Hi:

I will soon start a DONE4. One of the problems is that OW offer no service between Shanghai and Beijing. I suspect many OW RTWers have faced this problem.

I will have to buy a J class ticket. There are three options:

CA (Air China) on either a 738 or 74E
MU (China Eastern) on a AB6
FM (Shanghai Airlines) on a 737

The best price (one-way) seems to be $177 at elong.net (April 5).

Anybody have any experience with these airlines on this route? Any experience with elong.net (or a better site)?

Also, elong.net offers some very cheap economy fares for $60. Is J class worth it?

Thanks in advance!

If you want to make the most of your DONE4 you could take CX between PEK-HKG (2 flights daily) and then buy a separate ticket on Dragonair (KA) from HKG-PVG. Fares for random dates in May make a KA return price out at 461 in Y, 619 in J and 800 in F (all prices in US $).

That is not good advice imho. The CX PEK-HKG segment in J is regional business class. Nothing special and the flight times are not convenient. Also, by flying to Shanghai via Hong Kong, your out of pocket (for the HKG-PVG sector versus PEK-PVG) increases signficantly. Another option is to take the overnight express train between PEK and PVG.

What's the big deal here? I've found NRBC to be fine on short hops like this. The op asked about how to make most efficient use of a DONEx so that's what I've posted; but agreed the schedule could be better.

if you're willing to fly y, there are around 30 flights available for y400 ($50). as far as specific choices are concerned, i usually try to avoid mu and hu at all costs (though i might make an exception to try an mu 343/345). between fm and ca, i prefer fm, but ca's new 777s are pretty nice.

btw, elong is a pretty crappy site imo. they use bait and switch pricing (so does ctrip, to a much lesser extent, because the listings you see aren't real time) love to tack on fees of their own that set them apart from almost every other ta i've ever dealt with.

i suggest you wait till you get to beijing before buying a ticket; those fares will probably come down a bit between now and april 2 (and will likely hold steady or rise again between the 2nd and the 5th)

edited to add: i just realized that you want to fly sha to pek rather than vv. that's usually a bit more expensive (i often pay close to full fare), but there are still a handful of flights for y450

Thank you. This is most helpful. I think i will wait to buy, and when I do I will see what prices the conventional sites (expedia, etc.) have to offer.

The service on those airlines is about the same. Bigger equipment is usually better, though (avoid the 737s/727s if possible). Pricing should also be about the same. No point in booking on elong/ctrip as you should be able to secure the same or better pricing in Beijing.

Domestic F/J is nothing special, but Y can be pretty miserable and the fare difference on that route should be quite small. I usually u/g myself on China domestic legs to seperate myself from the riff-raff in Y.

waiting won't help much insofar as expedia et al are concerned because those sites only sell full fare (plus a little exchange rate magic, as far as i can tell).

as for the fare difference being small, it is true that j isn't a whole lot more than full y, but right now y is around $60 (as you observed), which is a lot cheaper than $150 by my math.