The trip to Shanghai
Well, Linda and Melissa dropped me off at the Canberra airport. I was fortunately able to check my luggage through to Shanghai. They had breakfast at the airport before I left. The flight to Sydney was unexceptional bar the fact that for the first time on a large commercial aircraft I was piloted by a female.
It was just as well that I was able to check the luggage and that there was not too much activity at Chinese Eastern check-in, as the plane started boarding about 10 minutes after I arrived at the gate.
We had much trepidation about Chinese Eastern, but so far it has been good. (Of course, part of that may be because for the first time in my life, I am not flying economy. Thank you Linda.) There was plenty of room. In fact I had even more room as the seat next to me was unfilled. The 165 degree seat reclining talked about in the China Eastern advertising was from 180 degree vertical, but that was comfortable enough. The food has also been quite good, albeit far too much. That which they have been bringing on for starters was more than sufficient, but I haven't been able to resist the mains. For lunch I had BBQ pork and duck with noodles, and for dinner I had orange roughy (fish) with noodles. Also in business class, they brought around juice every thirty minutes or so.
From my flying point of view, I was a bit concerned at the start of the flight by a loud rattling for the first 30 minutes after takeoff. Nobody else seemed to be too concerned. At first I assumed that this was oriental inscrutability facing death. Eventually, the noise disappeared to be replaced by the usual jet turbine noise, so I assume the rattling was the stress associated with an Airbus 340 lifting off with a full load of fuel and passengers for an 11 hour flight. Who knows? I will probably know more the next flight.
When I arrived in Shanghai, my luggage was the second through the carousel. I cleared quarantine and customs in 10 minutes and was checked in at the Ramada Airport Hotel in another 15 minutes. This hotel is quite nice with all of the mod cons -- cable and internet.
It was just as well that I was able to check the luggage and that there was not too much activity at Chinese Eastern check-in, as the plane started boarding about 10 minutes after I arrived at the gate.
We had much trepidation about Chinese Eastern, but so far it has been good. (Of course, part of that may be because for the first time in my life, I am not flying economy. Thank you Linda.) There was plenty of room. In fact I had even more room as the seat next to me was unfilled. The 165 degree seat reclining talked about in the China Eastern advertising was from 180 degree vertical, but that was comfortable enough. The food has also been quite good, albeit far too much. That which they have been bringing on for starters was more than sufficient, but I haven't been able to resist the mains. For lunch I had BBQ pork and duck with noodles, and for dinner I had orange roughy (fish) with noodles. Also in business class, they brought around juice every thirty minutes or so.
From my flying point of view, I was a bit concerned at the start of the flight by a loud rattling for the first 30 minutes after takeoff. Nobody else seemed to be too concerned. At first I assumed that this was oriental inscrutability facing death. Eventually, the noise disappeared to be replaced by the usual jet turbine noise, so I assume the rattling was the stress associated with an Airbus 340 lifting off with a full load of fuel and passengers for an 11 hour flight. Who knows? I will probably know more the next flight.
When I arrived in Shanghai, my luggage was the second through the carousel. I cleared quarantine and customs in 10 minutes and was checked in at the Ramada Airport Hotel in another 15 minutes. This hotel is quite nice with all of the mod cons -- cable and internet.
posted by Ben Colin Freasier | 1:12 PM
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