of trouble. He eyeballed me for a couple of seconds, and I’m sure he thought something along the lines of “effing tourist” as he spotted the yellow MTA pass in my hand. Eventually, he moved on and I breathed a sigh of relief.

The train arrived at Penn Station a little over 20 minutes after leaving Jamaica, and it took another 15 minutes for me to walk to my hotel, the Hyatt Place Midtown, from there.


The last minute change switch to JAL also meant I would overnight in New York instead of San Francisco. So I had to scramble to find a place to stay. Unfortunately, just about every decent hotel on Manhattan and the surrounding areas were either outrageously priced (i.e. over $400) or sold out, when I checked two days out. The Hyatt Place Midtown South had a couple of rooms left, but they were outrageously priced at $649 per night. Fortunately, they were still offering award reservations so I was able to snag a room for 20,000 Gold Passport points. Not the best deal, but certainly better than paying for the room outright.


I was immediately checked in by a friendly clerk when I arrived. He was rather chatty so I asked about what was driving up the room rates for the night. He explained that between the dedication and opening of the World Trade Center Memorial, the NHL playoffs, and the lingerers from NFL Draft were eating up most of the hotel rooms in the city. Makes sense. Anyways, I chose the bonus points as my Diamond amenity, and headed up to my room on the 28th floor. While smaller than a typical Hyatt Place room, it was clean, comfortable, and the view wasn’t half bad.


After showering and changing, I headed out to meet my friends at McCormick and Schmick’s for happy hour and kick off the celebration of my promotion. On the way, I spotted into Roger Goodell, the NFL Commissioner, who was also walking down 44th Street. He rebuffed my attempt at a photograph. You see, I was wearing the shirt of my favorite NFL team that day, and Mr. Goodell seems to have a strong dislike for my team. Anyways, the rest of the night was fun, but uneventful. I was back in my room by 11, to get some rest as the next day would rather long for me.

angrypenguin

I'm in! Great start to the report.

TOMFORD

Looking forward to the A380 bits!

MrPie

subbed for the rest of this delicious sounding trip

thespeedskater

follow modus on!

avneeshj

Thanks for the great intro and insight into the booking. I always look forward to that on the TRs. Subscribed and waiting for further installments.

MattEvan

How was the JL F class catering ex-JFK?

macdonaldj2

I'll hop onto this train...the beginnings are looking good

dat4life

Folks, I have the next two sections (JL F and CX F) more or less ready to post. I'll definitely have the JL F section up tonight, and the CX F section by tomorrow evening at the latest.

Thanks, angrypenguin!

Oh, yeah! Such a wonderful aircraft, and that flight (QF F) was definitely the best of my (semi)young life.

Thanks, MrPie!

Thanks, thespeedskater!

It was fine, not great though. You'll see in a little bit.

Thanks, mcdonaldj2!

Glad to be of service, avneeshj. Feel free to ask away if you have any questions about that.

yerffej201

looking forward to your jl f segment!

UAL250

This is going to be awesome. Bookmarked and subscribed.

But Goodell was walking by himself? Would seem he would have some security...

Great start!

dat4life

I had intended to sleep in the next morning, but I ended up waking up around 7 to the pitter patter of rain drops on my window. Just as well, as I had a pre-vacation flood of emails to answer and some more administrative crap to take care of before heading back to the airport. But the first order of business was breakfast, as I was rather hungry after eating light the night before. Hyatt Place offers a nice complimentary breakfast spread featuring breakfast sandwiches, oatmeal, cereal, yogurt, and fruit. I just stuck with oatmeal and fruit in anticipation of all of the food and alcohol I’d be consuming in the air that afternoon. After finishing up work, I still had plenty of time for a run. I would have liked to run to Central Park, which was just over a mile from the hotel, but was relegated to the hotel’s exercise room because of the crappy weather. While not particularly big, it had all of the essentials with a couple of treadmills, ellipticals, and free weights. I pounded out a couple of miles on a treadmill before heading back up my room on last time to shower and finish packing.

The rain had stopped by the time I checked out, but I didn’t fancy slopping through the puddles on the way to Penn Station. So I hired a black car through the hotel for a flat $65. The black car ended up being a Toyota Highlander Hybrid Limited, which was a comfortable and fairly green ride. The flat rate was a boon, as it turned out, because it took over two flipping hours to get to JFK. Apparently, President Obama, who was in town for the World Trade Center Memorial dedication, was heading to JFK around the same time I was. Since he’s somewhat important, I suppose, New York’s finest escorted him all the way to JFK sealing off roads in the process. Of course, that snarled up traffic for the rest of us. For once I can actually say, and be completely accurate, that it’s all Obama’s fault.

