mraquinas

Booked a flight using AP miles from CGK - PEK. The only available seat is with Air China flight 978 via. Xiamen. Has anyone in the forum have any experience with Air China 737-700 (73G) in J (CA call this "first class") or maybe with this CA978 specifically? I know that the Y seat are as awful as US Domestic J, but I wonder how about the meal/services/lounge access at CGK?

Any one can share the light about this route or this particular fleet of AC...anything would be very much appreciated...

PS: I don't understand how CA is using 737 for 7-8 hours flight such as this one :-(

ghfatw

The J/F seats on the Air China 737's are basically the same as traditonal US domestic seats. On routes from China to Singapore/Malaysia/Indonesia the carriers tend to use planes without nice J seats. I don't know what seats Garuda uses on its Shanghai-Jakarta direct flights but it is a 333 and therefore the J seats might be nice.

MP (Miles+Points)

Jakata to Xiamen is only a 4-5 hour journey, right? Not really a 7-8 hour flight.

CA F class is ok for a 2 hour domestic flight, for long journeys it's not that comfortable. And the food quality varies so much on different CA int'l flights. I had wonderful hot food with choices served to me from CA flight, also had crap stuff can't even eat.

Good luck with this one, and let us know how it went.

CNJMichael

My only experience is PEK-URC on a CA 737-800. The flight was about 4 hours long, and the Y experience was perfectly fine. Seat pitch was pretty much identical to U.S. carriers. However, I found the catering to be better than what I usually get on U.S. carriers.

XMN is a fairly easy airport to transit. On a URC-CAN flight, we had a stopover with no change of planes and it was nice to get out and stretch our legs for a while.

mraquinas

According to the itinerary :
Jakarta (CGK)
to Beijing (PEK)

Dep. 01:10
Arr. 11:05
Stops: 0
Sat. Jul 31, 2010
same day
Duration: 8h 55 minAircraft: 737-700
Meal: Information not available
CA978Business

I assume that 8:55 hours includes 55 minutes refuel in Xiamen

I will try to make a TR as soon as I get the experienced of this flight and should be a lot of photos....

PS: does CA have any affiliated lounge in CGK?

House

You can bargain on more than 55 minutes for what is more than just a fuel stop. The flight will become a domestic flight at Xiamen, which will require you to leave the plane, go through customs/immigration, reclaim your bags, recheck and go through security before reboarding. The airport is small so it's not a huge hassle, and at PEK you are a domestic arrival so getting out of the airport is pretty quick. You will be joined for the XMN-PEK segment by passengers just flying domestically within China.

toyotaboy95

You don't get catering on U.S. carriers . Usually on Mainland China flights, you'll get mystery food but breakfast is totally fine (per your timing, there is usually western/continental (eggs and sausage) breakfast and congee/noodles (Economy). In First, there is likely to be more expensive food (salmon etc.).

CGK has a total of three lounges (one exclusively for GA) and CA should be using one of them.

moondog

Unless procedures have changed recently, you don't need to pick up your bags in XMN and transit immigration has always been surprisingly fast there (DLC also); usually back on the plane in less than 30 mins.

House

My recent experiences on this have been at PVG, where there were mixed messages from the ground staff. The theory was that no reclaim was needed but the connecting bags were going around on the reclaim belt.

moondog

I'm not sure what goes on behind the scenes. What's more, it wouldn't surprise me if procedures varied from airport to airport and were also constantly in flux. However since ~20 one stop international flights pass thru XMN every day, I have to assume that they reasonably well organized.

IME one stop flights are far more annoying when leaving China because they often entail waiting in a grim room in the international terminal cordoned off from lounges, stores, and restaurants... followed by a long, escorted, walk to a domestic gate.

I got my first taste of this routine when a client booked PEK-SIN on CA via XMN,... an experience that prompted me to insist on SQ for subsequent trips.

All of my other XMN and DLC transits have been on award tickets, on routes that were otherwise very expensive (e.g. PEK-HIJ, PEK-MNL, PEK-CTS). In the case of HIJ and CTS, there really weren't any better alternatives on my travel dates.

mraquinas

I am not hoping for pajamas or amenity kits or things we usually received from 5 star airliners while flying F or J, but I hope at least to receive a nice meal service...likewise, even regional flight like this, plus flying in a narrow body plane for 6+ hours would be a pain and CA will certainly lost many of potential REV-PAX for this route.

moondog

The fact that CA and CZ have been running 737s and 320s via XMN to SE Asia for the past 10+ years suggests that they are happy with the arrangement.

mraquinas

Nothing spectacular but....nice to have.....

moondog

When I saw your picture, I couldn't stop myself from mentally replacing the food shown with a 12" Spicy Italian.

UMD

I thought we were talking about CA but why did you show a picture of an SQ meal?