Tag Archives: Dreamliner

Air New Zealand’s Dreamliner Shanghai – Auckland Economy W/Skycouch

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We had to get our boarding passes issued as Thai had been unable to do it the night before.  Although I had us booked in the best possible free seats, they upgraded us to a Skycouch!  Barring redeeming in business, this was the best possible outcome for a long flight in a Dreamliner!

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Purple is one of my favourite colours so I was pleased with the mood lighting!

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Here you can clearly see the layout of the economy cabin 3-3-3 configuration.

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Touchscreens made it easy to control the AV.

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In the 4th photo below, you can see the diagrams of how to use a Skycouch.  There was no way we were going to fit side by side so we went with the 2nd option for couples with 2 seats extended and one seat used as a normal airline seat.  My husband can sleep sitting up and I can’t but I did manage some sleep in the space of the 2 seat Skycouch.

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It was interesting how the mood lighting changed throughout the flight.

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The city of Auckland came into view and the flight was over.

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Gotta love bird paintings!

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We used my Amex’s Priority Pass to access the Emperor Lounge where I spent as much time as possible online.  They keep careful track and we were unceremoniously kicked out when the 3 hours were up!

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Oh joy!  Our flight to Rarotonga was delayed 3 hours!  At least they gave us food vouchers which we spent at the Burger King to maximize the value.

IMG_2147Since I have already blogged about the Cook Islands and the remainder of this trip was about visiting family, I’ll end this trip report here.

Back To The Back: Thai Airways KUL-BKK-PVG Economy

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I had run out of United miles so it was back to the back of the plane for this trip.  It was still a phenomenal use of miles since the routing got us from Brisbane to Chiang Mai, Chiang Mai to Koh Samui with a 23 hour layover in Bangkok, then an open jaw from Kuala Lumpur to Rarotonga via Bangkok and Shanghai with a 10 hour layover.  In this post, we will look at the Thai economy experience on the Dreamliner.

In economy class you don’t get lounge access unless you have a credit card that includes Priority Pass (Amex) or Lounge Club (formerly include with Chase Ink).  We wandered around the airport and checked out a few shops but didn’t buy anything.  The kaftans were nice but out of my budget.

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A quick shot of the business cabin as we walked through.

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And here’s the economy cabin.  This is where dreamliners become “nightmare-liners”.  Seats are in a 3-3-3 so couples will usually have a stranger with them unless they get lucky and have an empty middle seat.  We weren’t lucky but at least it was a short-ish flight from Kuala Lumpur to Bangkok.

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The one thing I did like was the controls in the seatback instead of buried in the side compartment of the seat.

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Trying to sneak more photos of business class on the way out.

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We had a 3 hour layover in Bangkok so we used Lounge Club to use the Louis Tavern lounge.  It’s nowhere near as good as the Thai lounge from the last time we were here but better than sitting at the gate!

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I was too tired to take photos of the plane between Bangkok and Shanghai so managed to pass out despite being in economy.  At least this time we had no one in the middle seat!  We quickly got transit visas and headed off to take the Maglev into town.

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