After we were still sitting in traffic after the two hour mark, I was really starting sweat it. But my driver ended up taking a bunch of side streets, and we managed to pull up in front of Terminal 1 just under 70 minutes before departure.


As I approached the check in counter, an agent greeted me by name. I was a bit taken back as to how she knew who I was. As it turns out, I was the last First Class passenger to arrive. The agent had already printed my boarding passes, baggage tags, and even filled out First Class tags for both my checked bags and carryon bag. So all that was left to do was check my passport, and I was sent on my way toward security.


The line in the priority lane was thankfully short, and I made it to the ID checkpoint in just a couple of minutes. The TSA agent checking IDs was friendly enough, but he proceeded to read over every single character printed on my boarding pass. Twice. I’m sure it was for very important security reasons. After he was satisfied, he spent another solid minute scrawling gibberish all over it before finally sending me over to the x-ray machine.

After gathering my things from the conveyor belt, I headed straight for the JAL Lounge, which is located just to the right of the checkpoint.


I was directed toward the First Class side of the lounge after my boarding pass was checked at the entrance. The lounge was disappointment. The First Class side was rather large, presumably to accommodate oneworld Emeralds, with non-descript décor which resembled an office waiting area. The seats were decently comfortable though. There were a quite a few windows, but tarmac views were obstructed by a large air conditioning unit just outside. The selection of drinks, both alcoholic and non-alcoholic, was decent, but the food selection was meager. It consisted of ramen noodles and some very unimpressive looking canapés. And worst of all, wifi was either not working. I took a peek at the Business Class side of the lounge and found it even worse as the offerings are the same and it was even more crowded than the First Class side.


In the interest of maintaining a quiet environment, cell phones aren’t allowed to be used in the lounge. But the air conditioning unit made one heck of a racket, pretty much rendering the cell phone rule moot. Despite its numerous shortcomings, the JAL lounge was still a far more pleasant place to wait than in the hot sticky terminal.

About 5 minutes before boarding was schedule to start, the lounge attendant announced that boarding was delayed 15 minutes due to delayed servicing of the aircraft. Not a big deal, but still the attendant apologized profusely. I decided to take the opportunity to stretch my legs before my 14 hour flight, and check out the heavies that had taken up residence around the terminal. Having seen its vertical stabilizer from the JAL lounge, I headed over to check out Korean Air’s A380, which was parked at the far end of the terminal. While I’m not a fan of the aesthetics of its design or the livery the aircraft is wearing, I have to admit the A380 is an impressive sight and quite the technological marvel.


Just across the terminal from the Korean Air aircraft, was a Turkish Airlines A330-300 headed back home to Istanbul. That flight was just beginning to board economy class, so the boarding line stretched a good ways down the terminal. As I was going around the line to get a picture of the aircraft, I couldn’t help overhearing a conversation between a group of college students. They were excitedly talking about how their final exams turned out and the things they were looking forward to do in Istanbul. For one of the students, it was her first time away from the United States. I can only imagine how excited she was, getting to experience that with what looked to be a group of her good friends.


With the clock ticking ever closer to our delayed boarding time, I walked toward my gate, only pausing to snap a couple of quick pictures of the 777-300ER that would be taking me nearly 7,000 miles to Tokyo.


When I had left the lounge to take a stroll, I noticed a several of TSOs congregating around the security checkpoint, looking like they were having a grand old time. I passed by the checkpoint 10 minutes later heading to my gate, and they were still there. The cherry on top of the sundae, were the two female TSOs who walked passed me a couple of minutes later. They were loudly complaining about “all of them stupid foreigners who don’t know nothing”, with a liberal dose of “f” bombs sprinkled in. Your tax dollars at work, folks.


I arrived at the gate to find boarding yet to begin, and even managed to be first in line despite being rather late. While waiting, I amused myself with the information screen, which as it was scrolling through the list of code share flight numbers. Apparently, JL 5 was operating as British Airlines XXXX and Malaysia Airways YYYY that day. The gate agents were another source of entertainment as they apologized for the delayed boarding time several times in the 5 minutes I waited in line. To put this in perspective, the delay probably totaled only about 30 minutes.


Japan Airlines 5
New York John F. Kennedy (JFK) – Tokyo Narita (NRT)
Depart: 1:25 PM
Arrive: 4:25PM +1
Aircraft: Boeing 777-300ER
Seat: 2D (First Class)

Boarding began with an elderly gentleman in a wheelchair and a family with two small children, both of whom were well behaved. First and Business Class soon followed. At the boarding door, a flight attendant with a beautiful smile greeted me and directed me to make the coveted left turn after a quick glance at my boarding pass. Another flight attendant intercepted me as I made my way through the mini Business Class cabin. She too looked at my boarding pass and then escorted me to my seat, 2D.

