Aboard CX 138 Sydney-Hong Kong 2/3 April 2006
I've got to say that Cathay Pacific has got me hooked. Every time I thought about something I needed, there was a beautiful young lady at my elbow, or as close as you can get to the elbow of someone in a window seat, anyway. I could get used to this!
As I write, we're about an hour out of Hong Kong, I've had a scrummy breakfast, watched an episode of Kath and Kim, and now I'm just rounding out the edges of my contentment.
We're over the South China Sea in a Boeing 777. Four in the morning local time and black as a something's whatsit outside. It's been a great flight and while I prefer a daylight flight so I can gaze down over waters pale and limpid or jungles dense and torpid. Or something like that. Kath and Kim brings out the inner poet in me. If not the grammatic fanatic. Let's accentuate the positives and say that I've saved the price of accomodation with a night flight.
Can't say as I slept well, but I never do on a plane anyway. I slept better than any other flight, let's leave it at that. I woke up with a jolt something past two AM when they turned on the lights and commenced breakfast.
That's Hong Kong time. I have a habit of setting my watch to destination time when I get on the plane. All this mucking about with daylight saving has provided a bit of delicious uncertainty to the process. I'm never good at this spring forward autumn back routine at the best of times and heading up over the equator on the same day that New South Wales changes over is just gilding the silly billy. Or something like that. Anyway, we're landing in half an hour. Or possibly two or three.
Let's see. Today I get to hang out in Hong Kong. In transit, so the entry form I've filled out and wedged into my passport may become an interesting souvenir.
I'd better close down now - I think we've commenced our descent. Either that or the pilot is feeling his oats.
Yes. The pilot's confirmed descent. I'll see if the cabin crew has this morning's newspaper. That'll test their service levels!
Comments:
From the moment I stepped aboard and turned left intead of right, I reached a higher plane. Business Class on Cathay Pacific is the way air travel should be. Two abreast instead of three, and they knock out every second row of seats. Maybe up ahead in First Class they were able to stretch out flat, but I came pretty close. I could press a button and the seat would unfold or recline or do a bit of both.
The delightful cabin attendants kept me supplied with spiced tomato juice, and when they served a meal, they did so on starched linen with practiced grace. They pampered me shamelessly. Qantas is OK, I thought to myself, but I've found a new love!
The daylight saving thing was a bit of a worry. In the Sydney Qantas Club they weren't announcing flights and my boarding pass issued in Perth and the overhead monitors were indicating two different boarding times. I had to get the counter staff to check before I could relax and enjoy a bit of freebie internet.
At this point I'll mention my watch. Perhaps it was a needless extravagance when I bought it some years back, but since then my
Citizen Eco Drive Skyhawk has been a wonderful companion on international trips. It has time zones plugged in, and all I need do when I board a plane is to select my destination, press two buttons at once, and the hands move around to my next time zone. It has a digital display if I want to check on a different time zone, such as what time it is back home.