Originally Posted by
Splotly
Schoolboy error by me - yes now you say it, it’s obvious of course BA8 is the return leg! But actually in all the hundreds of flights I’ve taken I’d never noticed its odds number outbound - well well !!
I should have meant the other outbound (BA5) that’s only on some days. With its different flight time does it have a slightly different meal service - and if so any views on which is generally preferred? And either side have a better view?
I won’t change the OP title of the thread though, otherwise your post will look strange when people read it.
I changed my November BA7/8 booking to BA5/6 last week, there having been an unusually high number of Avios seats available!
I've only ever used BA7/8 before, back before Covid when they were 777s flying over Russia - the reason being it's usually an Avios flight, and slots on BA5/6 are like gold dust compared to BA7/8 (and as they're hard to come by, that's saying something).
The downside of BA7 is that the timings aren't so good - you take off in the morning, UK time, landing relatively early in the morning Japan time (around 7AM). That means that you'll probably not be able to check in to your hotel (unless you pay for the night before), and as a bonus means you spend all day feeling like a zombie. In theory BA5, being a few hours later, would mean better sleep onboard and less zombiefied hours the other end.
Coming back, BA8 lands at a reasonable time (mid afternoon), but it's an early start (I'm old-school and like to be at the airport 3 hours before the flight time). BA6 means less of a hectic start but you won't be back in the UK until the evening.
In my case though it was the thought of spending 14 hours in a yin-yang seat versus 14 hours in a club suite that swung it for me - even with the drier air, I'd prefer the newer seat I think!
NB - there are only two meals served on board, so my plan is to bring some bottled water and snacks on board. The Club Kitchen might come up trumps, but I wouldn't bank on it...
EDIT: And I used to prefer left for outbound, right for coming back, as I like looking at the scenery and prefer not to have the sun shining in. Now that it's a pseudo "round the world" flight, I've picked left for both legs - and I'm hoping to see the northern lights over Canada on the way back!
(I'm also expecting the return leg to feel very strange. You take off in the early afternoon, head through the night, fly through the day, land again in the darkness... and it's still the same day on the calendar!)