HKG is a really pretty airport. It's held up really well over the decades.
I walked past the first class check-in area I would not be using today to find the business class line.
With my boarding pass issued, I headed through security and immigration. It was cool to see that Hong Kong now also has those scanners that allow you to leave everything in your bag. And I was able to use the eGates to exit the city, at least.
My flight was departing from Gate 2, immediately adjacent to The Wing lounge. So of course, with three hours to spare, I decided that actually I was going to trek all the way to the other end of the airport to check out The Pier instead.
I'm making good life choices today.
The Pier was down this escalator at the far end of the terminal, dropping me off into a very long stretch of rooms in the lower level.
In addition to the standard buffet, there was a noodle bar, a tea room, and a couple of other themed areas, with plenty of seating throughout.
I got myself some noodles, dim sum, and a pot of tea before settling in for a few hours.
Strangely, I added my Alaska MileagePlan number to my reservation during online checkin the night before, and now it's showing me as Sapphire for some reason despite the fact that my MVP Gold status expired last calendar year. No idea what's happening here.
A bit of planespotting down here.
With about an hour to go before my flight, I decided to leave The Pier and start walking back. There was a flight to Shanghai boarding immediately next to my lounge; if only there had been award space on this one.
Walked briefly past The Bridge, another lounge, but decided it wasn't worth popping into this one.
Oh gosh the walk back is so long, and as far as I know, you can't take the train back to the lower gate numbers. Well, if it isn't the consequences of my own actions...
Rather long wait for the Plaza Premium lounge that I decided to skip as well.
And here's my gate, number 2.
The entrance to The Wing is literally facing my gate, so I decided I may as well duck into there to wait for boarding to start.
Predictably, with this lounge being so much closer to security, it was much more crowded.
FlightRadar24 wasn't showing my tail number yet, so I was sitting here in the lounge craning my neck trying to read the tail number off my plane at the gate. The lounge was overlooking the gate area, so I could keep an eye on whether boarding had started.
Soon, people were lining up for boarding, and I decided to hop in line as well.
And about 10 minutes after the printed boarding time, they finally let us on.
Cathay Pacific CX 362: HKG – PVG
Airbus A330-330, B-LAK
6/5/2025 19:20 HKT – 22:10 CST
Business Class, 12A (window)
I had asked about this on Flyertalk a while back but it seems that equipment swaps on this route are extremely common, so I was very concerned when I booked this flight that I'd end up in a recliner seat. I was thus ecstatic when I finally deciphered the tail number back in the lounge to see that indeed, I was getting lie-flat seats.
A nice Cathay Delight PDB. A very nice smoothie.
Holy crap that footwell is massive. I see what people say about Cathay having amazing reverse herringbone seats, especially as early on as they introduced this product. The only real complaint is the lack of storage; I had to put my backpack in the overhead bin for takeoff. Otherwise, this is still a phenomenal seat for sleeping, even after all these decades.
Got a hot towel.
And watched the jet bridges pull back.
Cathay's safety video began to play, and I was surprised to see that it was only in English and Mandarin. I had seen the version they posted on YouTube, in English and Cantonese, but apparently they had a second version sitting around with all the Cantonese replaced.
We pushed back against a beautiful sunset I couldn't capture properly on camera.
By the time we made it to the runway, it was already dark.
And just like that, we left Hong Kong behind.
Anyone know what these blue and teal lights are? Boats?
Lavatory was stocked simply. No foot pedal on the trash can.
Free wifi was available in Business class, though it took us hitting 10,000 feet to become functional. Speeds were surprisingly okay.
For dinner, I chose the beef option. It was very mediocre. The vegetables were oily and too sweet. The beef itself was fairly dry and lacked in flavor on its own, though the gravy helped a lot. The shrimp salad was frankly disgusting. It didn't help that I wasn't too hungry, having eaten in the lounge.
The garlic bread was good, though.
Capped the meal off with some ice cream and Hong Kong milk tea.
Flight paths involving Mainland China are always so funky.
I put the seat into bed mode, which was fairly comfortable, except for the big slab of the side that peeled off and landed on my foot. Okay, so I guess the maintenance could also be a bit better here.
Soon we landed into Shanghai.
Is that a Spring Airlines plane parked next to a United jet?
And thus a perfectly pleasant short flight came to an end. Cathay's catering onboard seemed quite dire, as does the state of repair of their old (but still phenomenal) seats. The lounge, however, was awesome. I can't think of the last time I was impressed by a business class lounge that didn't have a sit-down restaurant inside, but Cathay managed to do it. Good for them. The service onboard was also quite well intentioned. Overall, I have no real issues with this flight, especially given it was only around 2 hours. Still, I think Cathay is still noticeably not operating at the same level of polish as they were before the pandemic.
A quick walk through the bowels of PVG took me to a fairly empty and fast immigration line, after I left my fingerprints and filled out an arrival card.
And soon I was dumped into the good ol' International, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan Arrivals area.
Since the Shanghai Metro apparently stops running around 10:30pm for some reason, I needed to catch a cab to my hotel.
That's a story for next time.