Carfield From United States of America, joined Dec 2003, 1501 posts, RR: 9 Posted (5 years 8 months 3 weeks 1 day 14 hours ago) and read 4803 times:
Hi all,
Here is my latest report – it will be a very abbreviated report and I have basically just taken a vacation with my family to Bangkok, Thailand. We bought a HKD$4200 air + hotel package, in which we flew Emirates’ Business Class to and from Hong Kong, and staying at the Grand Hyatt Erawan Bangkok. The trip was great and I will include pictures from the hotel and the flight. I am too lazy to write out a report and we have heard much about Bangkok and Emirates here.
Evaluation:
Emirates:
The inflight service continues to suffer a bit of inconsistency, in terms of flight attendants and enthusiasm. Everything is carried out according to the manual, but the F/As did not seem to be too happy at most times. I guess the BKK-HKG-BKK turnaround is not the crew’s favorite, and some of the F/As are understandably tired on the HKG-BKK segment, which is understandable after a four hours layover in HK and working earlier on the flight over to Hong Kong.
The lounge in Hong Kong is surprisingly fine. The CNAC VIP lounge is very quiet in the evening hours and the seating is very comfortable with lots of room to stretch out. The food buffet is quite extensive with pasta, cream of mushroom soup, snacks, sandwiches, hot dogs, fruits, ice cream, and a good range of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. However, I look forward to a better equipped Emirates Hong Kong Lounge, which is supposed to open soon according to its timetable.
Because my aunt requires a wheelchair, we were sent to the much nicer Royal Orchid Lounge between the forties and fifties pier, which feature a much nicer décor, lots of message chairs, and okay selection of snacks. I will give a more extensive report on my TG trip soon.
Grand Hyatt Erawan Bangkok is a very nice hotel, and the location is very central, and there are nothing to complaint about.
Ronerone From Jordan, joined Aug 2004, 1468 posts, RR: 55 Reply 1, posted (5 years 8 months 3 weeks 1 day 11 hours ago) and read 4645 times:
Nice trip report. Straighforward and to the point. Most importantly the pictures were excellent. I loved the TG A346 pictures.
I agree with you regarding EK's robotic service. You literally have to look for the nice ones on the flight and try to deal with them. You get more robotic 'attention' in C class compared to Y, but as far as enthusiasm goes, the probability remains the same i think.
Quoting Carfield (Thread starter): HKG-BKK segment, which is understandable after a four hours layover in HK and working earlier on the flight over to Hong Kong.
Can you elaborate on that please?
So you mean there is a crew change at BKK and the new crew deployed to HKG will layover for 4 hours at HKG and return to BKK for another crew change?
Sounds a bit odd, why can't they just go all the way to HKG from DXB?
Thanks for the report!
Roni
A Stop Away From One-Stop, Is Non-Stop : Airbus A340-500
Lufthansa747 From Philippines, joined May 1999, 3119 posts, RR: 51 Reply 2, posted (5 years 8 months 3 weeks 1 day 11 hours ago) and read 4636 times:
Thanks for the short report and good pics Carfield. Always enjoy reading your stuff. That package sounds like a bargain compared to the C fare ex-BKK.
Quoting Ronerone (Reply 1): So you mean there is a crew change at BKK and the new crew deployed to HKG will layover for 4 hours at HKG and return to BKK for another crew change?
Yes that's how they do it, layover in a lounge at HKG at least when I took it.
It's common practice for the tag-ons to have the crew do roundtrip, at least AY (BKK-SIN/HKG), SK (BKK-SIN when they had it), LX (BKK-SIN), all LH Asia tag-ons etc all follow this procedure.
767747 From United States of America, joined Jan 2005, 1521 posts, RR: 28 Reply 3, posted (5 years 8 months 3 weeks 1 day 4 hours ago) and read 4448 times:
Carfield,
Excellent report! EK Business Class looks pretty good. The picture of the Austrian Airlines A343 at BKK is great. I flew on an Austrian A343 from JFK-VIE in '99 in "Grand Class" and it was the best flight of my life. I hope to get to fly Austrian again.
AGD From Canada, joined Aug 2004, 204 posts, RR: 3 Reply 4, posted (5 years 8 months 3 weeks 1 day 2 hours ago) and read 4363 times:
Hello,
Nice report and great photos.
I enjoyed looking at your pictures a lot because I flew EK HKG-BKK last june, in business class as well. As I'm not a regular J class flyer, it was for me an enjoyable experience and couldn't notice anything wrong. As you said, the CNAC VIP lounge is great, and I was surprised by the choices we had in terms of food and drinks, having read bad reviews about it before I went.
As for the flight itself, the food was great and was really tasty to me. We had such a good chocolate-orange mousse as a dessert...yummy! I too noticed that the crew seemed to be bored and tired for some reasons. F/As were professional and did fine, however more smiles would have been nice to see from them.
But hey, the J-class airfare for that flight is so cheap, even compared to CX or TG Y-class fares for the same route. I can't see myself complaining about anything.
Carfield From United States of America, joined Dec 2003, 1501 posts, RR: 9 Reply 5, posted (5 years 8 months 3 weeks 14 hours ago) and read 4157 times:
Thanks for the kind comments! This package is really great...
Yes, EK crew overnight at BKK, instead of overnight at HKG, due to a much lower accomodation cost at BKK, rather than HKG. I believe the only EK crew that get to overnight at HK is the DXB-HKG nonstop flights.
AY crew and LX crew work:
HEL/ZRH to BKK
One Overnight
BKK-SIN/HKG/KUL-BKK
One Overnight
Return to HEL/ZRH next evening
I imagine most other Asian airlines run a similar crew schedule. Even the pilots work the return flights at some cases...
N178UA From United Arab Emirates, joined Jan 2001, 1565 posts, RR: 73 Reply 6, posted (5 years 8 months 1 week 1 day 5 hours ago) and read 3605 times:
Great Report, love the picture details. I flown EK387/384 flight twice , booking online J class price is HK$2700 include tax. Economy is around 1800, so only 900 more for 2 sectors of 2hr40mins is superb value plus EK give 70% extra miles if you book online travel J class.
I noticed EK changed menu from July to August. But July06 is the same as July05.
I also think EK387 or EK384/386 schedule is perfect getaway for HK white collar Mon-Fri 9-5 worker. Simply take EK384 or EK387 on Friday night and return Sunday late on EK386. Love their 2 class A332. Row 2 is the best.
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