- [Noel] Cathay Pacific,
they used to be known as one of the world's great airlines. - [Marco] But even I,
Marco Polo, never dreamed such wonders could exist as aboard Cathay Pacific's
Rolls-Royce powered fleet. - But what are they like these days? Are they still one of the greats? Or have they been left behind
in a world of luxury airlines? It's not good. This week I take a flight
to Japan to find out exactly what's happened to Cathay Pacific. Well, good morning from Hong Kong's Chek Lap Kok International Airport. And I'm taking a ride
today with Cathay Pacific across to my 100th country. Let's go and get on board. I headed for security where
you get your photo taken before you head through. As it turned out, this was just my first
photo of the day, though, as every other checkpoint
in Hong Kong airport takes your photo as well,
I should have done my hair. After I got through security, there was one more photo shoot before I got through to Air
Sign and headed to the lounge. Cathay Pacific have several lounges here at Hong Kong Airport. And I decided to go to one called The Wing because it was the closest to where I was. Hi there. Good morning, how are you? - [Employee] How are you? Thank you so much. Thank you, welcome. - All right, thank you. Once you get inside, The Wing's a pretty standard business class lounge. There's ample seating and a bit
of food and drink to choose. But I don't think it's
particularly any better than a lot of the contract
lounges that you find in airports around the world. Let me know what you think,
though, down in the comments. This is the Cathay Pacific Wing Lounge at Chek Lap Kok Airport. And it's one of three lounges that they've invited me to come to here. I dunno where the others
are, I'm miles away. I think this one's even miles
away from the gates as well. They've obviously found a space here, and they're able to use it. I think it's about a 15
minute walk down to the gates. I can't be too long here. Cathay Pacific, you remember them as a kid being one of the solid
airlines from around the world. They had a reputation for being one of the world's best airlines at one point. My old granddad, bless him, used to go on about Cathay
Pacific all the time. It was the best airline he'd ever flown on 'cause he used to fly
through Hong Kong quite a bit with his work, through
the old Kai Tak Airport. And I remember flying on Cathay
about sort of 15 years ago. And they were a bit crap, to be honest. They weren't that great. I don't know whether they will have improved little bit in
the meantime, who knows? Pretty soon it was time
to head down to the gate. I've never had that before,
it's an L-shaped lift. You walk in that door and
walk out that door, how weird. Let's head to the gate. We're at Gate 24, which apparently is only like a 10 minute walk away from here, so. All right, and there is my
ride over to Tokyo today. This is Cathay Pacific's Airbus A350. It's the latest aircraft that
they've got in their fleet. When I last flew on Cathay, I think the biggest thing
they had was the 747-400. Flew on a few of those. They were really, really cool. They don't have anything anywhere near as sort of exotic as that these
days, and as cool as that. But the A350 is still
a pretty cool aircraft. And honestly, as I've said before, it is my favorite wide-body plane that's on the market at the minute. It's an amazing plane to ride on. So it's gonna be great
to ride over to Tokyo with it today on this plane,
it's gonna be pretty cool. And they've got like this
bridge thing just here, like they've got in LaGuardia in New York. That's pretty cool, isn't it? I was considering trying to go up and get a few pictures from up there. But my plane's boarding in a minute, so I don't really think I've got time. One thing I remember
about Hong Kong Airport from last time I was here was a number of really cool exotic
airlines that they get here that you may never even
have heard of before. There's one out here today
called Greater Bay Airlines. Who are they? 737, it looks like a 800, GBA. Who are they? If you know who they are, let me know down in the comments. Wouldn't that be a good
one to get a ride on, Greater Bay Airlines? Plane spotting complete, it was time to get on
board my ride up to Japan. Thank you. Good morning, how are you?
- Sorry, my hands are- - [Noel] Yeah, it's okay, thank you. - That side.
- All right, thank you. - Welcome on board. - Hi, welcome on board.