I prefer window seats, but for some reason, I was not able to select a seat online or over the phone ahead of time. Per Expert Flyer the previous evening, seats 1K (a window) and 2D were still available with one seat available for sale so I wasn’t too worried. But someone either booked a last minute walk up fare or award ticket, because 1K was taken by the time I checked in. Either way, I thought my digs for the next 14ish hours were pretty awesome


I really liked the color scheme, with the dark brown leather contrasting well against the lighter brown wood accents and tan walls. The design of the seat looked quite similar to Singapore Airlines’ First Class seat on their 777-300ERs, which definitely isn’t a bad thing. Sitting down on the seat confirmed that impression. While very similar, JAL’s product is better in one very important aspect. Singapore’s seat is a bit too wide, leaving 99 percent of people without armrests during take off and landing. JAL’s seat has armrests, which can be lowered while in bed mode leaving the bed just as wide as Singapore’s. The seat is a bit on the firm side, and I could see some people finding it a bit too hard, though I found it fairly comfortable. There’s plenty of storage space, with a large compartment directly next to the seat area that is big enough to fit any laptop. For smaller items, there is a compartment just forward of that large compartment and another near the large television screen, which also houses a universal outlet and USB charging port. Of course, there is also space available for larger bags under the ottoman and in the overhead bin.

As soon as I unpacked my laptop and other items I needed for the flight, a flight attendant appeared and introduced herself…in Japanese. It took her a couple of seconds to realize before she realized I did not understand her. We both laughed. Her faux pas was understandable, as I was the only passenger in First Class who did not speak Japanese. And of course, the fact I am of Asian descent, and have been told on more than occasion I could pass for being Japanese probably contributed as well. Anyways, she reintroduced herself, in English this time, and informed me of our flying time of 13 hours and 25 minutes. She too apologized for the delay.

The flight attendant who had escorted me to my seat came around with a tray of orange juice and champagne, not one minute later. I chose champagne, which was served in a proper glass flute. From trip reports I’ve read, I knew that JAL serves two types of champagne in First Class, Dom Perignon and Salon. Since a bottle wasn’t presented, I did not know which one was being served. It took just one sip for me to recognize Dom Perignon was being served. I rarely enjoy champagne of this caliber, and when I do it’s for a very special occasion. Most recently, I had a glass of the good stuff when a friend passed the bar exam a little over a year ago. While my accomplishment may not be as impressive as passing the bar, Dom seemed like the perfect way to celebrate my promotion. After a silent toast, I continued savoring every sip as I settled into my seat.


When a flight attendant dropped by to offer a refill, I asked about the Salon. She replied it would be served after take off. Cool beans. At any rate, I took up her on the refill. She did warn me the glass would have to be collected before pushback, which would be any minute now. Not a problem ma’am. I’ve definitely shotgunned worse things in the past. I mean, that’s the reason we got to college, right? Errr…never mind. The flight attendant was back to collect my champagne flute just a minute or two later. I quickly chugged the remainder of the contents before handing the glass back to her, which she took with a polite smile and hurried back into the galley. I’m sure she thought something along of the lines of, “crap, I’m the one stuck with the lush today.” However, in practice, the entire crew had no problem keeping my glass topped off with any adult libation I requested the entire flight.

Taxiing is usually one of my favorite phases of flight, especially at a major international airport such as JFK that has lots of interesting traffic. But without a window to gaze out of, it was downright boring. So let’s pick up after we rocketed into the sky after a quick take off roll.

Before long, the flight attendants were dinged out of their seats and began preparing to serve lunch. Most of my fellow passengers upfront seemed to take advantage of the turndown service aside from 1D and myself. The purser took this opportunity to greet passengers, and pass out the menu and wine list for the flight. Let’s have a look at this, shall we?


And for those of us into liquid nutrition here is this drink menu. And just wow. It is definitely the most impressive drink menu I’ve seen on an airplane, and it definitely rivals some of those found in earthbound restaurants.


As I was perusing the menu, my aisle flight attendant came by with a hot towel. Not those thin potable water tank scented gauze pads our U.S. flagged carriers tend use, but a nicely scented thick towel. She also offered me a drink to enjoy while I “chose my lunch”. I ordered my much-anticipated glass of Salon. She soon returned to lay a crisp linen tablecloth on my tray table, and then followed with a small plate canapés. The other aisle flight attendant was right behind her with a champagne flute and a bottle of Salon The bottle was properly presented, with the label facing me and poured after I gave a small nod. Hmmm…not bad. Not bad at all.


