Hello all,

I will be visiting Prague next month for a few days and am thinking of trying Sichuan Airlines to ZRH on the Saturday.

Has anybody experience of flying this route with Sichuan and if so what are they like to fly with, I have no reason to travel to ZRH except to experience Sichuan Airlines . Also, is it possible to to fly PRG-ZRH-PRG on the same day, the aircraft is scheduled to be on the ground for 90 minutes. It is a long time since I have been to ZRH so would it be necessary to go landside, check in and then back through security etc? After looking at the Sichuan Airlines website I can't get a same day return but I can book separate one way tickets.

Thanks,

V

I flew Sichuan Airlines from HKG-CTU and they served the best in-flight meal I've ever had on a plane. I would fly them again just for the food! Good luck!! If you book two one-way tickets, can you check-in on-line for both flights? Just land in ZRH and wait for your one-way return?

I flew zrh-prg on Sichuan in November last year. Always nice to fly an a330 on such a short flight. The flight itself was uneventful. A snack was serve during the flight.
As for doing the return flight the same day,. I don't think there is any problem. You can't check in online from what I recall. So you will likely have to go landside. But 90 minutes should be no problem unless the inbound flight has a bad delay

HOOB747 wrote:

I flew Sichuan Airlines from HKG-CTU and they served the best in-flight meal I've ever had on a plane. I would fly them again just for the food! Good luck!! If you book two one-way tickets, can you check-in on-line for both flights? Just land in ZRH and wait for your one-way return?

I flew them CTU-HKG and I agree that the food was surprisingly very nice

blandy62 wrote:

As for doing the return flight the same day,. I don't think there is any problem. You can't check in online from what I recall. So you will likely have to go landside. But 90 minutes should be no problem unless the inbound flight has a bad delay

No, the flight is operated as "Intra-Schengen" - there is no need to go through passport control; immigration for leaving Europe will be done in Prague only. You can check-in at ZRH straight at the departure gate. No need to go landside, as there is no passport check. Service is just a package of dried aged beef and green tea.
As entry into Switzerland is very straight forward, I would spend some hours in Zurich sightseeing, flying back with LX Airbus A220-300 in the late afternoon.

debonair wrote:

blandy62 wrote:

As for doing the return flight the same day,. I don't think there is any problem. You can't check in online from what I recall. So you will likely have to go landside. But 90 minutes should be no problem unless the inbound flight has a bad delay

No, the flight is operated as "Intra-Schengen" - there is no need to go through passport control; immigration for leaving Europe will be done in Prague only. You can check-in at ZRH straight at the departure gate. No need to go landside, as there is no passport check. Service is just a package of dried aged beef and green tea.
As entry into Switzerland is very straight forward, I would spend some hours in Zurich sightseeing, flying back with LX Airbus A220-300 in the late afternoon.

Really had no idea you can check-in at the gate. Thought you still need to go to the check in desk landside. Thanks for clarifying that

Thanks to all for the replies, checking in at the gate is new to me too.

I did it in February, arriving on EW and connecting to PRG on Sichuan Airlines. At the transfer counter I was told to go straight to the gate for checkin and I wasn't the only one. No problem at all.

I'm doing it in May as well, always nice to log a new airline on a 5th freedom route such as this one.

SRQKEF wrote:

I'm doing it in May as well, always nice to log a new airline on a 5th freedom route such as this one.

Hi,

Just wondering how you booked, any time I try to complete a booking on their website it errors going to the payment page.

Thanks,

V

sahaair707 wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

I'm doing it in May as well, always nice to log a new airline on a 5th freedom route such as this one.

Hi,

Just wondering how you booked, any time I try to complete a booking on their website it errors going to the payment page.

Thanks,

V

I had the exact same problem, in the end I booked it via Expedia.

Thanks for that, I was begining to think it was me.

Most of the time with the smaller Chinese airlines, use ctrip or some other online platform.

Sichuan is one of the fastest growing airlines in China. It only operates an all Airbus fleet from it's main hub in Chengdu and Chongqing. My opinion about this airline is the airline is good enough. Food was good, staff was friendly and no personal entertainment on my previous flight from Jinan to Chengdu. I never flown 3U's long haul flight yet.

By way of a quick update, I travelled PRG-ZRH-PRG with Sichuan yesterday (May 11th).

Enjoyed the flights, got a tea with biscuits and a pack of beef. As above I was able to check in for the ZRH - PRG at the gate, I tried to check in for this flight before I left PRG but no dice.

Did ZRH-PRG last year. Crew were friendly but didn't have a clue when I asked to visit the cockpit afterwards. Getting off was utter madness due to the separate queues for China and elsewhere.

Sichuan will discontinue the service from August... Another 5th freedom route gone!

debonair wrote:

I did it in February, arriving on EW and connecting to PRG on Sichuan Airlines. At the transfer counter I was told to go straight to the gate for checkin and I wasn't the only one. No problem at all.

Trip report on the 330 ??

debonair wrote:

Sichuan will discontinue the service from August... Another 5th freedom route gone!

But they will start Helsinki - Copenhagen in September, a more interesting route if you ask me (and a longer flight).