- Hi. Thank you. My first impressions once I got on board weren't all that great. I mean, just look at
how dirty this shelf is at the front of the cabin. Other than that, the
seats in business class are in a pretty standard
one-two-one configuration, with super diamond seats like you find on many other airlines. I'm sorry, I'm in here. Let me mind outta your way. - Are you in 17?
- 18. - 18, oh, thank you so
much, over this one? - Yeah, 18, this one, yeah. Thank you. All right, and welcome on board the Cathay Pacific Airbus A350. I've said many times on this
channel, I love the A350. It is probably my
favorite wide body plane, in part due that amazing
view you get out the window. It's just a cool looking plane, isn't it? Isn't it good? And I think Cathay's delivery
suits it quite well as well. But this is business class
seat 18K on the Cathay A350. And it's a standard BE diamond,
super diamond, whatever seat that you find on a lot of
other airlines, really, nothing too special. You've got your controls up
here, little remote control. You've got like this
little storage hold here, cubby hold, just got my crap in. There's a mirror and stuff in
there and little thingy there. And obviously space down here
for the flatbed to lay down into quite a big TV screen here as well which we'll have a look through in a bit. But in general, it's not too bad. It's not as nice as a lot of other business class
products, but it's all right. It's only a six hour flight. So it's not bad for a
flight like this, really. I am a happy AV geek. They have cameras, one on the top, and one on the front. That's my entertainment
sorted for the flight. Sod the rest of the IFE, that'll do me. - [Pilot] But for now, sit
back, relax, enjoy the service. I'll get back to you prior to our arrival into Narita with some
updated details, thank you. - And pretty soon, we were
pushing back from the gate to get on our way for our
flight across Asia to Japan. As we taxied out, I saw this
Cathay Pacific, A321neo. They've only had them
for a couple of years, after operating a solely wide-body fleet for quite some time, so
that was pretty cool. One thing I couldn't
help but notice, though, as we taxied out was the absolute state of the fleet of Cathay Pacific. Their aircraft are absolutely filthy. Look at the state of this Airbus A330. And the other aircraft that I saw weren't that much cleaner either. Now I remember many years ago
Air France had a reputation for having the dirtiest
planes in the world. But I just have to wonder if Cathay Pacific are the
new holders of that title. Fairly soon, though, we'd
made it to the runway. And it was time to take off
and get on our way to Tokyo. Now, say what you will
about Cathay Pacific, there is no denying that
taking off and landing at Hong Kong Airport is just an absolutely incredible experience. It's just so beautiful here. Our route today though took
us east out of Hong Kong to fly right over the top of Taiwan before heading across to Japan. Flight time today was
three hours and 44 minutes, cruising at 41,000 feet. After we took off, I decided it was time to do a little piece to camera, which was a task easier said than done as I could hardly get a word in edgeways with all the announcements. - [Attendant] Hello everyone . - We're airborne. Oh for- Every announcement they are playing in like
12 different languages. I mean, it's not the United Nations of flight announcements. I mean, I dunno if there's
enough flight time today to get through every
language in the world. But we- There's one more to go. All right, I'm gonna talk. All right, airborne from Hong Kong. Finally after about an
hour and something delay, which has not really been
explained so brilliant. So we are airborne from Hong Kong now, heading on our way across to Tokyo. I have to say the cabin crew
are quite nice, quite friendly. As I mentioned before,
though, the seat's nice. It's a lovely business class seat. Nothing particularly special. It's just a regular business class seat. Yeah, I think the thing is with Cathay, it's supposed to be the
service that's the good thing. And that's what we're gonna try out today, and see what that's like. But they seem to be nice. The cabin crew are quite
friendly and quite helpful. They brought around some pre
takeoff drinks before we came. I just had a glass of orange juice. And now we're airborne, and they're gonna start getting ready
with the lunch service, I think we've got today on this flight. Yeah, it's okay, it's okay. It's nice to be in a really