“Mr. dat4life,” a soft voice interrupted me from my thoughts. “I am your new flight attendant; we have decided to switch aisles in order to better serve you,” the voice continued. The voice belonged to the other aisle flight attendant. As I noted earlier, while my original aisle flight attendant was a perfectly attentive and sweet lady, she did not speak much English. Mind you, I don’t fault her at all. I’m flying on Japan’s flag carrier, and therefore JAL’s flight attendants are expected to be fluent first and foremost in Japanese. All other languages are secondary. And to be perfectly fair, her English is leaps and bounds better my Japanese. That said, we did have a bit of language barrier. The service humming was along, albeit a bit slowly, but it really didn’t matter to me. Either way, I appreciated the crew’s foresight and eagerness to please.

Anyhow, back to the task at hand: lunch. While the Japanese menu sounded great, I stuck with my rule of always ordering the specialty of country my flight originated from. I decided on the steak as the main course, although the sea bass sounded great as well. As for the appetizer, I went with caviar and the seafood timbale. My new flight attendant cheerfully confirmed the order and asked how I wanted my steak cooked. Rare, of course. She cocked an eyebrow, and asked if I were sure. You betcha. “If, you insist, Mr. dat4life, she replied looking as if she signed off on my death warrant. And off she went to put in my order, and returning just a few moments afterward to top off my champagne.

My table was soon set up along with a gleaming white bread plate, a dish with butter, pepper, sea salt, and olive oil, as well as a set of silverware. I also offered and accepted a glass of water as well. The amuse bouche of seared tuna, shrimp, and fois gras mousse was tasty, though not memorable. The ginger cream sauce with the tuna tasted more like ranch than anything else, but it was still pretty good.


Next up was the caviar. It was nicely presented in its tin, along with the usual accompaniments of chopped egg, onion, crčme fraiche, lemon, and blinis. A proper caviar spoon was also included. The last and only time I have eaten caviar was back on Cathay Pacific two years ago, and found it to be quite the tasty treat. So I was really looking forward to having it again. Let’s see if remember how to do this… a little dab of cream fraiche on the blini, a generous dose of caviar, and crown it with a bit of egg and onion. Man, I really I know what I’m doing. But either way it was pretty damn tasty. I enjoyed the blinis more than the toast points Cathay used to include in their caviar service.

To my surprise, the seafood timbale was delivered as I was chowing down on caviar. I would have thought the meal would have been served in individual courses, but it really wasn’t a big deal. The presentation of the dish was beautiful, and most importantly the seafood was very fresh. Underneath the lobster claw meat and the pesto was a seafood salad, with large chunks of lobster and prawn, inside of a molded radish. Overall, the dish was absolutely delicious and I enjoyed every single bite.


The appetizer course was cleared mere minutes after I finished my last bite. I had already eaten more than I usually do for lunch, but today I still had quite a bit of work in front of me. Alright…I think I can do this!

Up until this point, I had been drinking champagne. The flight attendant asked if I would like to enjoy a glass of wine to enjoy with my main course. Well, if you insist. Mind if I try the Chateau Rauzan Gassies 2004? “No trouble at all, sir,” she said as she scurried off. She returned a few minutes later with a large wine glass and the bottle. The bottle was properly presented, and a small sample was poured for me. I’m definitely no wine connoisseur, but it tasted great to me. After I gave a small nod of approval, I received a generous pour. I was then informed that my main course would be ready in about 15 minutes. And true to her word, my flight attendant, returned 15 minutes later with my steak.


She explained that she was worried the galley operator wouldn’t be able to make my steak the way I wanted, and asked if I could cut into the steak to make sure. So I did. It was more on the medium side of rare, which was fine by me. I told her it was perfect, which seemed delight her. Anyways, the steak was very good and not too fatty, though it was a shade on the chewy side. While the gravy detracted from the presentation of the dish a bit, the added flavor accented the steak very nicely. The zucchini was perfectly grilled as it was both flavorful and still a little crisp. The potatoes were warm, soft, and the even skin had a bit of a crunch to it.

I should probably mention that the bread basket was offered with each course, and consisted of white, sourdough, and multigrain rolls as well as breadsticks and garlic bread. While a nice selection, I was hoping to try some of JAL’s specialty breads, such as the cherry blossom roll, I read about in a number of trip reports. But those are only offered ex-Tokyo. Nevertheless, both the garlic bread and breadsticks were very good.

“Cheese, Mr. dat4life?” my flight attendant asked as she cleared my main course. If you insist. I was brought a nice looking plate of cheese. While nicely presented, the cheeses were typical American cheeses, but very tasty nevertheless.


As for dessert, I wasn’t particularly in the mood for chocolate crunch cake. So I decided on the dessert option from the Japanese menu, the sesame pudding. Sesame pudding is one of my favorite Chinese desserts, so I figured I might as well give it a whirl. While the Chinese version is typically served warm and is more of a sweet thick soup, the Japanese version, at least this one, is served cold and has more of a thick pudding like consistency. Nevertheless it had the same delicate sweet flavor, which I enjoy.


