It's been more than a year since batmandds and I enjoyed our last RTW. This year, we've decided to try some new First Class products including Singapore’s new A380 First Suites. And with our better halves surprisingly agreeing to 4 day hall passes, we are off on a decadent culinary and flight odyssey that includes Singapore First, Thai A380 First and Air France 77W La Premiere. The culinary highlights of the trip is our day in both Singapore and Bangkok where we’ll enjoy an early brunch at the Maxwell Food Centre and later that day, a 25 course tasting menu at iconic Gaggan in Bangkok. Now in its fifth year as Asia’s #1 restaurant, Gaggan just moved up to #4 in the world. From theworlds50best.com...









ANA First Class LAX to Haneda

We decided to rendez-vous in Shanghai to experience Singapore's new A380 First Suites to Singapore. While batmandds is flying LAX-PVG in the new Delta One A359 Suites, I found an ANA First Class award seat on their 1am LAX-Haneda 77W, and a Business Class SkySuite award seat on JAL's NRT-PVG 787. Not much traffic on the 405 at 10pm tonight but the LAX access roads were jam packed. I gave up on trying for the T4 garage and parked in the T3/TBIT garage.



Since I had checked in online and had my boarding passes, I bypassed the counter and headed directly for PreCheck or so I thought. Missed the PreCheck closing by 15 minutes and then wasted another 20 minutes at the other end of security with the masses since there was NO PRIORITY LANE for Business or First Class.





Up to Level 6 and the Star Alliance Lounges. My first stop was the Star Alliance First Class Lounge which is First Class in name only.



Pleasant staff but there is nothing special about this lounge as it has no view, weak serve yourself food options and/or a limited cook to order from a ratty old menu. The annoyingly loud father/daughter face-timing completed the ambience tonight. LOL. I did a round of pics...













... and then headed for the much more pleasant Business Class Lounge.





The large main part of the lounge.











One of the really cool features of the Business Class Lounge is the outdoor terrace.









Another great feature is the concourse terrace...











At T-45, I headed out for Gate 154.

ANA All Nippon NH 105
Los Angeles LAX to Toyko Haneda HND
777-300ER
1:20am-4:50am +1 (sked)
1:40am-4:39am +1 (actual)
July 1, 2019
First Class
Departed 3/8
Suite 2A

As if a 1:20am departure isn't bad enough, boarding was delayed 20 minutes until 1:10am or so.





First Class was invited to board just after a couple dozen "passengers with children under two and those needing a little extra time". We all boarded thru 2L and as soon as the greeting flight attendant saw my boarding pass, she escorted me to my 2A. Nice cabin although the ANA square is not my favorite seat. Excellent privacy but who needs a wall of storage in front of the window?











As I settled in, our two wonderful First Class flight attendants and the Purser stopped by to welcome me. And so began nearly 11 hours of exceptional service.







IFE was just OK, although the selection of western movies and music pretty weak. I wound up watching the best of a bad lot... The Devil Wears Prada and The Accountant both for what has to be close the 20th time each.







With the late push and taxi, we here wheels up at 2am. Despite the late hour, I decided to sample the menu and then sleep.



Not sure where the champagne glasses were, but this glass holds more anyway. LOL.



Tonight's menu with a variety of light dishes, which seemed appropriate given the time of day.







And respectable wine and beverage menu...















The amuse bouche starters were excellent.





My first dish was the IPPUDO rich-tasting miso "DAICHI" ramen. Wow, this was spectacular and way more filling than I had assumed. And more Krug.





Like I really needed another dish but took one for the team with the ANA curry and steamed rice. With more Krug. Delicious!







One of the First Class flight attendants persuaded me to try some sake before bed.





Since there were only two other passnegers in First, we each had our own separate beds across from our seats. My 2D...



I got five hours of airplane sleep, maybe 3 hours of solid sleep and then 2 hours of meh sleep. I worked for a few hours and watched The Accountant. At around T-90, breakfast. The Cheese scrambled egg crepe roll with supreme sauce was really good.











Despite the late departure from LAX, we arrived at the gate a few minutes early. All in all, an excellent flight. Great service, food and drink. And one of the flight attendant even lowered the cabin temp to +20/68when I asked.





And really close to customs...



... where at 5am there wasn't much of a line.



My Blacklane driver was waiting for me as I exited customs and we were on the road to Narita by 5:25am.

Fabulous!
excited to read this full report. Gorgeous pictures!
I really detest when airlines lack a priority lane for F while in 2012, Air France’s very generous Sky Priority meant very short lines for immigration and check-in while only sitting in Premium Y.

Japan Airlines New First Class Lounge at Narita

With very little early morning traffic, we arrived at Narita Terminal 2 at 6:20am, about 90 minutes after landing at Haneda. The place was eerily quiet.







And then I found out why. The JAL counters don't open until 7am. LOL. After confirming that I was One World Emerald, she invited me to sit inside until the counters opened.









Although the JAL counters open at 7am, security or at least security at this end of T2 doesn't open until 7:30a. When Priority security did open, there was no one in line and I was thru in no time.



Directly after security is the newly renovated JAL First Class and Sakura Lounge. The old First Class Lounge was pretty depressing and in need of a make-over.



The new First Class Lounge is upstairs on Level 4.





Much of the lounge seemed to be food and dining related and seemed to be an improvement over the old lounge. But gone were the nice tarmac views of the old lounge.















I headed for a quiet seating area while I waited for my turn in the showers.











Some nibbles while I waited for the pager to signal that a shower was available.





Once my pager went off, it was a rather circuitous route to get to the shower which was actually located in the Sakura Business Lounge two floors below.









By the time I had finished my shower, it was close enough to boarding that I decided to go to the gate.