comfortable seat like this, actually, I have to say,
for such a short flight. I think it's about four hours
up to Tokyo from Hong Kong, which isn't too bad at all, really. But as I said, yeah, it's a nice seat, just nothing particularly
that sets it apart from a lot of other airlines
in business class, really, which is a bit of a shame
because I was kind of hoping that it might be something
a little bit different, but it's not, but hey-ho,
it's still pretty nice. And we've got about four hours,
I think, to run up to Tokyo. Thank you to this week's
video sponsor Surfshark, who always come to the rescue whenever I want to watch some
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when you use my promo code NOELPHILIPS at the link on the screen now. What are you waiting for? Even Baby Shark approves. I mentioned before that I've
flown with Cathay before. And I've made a promise many years ago that I would never fly Cathay again, after I had some absolutely
awful flies with them. We flew to New Zealand and back with them on their A340
that they had then, and their 747-400 in economy. And the flights were pretty
much just dreadful all around. They were all delayed massively, in some cases like three, four hour delay we're talking here on some of the flights. The icing on the cake, on the way back we took off from Hong Kong for our flight back to London. Baring in mind this was 2006. So this was before the era
of smartphones and wifi and having like movies
downloaded onto your phone and things like that. We took off from Hong Kong. Within like 20 minutes of taking off, they shut down the in-flight
entertainment system because of a fault with it. And we had a 13 hour flight back to London with no in-flight
entertainment whatsoever. The screens were just completely dead. And yeah, as I said,
remember this was like 2006, and nobody had like films
and TV on their phones or anything like that to read or to watch, or to read stuff on their
phone or anything like that. It was nothing like that. It was a 13 hour slog in daytime all the way from Hong Kong to London. And the service, again, on that flight was not that memorable,
not that brilliant. The crew weren't particularly interested in the whole situation. They were just like, well, it's a bit of tough
luck then, isn't it? So yeah, those flights, those delays, those issues that I had
back then are kind of what's put me off flying Cathay
again for a very long time. So far today, I have to
say, I'm not doing too bad. The crew seem to be quite nice, at least. We've got working in flight entertainment, which is a nice thing. And we've got the cameras, which is nice. Things have sort of
improved a bit, I think, over the years in that
regard, which is quite nice. All right, food time. And this is the starter. We've got like some fruit
here, and a blueberry yogurt. And I've just gone for a
glass of orange juice, so. I did order a coffee as well, but that doesn't seem to have turned up. So I'll have to ask 'em in a minute if they can go and get me one. All right, I asked 'em
again for me coffee, and they've brought one
round, so that's nice. And breakfast has just turned up as well. And it's scrambled eggs
with bacon sausage, and I think like potatoes
or something and tomato. Whenever you microwave of sausage... You ever microwaved a sausage? It sorta goes all weird and yeah. Yeah, it's not the
best, it's not the best. It's definitely been microwaved, I think. 'Cause it's hot on the outside
and cold on the inside. Mm. And the other thing is as well, the food's absolutely swimming in grease. Taste it in your mouth, ugh. It's not good. - [Announcer] It's time for
the Noel Philips Loo Review. - All right then, time for
the Cathay Pacific Loo Review. And it's doing the old flashy thing again. It's an airbus, so I'm sorry. Airbuses always have this
weird flashing effect on them. But anyway, this is what the
state of the loo looks like. What's in here, what's in here? Bog roll, spare bog roll. And nice beauty, makeup mirror there. And yeah, that's pretty much it. There should be flowers
there, but there ain't, something else that we've
not gone on this plane. Yeah, I am not massively
over-impressed with Cathay so far, I have to say, they're okay. Just the everything's missing, you know? We don't have a blanket,
even, at our seats. They haven't got any on the plane. I asked them, they don't have any. No ammenity kits in business class. Again, it's not a massively long flight, so probably wouldn't entirely expect that. I dunno whether you'd get
