Zorak

Mom and I are flying SFO to TPE later next month in J...

- Reviews of the CI lounge vary widely in recency and opinion but I get the impression it's not much to write home about... anyone been there lately? How's the food? Looks like AF/KL lounge will be closed by the time we get there and the new DL SkyClub would require going thru security twice since T1 and IntlA aren't connected airside.

- OTOH from what I've read it seems like we should definitely check out the TPE lounges

- right now we're in 12A and 15A (it wasn't clear initially I'd be accompanying her so we booked at different times). Probably we'll just be interested in sleeping but I assume center seats would be better if we thought we might want to chat? Currently the only open D/G pairs are in 22/23. I think we're probably just going to ask whoever has 14A if they want to swap with one of us. (We're returning on different dates so that flight doesn't matter.)

Any other thoughts/opinions appreciated.

lolstebbo

SFO lounge is.... well...... it exists? Food's gotten better over the years. I don't remember what they had the last time I was there two months ago, but before that they had mediocre wonton noodle soups. Either way, it's an improvement over cup ramen and California Rolls from Costco.

If you're willing to walk a bit in TPE, go to the T1 lounge. Nicer ambience and increased food selection.

Center seats would indeed be best for chatting, but the aft J cabin isn't too bad. CI splurged on the partitions between cabins.

Zorak

Cool, thanks for the info!

gracall

Haha, +1. After a few initial visit I don't bothered using SFO CI lounge anymore.

To Zorak, with the new seats facing towards the windows, it would literally be a stretch to chat with folks across the isle in A or K. Swap for middle seats.

Zorak

Thanks -- since last night 21 D/G either opened up or I just failed to notice they were available, but I just snagged them for us

worldwidedreamer

Visiting a few weeks ago before the OZ flight, I would have loved a Costco California roll. I think the choices were ramen, shrink wrapped sandwiches and fruit. The AF lounge is far superior.

Zorak

On the way back from TPE now, posted some photos of the SFO lounge here:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/membe...ober-2015.html

In case this helps anyone encountering this thread as the first hit in a search:

- Access to the lounge is located immediately to the left after you clear security in Intl A. If you wander into/past the duty free store or even hit gates A1/A2 you're going the wrong way.

- The food was quite reasonable IMO (however I am an ABC so discount my opinion as you wish ) You could certainly make a meal out of it, although the on-board meal service was relatively soon after takeoff, maybe plan accordingly for appetite. I didn't try the sushi, which looked a bit dodgy, or the fruit/sandwiches.

- free wifi (password shown on placards, from Googling past trip reports I doubt it's changed in a while)

- there's a newspaper/magazine rack

- I was surprised at how quiet it was, which lasted maybe 20 minutes until someone started playing a phone/tablet game at top volume. They were shortly asked to turn the volume down. Following this there were irregular outbursts from people getting texts or phone calls and staff again went around asking people to keep their phone volumes down/silent.

My previous intl flights have been a handful of Y, VS J like 10+ years ago, and AF W, so I'm pretty satisfied with CI J overall the seat's comfortable; I had 15G on the outbound and am currently in 14K. In lie-flat mode it does seem a bit cramped... the personal space in A/G vs. D/K is naturally mirror-image from each other, in case you tend to sleep in a specific position, e.g. if on my left side with knees bent I found K to be easier than G (and obv. then A/D for right side) but YMMV. On my back I found my arms squeezed a bit by the armrests, which can be mitigated somewhat by lowering the one on the aisle side. Length/footwell isn't too bad. For reference I'm about 5'10" and, well, it wouldn't hurt me to lose 10-20 pounds

Mom got what I think was the turndown service but it seemed to consist mostly of folding the duvet in half and laying it down on the seat for additional comfort and giving her a blanket as a replacement, so I decided not to bother.

D/G were definitely better for chatting, such as it was -- effectively red-eye flight so there wasn't much conversation beyond helping mom figure out the AVOD (the FAs were quite willing to spend time and help with that too) and you have to speak up over the loud white noise of the cabin.

If there is interest I can post food menus/photos...