My dessert dish and table setting was removed not long after I finished dessert. The flight attendant soon returned with an amenity kit, and an apology for forgetting to give it to me earlier. The amenity kit came in co-branded Brooks Brother bag along with some additional Shisedo amenities. I was then offered turndown service, which I accepted. I headed to the lavatory to change while this was done. As far as I could tell, JAL’s lavatory upfront was the standard 777 lavatory, unlike many of its competitors who have added extras like nicer sinks, windows, etc., to their premium cabin lavatories. That said, it was exceptionally clean and remained that way throughout the entire flight.


I also took this opportunity to change into the provided pajamas, which were given prior to take off. The pajamas consisted of a good quality half zipped pullover top and pants. Most importantly, they breathed well as the cabin temperature was kept on the toasty side for my standards and there were no individual air vents. By the time I finished changing, I emerged from the lavatory to find the cabin lights dimmed.

One of the more unique features of JAL First Class, and the one feature I was most looking forward to trying, is their bedding. JAL partners with Tempur-Pedic, which I think makes some of the best earth bound bedding around. So I was really curious to see how that translated into a product to be used at FL380. Upon arriving back my seat, I found my bed nicely made with a crisp duvet and two pillows, one of which was a Tempur-Pedic memory foam pillow. The mattress pad used was definitely the thickest I’ve seen on a plane. All in all, it was definitely the most comfortable bed I’ve experienced up in the air. However, before long I begin feeling rather warm as the duvet was rather thick. I do love a thick duvet, but not at these warm temperatures. So I flagged down a passing flight attendant, and I asked for thinner blanket which she gladly brought me. Finally completely comfortable, I settled in.

Though I had my bed made, I was not intending to sleep at all as part of my strategy to minimize jet lag. Since I was arriving at night in Hong Kong, the prudent thing to do would be to stay awake to help my body clock adjust to the time change. There’s no better aid to stay awake than a good entertainment system. The latest iteration of JAL’s entertainment system is dubbed Magic V. While it has a decent selection of movies and television shows, the variety of content falls short of what is found on Cathay Pacific and even American’s new entertainment system. The screen, however, is the best I’ve experienced in the sky. It is large at 23 inches, with a crisp and high resolution picture. Two controllers are available for the entertainment system, an traditional analog handset, located in the large storage compartment, and a touchscreen controller in the smaller compartment. I could not get the analog controller to work, but the touchscreen controller was responsive and intuitive enough for the most part. The Bose QC 15 headphones were much appreciated as well.


Raising my seatback a few degrees to form a comfortable chaise lounge-esque position, I finished up The Hunt For Red October, which I started watching during lunch. I then moved on to Monuments Men. I’m a big history and military buff, so I’m naturally drawn to movies along those themes. Neither movie was particularly good, but they were watchable for the most part. I followed those up with American Hustle, which I thought was ok but not worth all of the praise lavished on it. That said, I thought Amy Adams delivered a great performance, and definitely made the movie more watchable to say the least.

Midway through American Hustle, I was feeling sort of peckish so I took a look at the menu. JAL doesn’t have a snack menu or a pre-arrival menu per se. But they do have an a la carte menu that’s available up to 30 minutes prior to arrival.


The soba noodle soup with duck caught my eye. No need for the call button today, as my lovely flight attendant was by my side when I looked up. I placed my order with her, and she promised to have it ready in 15 minutes. And exactly 15 minutes later, she returned with a table cloth, a nice touch for what is just a midflight snack, and another flight attendant was just behind her my noodles served with some of the small dishes on the menu. Taking a break from alcohol, I decided to try the JAL Sky Drink, which tasted lot like a less sweet and tart version of lemonade. The noodles were tasty and were even better with the addition of chili paste. But then again, what isn’t?


After I finished American Hustle, I had a hard time finding something else to watch. There really wasn’t any other movies I really wanted to watch, and it was slim pickings when it came TV shows. So I settled on Anchorman 2. I do like some of Will Ferrell’s works, such as Talladega Nights and Step Brothers. I even found the first Anchorman fairly entertaining. But the sequel… Blah. The jokes were a little tired and drawn out to the point of irritation, for my tastes at least. But at least I can say I’ve seen it now.

I napped for a bit after I finished up that movie, and woke up to the sounds of commotion. Apparently, the passenger in 1A had an item fall through a crack of his seat. So all of the First Class flight attendants and a few others I have not seen before, presumably from Business Class, were gathered around the seat trying to find it. First, they used a couple of chopsticks tied together, and then eventually resorted to unassembling what they could of the seat. I’m not sure if they were able to retrieve it, but that passenger looked mollified and deplaned with the rest of us, so I assume the resolution was agreeable.

