CATHAY PACIFIC FIRST CLASS, HKG-JFK
Spending a night in a city with no place to stay can be annoying. The solution is usually to party all night. However, intense hangovers do not result in great travel experiences, so I took it easy and started heading back to the airport around 3:30am.
The daybeds at the Pier First Class Lounge in HKG are great for spending a few hours and catching up on sleep. Unfortunately, the lounge only opens at 5:30am, so I spent 45min wondering the airport and lowering AMEX’s yearly profits by using my card to enter the Plaza Premium Lounge for free for 15min.
After abusing my card privileges, I took a wrong turn and finally ended up at The Pier 15min later. My first order of business was to find out whether I can switch into my beloved 1A, since the flight loading went from F5 to F3 a few days before. The answer was affirmative, and I was joyed to be sitting at the very front. There’s just nothing better in this world than having a boarding pass with 1A written on it.
The Pier - First Class Lounge
The next order of business was to book a massage session, then take a shower. The shower suites were nice, although I find the ones at The Wing better. Either way, I was happy to be smelling fresh again, and it sure felt nice to put on a new set of clothes after 15 hours.
After this, it was time for breakfast. Food options were plenty, but none really my taste – so I settled for an English Breakfast with no egg. Bacon, sausage and toast. Yum.
With my stomach content again, I headed to a daybed to catch up on some sleep. Ever afraid that I’d somehow sleep through my alarms and miss the cheapest Cathay First ticket anyone will ever get, I set around seven on them and proceeded to nap.
Daybed at The Pier
The buzzer for my massage went off exactly one hour before I scheduled it, which was slightly annoying - 20min isn’t much of a nap. Nonetheless, I went for a nice foot massage, and then returned to the daybed to chill out before my flight.
View from the daybed - Cathay A350-900
The flight was leaving from Gate 4, so I trekked it back to the other side of the airport, quickly stopping by The Wing to get my shirt ironed. When I arrived at the gate, I was a little scared to see the flight was on final call already. Contrary to the usual, I think I was one of the last 5 people to board the plane – but was happy to see only two others in the F cabin once onboard.
First Class cabin
Suite 1A
Settling into my seat, two FAs introduced themselves and welcomed me onboard. Both were super friendly and happy to converse. One (of course) asked about my age. Her reaction:
“Wow, you look so young, I thought you were 18.”
Sigh.
She informed me of today’s flight time: 14hr 48min, which sounded pretty alright to me. 16hr would be better, but I’m definitely not complaining about almost 15 hours in 1A. On the other hand, the man sitting in 2A was happy that the flight time was shorter than usual. He sounded like regular Cathay F flier.
For pre-departure beverages, I had to proactively ask for them to bring the bubbly. Only alternatives were offered. Two minutes later, a nice bottle of Krug 2004 was brought to me, which was illogically satisfying. I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between supermarket prosecco and Dom Perignon 1953 if my life depended on it, so this just tasted like champagne to me. It smelt funky, though. And the price tag made me feel pretentious snob. Life was good.
Krug 2004
After the bubbly delivery, I was handed an amenity kit and offered some pajamas, the latter of which was a fantastically ugly shade of blue. The pajama bag came along with some slippers as well, which are always nice to use on the plane.
Shortly after we taxied and sped off into the clouds, which revealed the cabin’s true age: my IFE flung out of its holder. The Suite had some other scratches and dints, which didn’t feel very first class, but it was perfectly functional otherwise.
Once airborne, I started out by doing the only thing anyone should do in First Class once the seatbelt is off: chuck on some PJs. The blue Chinese prince look definitely wasn’t the most attractive, but I felt grand.
Next up was a peruse of the dinner menu, which was – as expected – pretty average. Qatar’s J menu is far superior. Caviar seems to get everyone overly excited – I tried it once on a previous Cathay F flight and found it no better than a spoon of salt. So, I skipped out on appetizers and ordered a steak and Cathay Delight.
Before the steak, I was given something or another which tasted gross. It looked nice in the picture, though.