Per lolstebbo's tip, after checking in at TPE T2 I picked up some duty-free whisky I've been looking for and then walked ~10-15 minutes through the D -> A gates to the T1 lounge. It's much nicer than the SFO lounge but having just had a huge dinner on the heels of a huge lunch (semi-involuntarily, as is the Chinese custom for extended family gatherings), I didn't want to eat more before getting on the plane...

coolfish1103

Great report.

I would have opt for food in the lounge at T1 than on the plane, though.

Zorak

We did this trip again recently in 12D (me) and 12G (mom) in both directions. Some updates/additional observations:

The above seems to be a confused typo, I think I meant D/K for left side and A/G for right side. However I picked D this time because of this but oddly it seemed better on my right side than my left side. So now I have no idea

On the outbound I was testing out my seat during boarding and it got stuck in the reclined position halfway between upright and flat. 14D was empty, so they had me sit there for takeoff, after which 12D started working again, including going full flat. In the "morning" however it got stuck in recline and I had to switch to 14D for landing again. This was on B-18003 FWIW.

Turndown was offered to me proactively on the outbound, and I was slightly wrong in my description above -- they bring out a 2nd duvet and an extra pillow of slightly different shape/firmness. I did think it added a bit of comfort, so I asked for it on the way back. Oddly they collect only the turndown duvet (it's a different color) before landing.

The SFO lounge was essentially unchanged from my previous report.

We used the TPE T1 lounge, where I took a shower. Towels/shower gel/shampoo are provided. Oddly the ledge that looks like an obvious place to sit while changing clothes had a placard "please do not sit here" and there is nowhere else to sit. /shrug

This part was the same we ate a ridiculous amount of food with various extended family in the last 3-4 days of the trip. Oof. Including DTF in Kaohsiung

I thought I remembered the onboard food being decent although not exactly knockout back in October. This time it was mostly so-so, and mom had a steak that she gave the rest to me and I thought it was mediocre at best.

App on the outbound was a duck breast salad that was very flavorful and well-balanced and was the best thing I had in either direction. The congee was pretty good too. Fruit still served in the plastic bowls.

Service was always prompt and attentive, although the quality of the English announcements on the outbound could have been better. Also the FAs on the outbound kept forgetting I said English would be better; on the return the FAs were pretty good at intuitively guessing the limits of my ABC Mandarin.

We arrived early in SFO airspace but had to circle a bit due to fog and sequencing. We then had to wait to be tugged in to A7. Mom and I both have GE and breezed through, but although the first batch of ~30 bags arrived quickly (most with red "First Priority" and then a few yellow SkyPriority) there was a lengthy delay for the rest of the Sky bags.

Food pix:
1. outbound app, the duck breast salad
2. outbound entree, some shrimp thing with sweet/spicy sauce (sorry, I pre-ordered online and didn't copy down any descriptions or take pix of the inflight menus)
3. return app, prawn salad (well, the singular was accurate) with slices of I think this stuff? (it tasted vaguely fishy anyway)
4. chicken soup in the signature bowl (both directions)
5. for variety I selected one of the veggie options ex-TPE, dried bean curd sheets rolled with spinach. Aside: I have a minor peeve when the entree plate is set down with the plate facing the wrong way with the main item away from the diner. Also, too lazy to crop out my finger.

Zorak

Flew CI004 again yesterday -- for the pre-arrival meal, the fruit that previously came in a plastic bowl, was served in a glass bowl! Progess

coolfish1103

That plastic bowl got lots of "comments" on being cheap so they finally got around changing it for the 359 fleet. Not sure if they changed on the 77W yet.

Zorak

It's still a 77W on this route right now, but as with the other post about the amenity kit I imagine they're rolling out the upgraded serviceware to all the longhauls regardless.

lolstebbo

They've updated the picture of the amenity kits on their websites, so presumably both might be for all longhauls.

tris06

We will be flying business class to and from BNE this July so we will be able to confirm if there are any improvements. While we might get the upgraded amenity kits. I think we will still get the old meal service tableware on the A330 long haul. Which to be honest would be quite disappointing.

One should still expect to get the same quality soft product as other routes if its still costing like 3000 USD return to BNE.

bj27

Let us know. It seems like the market TPE<->BNE is not competitive, given that I think only CI and BR fly this route and both send old A330s with angled flat recliner style seats in J.