My wife and I just returned from Bangkok and we used AA miles to book our first business class flights on Cathay. We flew CX754 from BKK-HKG and CX892 from HKG-SFO. Both flights were on 359's. Here's a brief report and some observations.

Check-in at BKK was very smooth. There was no line at the counter and boarding passes and lounge cards were printed for both legs of the journey. We were able to use the priority line for security and immigration and it was a good thing, as the regular line at BKK can be.....challenging.....to say the least. All in all, we went from taxi to lounge in the space of about 15 minutes, a record for us at BKK.

The Cathay Lounge at BKK was all right. The noodle bar was a nice surprise, although the noodles were a little overcooked. The WiFi was fine and the chairs were comfortable, so not a while lot else needs to be said. The noodle bar at the HKG lounge was, not suprisingly, much nicer.

Boarding was smooth and we pushed back ahead of schedule. The IFE for the flight was fine, at least mechanically, and it's certainly not CX's fault that Hollywood and the music industry puts of junk these days. The seats were fine, although on both flights, it looked like the fabric and the components of the seat were already experiencing quite a bit of wear and tear. But I slept eight hours on the HKG-SFO leg, so I can't complain about comfort.

Food service started almost immediately on both flights. And here's where my disappointment came in, both on this flight and the later HKG-SFO flight. I thought that the food on CX was pretty pedestrian. We've been fortunate enough to gather enough points in both the Star Alliance and on OneWorld to take most of the major Asian TransPac carriers (Singapore being one that will come up in November). Each of the ones we've taken (JAL, ANA and EVA) have had more of a WOW factor when it came to mealtime. I didn't feel like that on Cathay. The meal selections were pretty much what I would have expected in economy class. I also thought the flight attendants on Cathay were much less helpful than on the others, certainly a LOT less helpful as compared to EVA.

So, in summary, the flight was comfortable, but I felt it wasn't as nice an experience as the flights we've had on ANA and, in particular on JAL (which we took going over to Asia) and most particularly on EVA, which we just love. I won't say I was disappointed, because it's pretty crazy to say you're disappointed in an awards flight on a five star airline, but I will say I expected a little more.