Anyways, at this point we were about 90 minutes out from Tokyo, and once again it was time to eat!


The western option didn’t sound all that interesting, so I went with the Japanese option on the a la carte menu which seemed to delight my flight attendant. To drink, I decided on more Salon as a new bottle was just opened for the passenger in 1D. It would be a shame to waste that bottle! Anyways, my flight attendant returned a minute later with another crisp table cloth and a bottle of Salon. I polished off a couple of glasses before my meal arrived.


The marlin was tasty and fresh, but it could have been a little hotter. I enjoyed the rice, which tasted freshly cooked as advertised. But I did not care for the accompanying fermented soya beans. My tray was cleared not long after I finished and replaced by a plate of fruit, which were fresh and ripe. It was a perfect way to cap off this nice light(ish) meal.

With no interesting movies I hadn’t watched left on the IFE system, I settled onAvatar to watch during the second meal service and approach, since I didn’t have access to a window. I do like Avatar, but I would much rather be gazing out a window especially when arriving at an airport I haven’t been before. But alas, it wasn’t meant to be that day. Not long after, the flight attendants began the preparing the cabin for landing, and the usual barrage of pre-arrival announcements were made. We touched down smoothly on the runway, and made the lengthy taxi to our gate. Before long, the jet bridge was attached, and I thanked the lovely crew on the way out.

I thoroughly enjoyed the flight. The food was good, and the service was attentive. From the perspective of the hard product, the seat was very comfortable in the sitting and bed positions. The IFE screen is top notch, but I can’t say the same for the content, which was a bit lacking. Not quite up to par overall with their oneworld Asian counterpart, Cathay Pacific, but I would not hesitate to fly JAL again if the opportunity arose.

dat4life

No need to look forward anymore. It's up!

Thanks, UAL250. You would think he would have security around him, but I didn't notice any. Either you can't mistake that strong jaw of thatch of red hair for anyone else!

dat4life

Author’s Note: What terrible day has it has been, with horrific events occurring around the globe. Two of those tragedies hit rather close to home. I work in the banking industry and have experienced a robbery first hand. But it was nothing compared to the magnitude of violence in the robbery of a Bank of the West branch in Stockton, California earlier this morning. While I was certainly scared during my experience, I can’t even begin imagine the sheer terror those in that branch felt that morning. My sympathies go out to the family and friends of those killed, especially to the young girl who watched her mother get snatched away by those heinous men.

And of course, I’m sure everyone here knows about the MH17 tragedy by now. And I’m sure this hits very close to home for all of us FTers. I first learned of the incident over lunch while I was proofreading this section of the report. It really put things in perspective, and makes things such as onboard food and service seem so small. My heart goes out to the family and friends of all those on board.


My experience on board was with JAL was great, the transit experience through primary hub was less than stellar. First off, we seemed to have parked at last gate in the terminal, necessitating a mile long hike to immigration. Which really isn’t a big deal, but when you factor in the muggy terminal and the lack of air conditioning, it’s a rather unpleasant experience. The line at security wasn’t long when I arrived, but it moved at a glacial pace for some unknown reason. To their credit, the staff at the checkpoint was polite unlike many of their American counterparts, but that does not excuse the long wait.

It took over 30 minutes for me to clear security, and by that time I was pretty sweaty so the first order of business was a shower. Thanks to a quick Google search, I knew that the Cathay Pacific lounge did not have shower rooms. The closest available lounge with showers was American’s Admirals Club so I headed there. There was a bit of a wait for a shower room, so the agent invited me to enjoy the lounge while I waited and gave me a pager. I was quite impressed with the club which was of good size with nice views over the tarmac. The lounge was quite busy with flights to Chicago and Dallas departing soon, but it did not feel too crowded when I was there. The food spread was several notches above the offerings at Admirals Clubs in the U.S.. Admittedly, that bar is rather low, but there was a nice selection of food including some sushi. I grabbed a small plate of sushi (surprisingly good) and a Coke to snack on while I waited to for a shower. As soon as I finished eating, my pager buzzed and I was off to my shower. I emerged from the shower room thoroughly refreshed. At that point, there was about 20 minutes before my flight was scheduled to board, so I decided to make the trek to my departure gate, which felt like it was located about halfway to Hong Kong. While it was a rather length walk, I did get to enjoy some nice views of the tarmac on the way.