Nice looking - poor tasting
Whilst better than the something or another, the steak was sub-par. I’m not one to complain much about food, but this was super chewy and undercooked. When I took my first bite, I also realized the flight attendant didn’t ask me how I would like the steak done. That was probably a bit of a failure...
On the other hand, my first Cathay Delight was fantastic. I might get some flak for this, but I’ll say it was much better than the Krug 2004. Ha.
During lunch, we flew over Taipei and I managed to spot Taipei 101, which I thought was pretty awesome.
Taipei from 30,000ft
With a full stomach and increasingly tired body, I asked the FA to set up my bed. As many will attest to, the bed in Cathay First absolutely rocks. The mattress cover is nice and soft, and the bed is super wide. When you grab 3 spare pillows from the surrounding empty seats, it gets even better.
Cathay First Class bed
Feeling nice and cozy, I watched the start of
Beautiful Boy and fell asleep within 30min. Around three hours later, I woke up to heavy turbulence which threw me up and down a little bit. I have no problem with turbulence, but this was bad enough to throw my IFE all around the place, so I had to hold it in order to continue watching my movie.
The turbulence lasted twenty or so minutes, and I sprinted a marathon two metres to the bathroom as soon as the seatbelt sign was off: the biggest downside of turbulence, in my opinion.
A nice sunset followed, which I thoroughly enjoyed with three windows at my disposal.
Wide angle sunset view
Sun setting under the 77W wing
Feeling hungry again, I ordered a burger and another Cathay Delight. The burger was tasty; a lot better than the steak. My second Cathay Delight didn’t taste as fresh as the first, but still not bad.
Burger with fries - the tastiest meal on this flight
Post-dinner, I continued to watch the movie for a while and then dozed off for a few hours again. In the end, I slept approximately 10 hours over three separate periods. A testament to how comfortable the bed was – and maybe my tiredness after an all-nighter in HK. One thing I noted was the crew never fluffed up the bedding when I visited the bathroom. Not a major thing, but it would’ve been a nice touch.
Cathay First Class bed
When I was finally awake for good, the sun had already risen and it was time to find something else to watch. I was very happy to find the third season of
Animal Kingdom in the TV section, as I’ve been unable to find it on Netflix ever since moving out of Hong Kong.
For ‘Dinner’, I had some fruit to begin with, followed by a chicken dish. The fruit was nice and fresh, and the chicken alright. Nothing special, but perfectly edible. By look of the photos, a third Cathay Delight was consumed as well.
Fresh fruit
Chicken something or another - not bad, not great
Dessert was some sort of pudding, which was good but not amazing.
Prior to landing, I relaxed with the seat reclined and read my kindle. I also decided it was time to imbibe in a little more Krug, and a new bottle was opened for me. I’m not sure if I feel bad about this, but I only had two glasses and the rest went to waste. I’m fairly sure the two other pax didn’t drink through the whole flight, so chances are two bottles of the good stuff were used up solely for me, despite only three glasses in the end. Whoops.
Relaxing with some champagne
With the flight coming to an end, I switched back into my non-Chinese Prince outfit and snapped some more photos of the cabin.
Nice ambiance - a bit more muted than QR's cabins
Suite 1A
Suite 1A
Suite 1A
Another view of the cabin - note the sleeping panda in 2A.
On descent I was treated to great views of Long Island and Manhattan.
Long Island
Manhattan in the distance
Manhattan in the distance
After 14hr and 58min, we touched down at JFK and taxied to Terminal 8. The crew came by and thanked me for flying with Cathay, then I was off to explore NYC for a few days. Of course, after snapping a final pic of the plane.
B-KPV - Cathay Pacific 777-300ER
This was my second flight in Cathay First, and as per any flight in First, it was excellent. The food wasn’t all that great, and the cabin wasn’t looking all too spick – but the rest of the experience was more than pleasant. And for this journey from Da Nang to New York costing all of $365, I’ll say I got some pretty freaking good value. I’m very much looking forward to the return trip later this year.