Originally Posted by
plazc
I'm looking at flying in J from IAD to CPT.
Most availability for United Business Saver awards is with Ethiopian on their 787-8 from IAD to ADD, then an ET 737-800 to JNB, and then usually SAA on the shorter hop to CPT. Further out, I see availability direct to CPT from ADD on ET's A350, which is nice too.
I have also found some space on SAA, flying IAD to JNB on their A330-300 and then on to CPT.
Which is "nicer" if I care about food, drink, and overall comfort on my first J flight? I flew to Japan in economy and it was fine, but this is a honeymoon splurge so I am curious which is the best hard and soft product between the different planes and airlines.
I found a thread from 2016 here but can't link to it. Has anything changes since forum/south-african-airways-voyager/1803825-sa-et-iad.html ?
Thank you in advance!
The A333 J is an awesome hard product - and having experience of both; would take SAA over ET. I would seriously consider though seeing what equipment and service you could get out of JFK on SAA; then you have no midnight disruption for the stopover; as quite rightly (although uniquely) SAA stow blankets during take off and landing as they could hinder an evacuation in the event of an emergency.
As a regular traveller on both, I do find the SAA product and interors better kept than even newer ET; to the point where some ET cabins look so worn despite the planes being very new (one seatmate on an ADD OSL flight in Cloud9 thought they were recycling cabin interirors from old planes to new)
Whichever airline you choose, have an awesome honeymoon in SA!