The Boeing 747 is arguably the most recognizable and iconic plane in the world. But it is more than just a pretty face. The 747 singlehandedly changed the world of commercial aviation into what we know today by making longhaul travel available to the masses. Over 46 years after the City of Everett took flight in the skies over Washington state, the 747 still plays a major role in many an airline’s longhaul fleet, albeit in dwindling numbers. Sadly, this trend shows no sign of abating if the sagging sales of the passenger version of latest iteration of the 747, the -8i model, and the ever increasing number of airframes being retired are any indication. Personally, the last time I’ve flown on the 747 was nearly exactly 9 years ago from Seattle to Houston, on the last leg of China Airlines' now defunct Taipei-Seattle-Houston service. So I quite excited to be able to squeeze in a few more flights on the Queen of the Skies on this trip, beginning with this jaunt from Tokyo Narita to Hong Kong.

Gate agents were already hard at work when I arrived, herding passengers into a long line which snaked a good way down the corridor. Upon seeing my boarding pass, a gate agent ushered me into a separate First and Business Class holding area. He also took my JAL printed boarding pass and returned a few minutes later with fresh boarding pass on Cathay card stock, something that is much appreciated by an avgeek like myself. The stated boarding time came and went, with the gate agents just milling around nervously around the podium. One of them finally grabbed the microphone and announced boarding would be delayed for approximately 15 minutes. And exactly 15 minutes later the gates leading into jetbridge were opened, and the First and Business Class line was invited to come forward. I waited patiently for my boarding pass to be scanned, and then hurried down the jetbridge for my date with the Queen of the Skies.

Cathay Pacific Airways 505
Tokyo Narita (NRT) – Hong Kong (HKG)
Depart: 6:20 PM
Arrive: 10:15 PM
Aircraft: Boeing 747-400
Seat: 1K (First Class)

A gaggle of smiling flight attendants greeted me warmly at the boarding door, one of whom inspected my boarding pass and directed me to turn left. Another flight attendant greeted me outside of the First Class cabin. “Good evening, Mr. dat4life. Please follow me to your seat.” Whoa, freaky! It turns out that I was the First Class passenger this evening. Score! When we reached my seat, 1K, she introduced herself as Amy and encouraged me to make myself comfortable. Don’t mind if I do…


Other than the size and shape of the cabin, the First Class offerings on Cathay’s 747 isn’t much different than those of the non-refurbished 77Hs. The cone shape makes this cabin feel even more private and cozy. Unfortunately, the cabin wasn’t in the best repair, and there were some signs of wear and tear, as well as the burned out seatbelt sign to my left. I can’t say I’m entirely surprised as retirement is eminent for Cathay’s 747-400 fleet, but it is certainly sad to see.


Another flight attendant appeared seemingly out of thin air a little while later. She introduced herself as Sachiko and explained she and Amy would be taking care of me tonight. Wow. A two to one flight attendant to passenger ratio… That’s a first for me!

Sachiko then offered to fetch me something drink. As I had drunk my fill of champagne on my JAL flight, I opted for with orange juice. Sachiko returned with a glass of just that and a hot towel a few minutes later. It wasn’t the sugary concentrate crap most of the U.S. airlines served, but real fresh squeezed orange juice. Delicious. In the meantime, Amy came by with tonight’s menu and wine list and urged me to have whatever I like and as much as I want since all of the items on the menu were catered. Lucky for her, I was still somewhat full from my JAL flight, or she was just asking for trouble. Departure was delayed a bit longer due to cargo loading, during this time my glass was never empty with Amy and Sachiko taking turns to top my glass off. The inflight service manager took this opportunity to welcome me aboard and have a quick chat.

We pushed back about an hour late and began taxiing to the active runway. The bulk of the evening bank of flights departing from Narita was departing at this time, so there was quite a line of planes in front of and behind us all waiting to take off. From vantage point of Seat 1K, I was enjoying a completely new perspective. You see, one of the items on my avgeek bucket list is to be seated at real pointy end of 747, or seat 1A/K on most airlines. What’s so special about those seats? For one thing, you’re seated forward of everybody, including the pilots. And on many airlines, including Cathay, the seats positioned along at the forward most curvature of the fuselage giving the occupant a near pilot’s eye view outside of the magnificent aircraft. It was really quite cool to be able to not just where we we've been, but also where we were heading.


About 30 minutes had elapsed since pushback, by the time we had lined up with the active runway. We held in position for a bit, before the flight crew set take off power on the aircraft’s 4 Rolls Royce engines. The trademark growl of Rolls Royce engines were more of a dull hum in the pointy end of the aircraft. Unlike its younger brother, the 777, or the run of the mill 737, the 747 seems take to take its time gathering speed for takeoff. We seemed to eat up every inch of runway before finally breaking the bonds of gravity and soaring skyward.

Several minutes later, we were climbing out over Tokyo Bay and the twinkling of the city by the same name with the end of a spectacular sunset providing a picturesque backdrop. Unfortunately, that was when the bottom dropped out as we hit some pretty heavy turbulence, which lasted through the climb out. That made it difficult for the crew to provide service and for me to take good pictures.


As soon as the ride smoothed out somewhat, Amy was by my side with a hot towel and asked what I wanted to drink. While a chilled glass of champagne sounded nice, a Johnnie Walker Blue on the rocks sounded even better. Amy returned a few minutes later with my drink and a small dish of whole cashew nuts. She remarked how good the scotch smelled, as she set my glass down. Indeed, it did smell wonderful and was the perfect accompaniment to the dish of cashews. I’m not exactly a regular scotch drinker, but I certainly appreciated the smooth and delicate smoky flavor of Johnnie Walker.


Just I was polishing off the last of my cashews, Sachiko came by to take my dinner order. Oops. I might want to take glance at that menu…


Since we were departing from Japan, I wanted to try the Japanese Kaiseki meal. But the lobster with dill salmon appetizer also sounded good, so I asked for both the Japanese meal and the appetizer. No problem. And another glass Johnnie Walker? Nah, I think I’ll just go with green tea. My table was set not long after with a crisp white tablecloth and gleaming silverware along with Cathay’s signature egg shaped salt and pepper shakers and Bon Appetit card, all of which were perfectly placed on the table. Amy then followed with my appetizer, which was fresh and delicious, and Sachiko followed with a pot of green tea, cup, and saucer.


My first plate and silverware were cleared soon after I finished to make way for my Japanese meal. A pair of chopsticks and a proper holder replaced the silverware before the sushi appetizer course arrived. I eat sushi and other types of Japanese food on a regular basis at home, the novelty of mixing soya sauce and wasabi at 38,000 feet… How flipping cool is that? The sushi itself was delicious, but to be honest nothing I couldn’t get at home. The next three courses were all tasty, and I particularly enjoyed the delicate flavor of the scallop in clear soup. The quince wine that was served with the second course was way too sweet for my taste. I just took a sip of it, and left at that. By far, the main course was the biggest let down of the meal service. While the beef was tender, it was very bland and required a good dose of salt and pepper to make it somewhat interesting. A fruit plate rounded up the meal. The fruit were ripe and delicious.


Service during the meal service was completely flawless. Amy and Sachiko coordinated the service perfectly ensuring there were no hiccups due to any type of miscommunication between them. All of my courses were cleared within minutes of me finishing them, and they allowed for a nice lull in between courses. Best of all, my teapot was checked regularly to ensure I had a free flowing supply. One of my pet peeves is running out of hot tea when I’m eating, as it takes some time to steep and of course that’s when I need it most.

Once my fruit plate and table setting were cleared, there were about 2 hours left before we landed in Hong Kong. Amy, who was clearing my table setting, asked if I wanted something else to drink. I went with Hong Kong milk tea, which I enjoyed while taking advantage of Cathay’s excellent inflight entertainment system. Unlike JAL who equipped their First Class cabin with an excellent screen but a terrible selection of content, Cathay has a fantastic selection of content paired with a satisfactory screen. I’d take that any day of the week over JAL’s setup. I had watched several episodes of Elementary over dinner, so I decided some lighter fare, in the form of The Big Bang Theory, would be in order.


My milk tea was topped off regularly, and on one of those visits Amy left a duty free bag with me, explaining it was a little gift from the crew. I didn’t open it until I got to my hotel later that night. Inside, there were a couple packages of pralines that were served on board. They came in very handy during my time in Mainland China, as food options were slim pickings over there.

All too soon, the captain came on the horn to announce 30 minutes to landing. The captain also advised that due to thunderstorms in vicinity of Hong Kong, the approach would be quite bumpy and the cabin crew should be seated as quickly as possible. In the pointy end of the plane, there really wasn’t much to tidy up. Amy and Sachiko dropped by to collect my cup and to say good bye. The ISM also dropped inquire how I enjoyed my flight and again apologized for the delay. She explained the reason they were late arriving in Tokyo is because of the same weather system that we were about pass through. Upon learning I had flown into Tokyo on JAL, she seemed to be genuinely interested in my experience there and how it compared to Cathay’s service. We ended up chatting until ride got too bumpy for her keep standing.

Oh man, the captain was not kidding. The remainder our decent into Hong Kong was as rough as I’ve ever experienced. Dishes were constantly rattling in the galley, and several loud crashes were heard on the way down. We didn’t break through the overcast until well into our final approach. At that point, the approach lights of Runway 7R came into view, a major avgeek moment for me. In fact, I might have fist pumped a couple of times… Unfortunately, the ride was so bumpy I couldn’t get a semi clear shot. Winds continued buffet our huge aircraft up until touchdown, but our flight crew was able to stabilize the approach just enough to set ‘er down on the runway. We ended taxiing for about 10 minutes before reaching our gate. Jetbridges were quickly attached, and I was off the plane as soon as the door was opened, thanking wonderful crew on the way out.