'em on the longer flights. But yeah, there's no
ammenity kits or anything. Just the food's not very good, the seat's average, it's okay. I just don't get it. I don't get why Cathay
have this reputation for being such a fantastic airline, when they're really not
that great, to be honest. So yeah, but hey, nevermind,
we've not got long here. We'll be landing down into Tokyo, that's where we're going. - [Announcer] That was the
Noel Phillips Loo Review. - All right then, let's have a little look at the in-flight entertainment
on the Cathay A350. So we've got this nice big TV here. And we've got... We go to the menu system here. You can go to the Watch page. And see, we've got a few movies and stuff. Actually, there's quite
a lot of stuff here, like "John Wick" "Ant
Man and the Wasp" "Creed" oh, it's that guy off
"The office" isn't it? He's looking very ripped
these days, isn't he? "Magic Mike" movie about Lady Gaga. Yeah, there's quite a lot of stuff there. "Rick and Morty" Sam would like that. He likes "Rick and Morty" Yeah, quite a lot of TV, as well. The selection's quite decent, actually. We got games to play, quite a few games. Of course, the cameras as well. I wish that was a view
that we had on the camera. Wouldn't that not be an amazing view? But you've got the front
view showing the sea. And then there's a top view
showing the plane and the sea, And then we've got the flight map, which is just flight path 3D that we see on a lot of
flights, and it's quite nice. It's one way you can sort of zoom in and move around and stuff. I like it when it's like that, so you can actually keep an eye on stuff. Which just gets annoying
though when you zoom right in. You wanna see where you're
literally flying over right now, and the plane becomes massive, and like half the size of China. But hey, I guess it's
designed for casual lookers, not people who are connoisseurs
of flight maps, I guess, if you could call yourself that. But it's quite good. So yeah, they get good marks for their entertainment system. I have to say, very decent
entertainment system on Cathay. It's just everything else that's kind of just lacking, really. I mean, like the food's
crap, if I'm honest. Not very nice at all. The crew are okay, quite friendly. The seat's average, you know? The trouble is, even the airport
experience wasn't brilliant the lounge wasn't brilliant. Everything's just meh, it's just okay. And that's the thing,
Cathay have this reputation for being a really, really good airline, one of the world's best airlines. And I don't necessarily
think that's deserved. There's so many better
airlines out there than Cathay. I mean, just yesterday,
I flew Shanghai Airlines a Chinese airline, and
they were much better than Cathay in every single way. There is no comparison between Cathay and the
airlines like Singapore or Qatar or Emirates, airlines like that. If anything, I'd say even
airlines like Air France and BA and United are better in their
business class than Cathay. It's just a bit sort of nothing, really, which is a bit of a shame. All right then, starting our
dissent down into Tokyo, Japan. My 100th country I've set foot
in, isn't that incredible? I never say visited, by the way. Because I don't really think, unless you're spending
a lot of time somewhere, you can ever really visit it. So I'm working on countries
that I've actually been in. And as long as you've
been in that country, and been subject to
their laws effectively, then you have been to that country, even if you are just transiting. But we are visiting Japan for a few days. We've got quite a lot to do here. A few videos to make while we are here. So it's gonna be fun, isn't it? Exploring this amazing country. But yeah, this amazing country that's not showing us
very much at the minute because it's sort of
underneath the layer of cloud. But hey, we'll be on the ground very soon, and ready to explore, I guess. As we got closer to Tokyo,
the clouds cleared beneath us, and I started to get a great
view of my 100th country. And let me just say, the approach into Tokyo
was absolutely phenomenal. I've flown to a lot of places in my time filming for this channel,
but I have to say that flying into Japan is just one of the most incredible experiences. The scenery out of the
window is like something out of a Disney movie,
it's just fantastic. If you want to follow
my journeys in real time as I travel around the world, consider checking out my
Instagram @Noelphilips.official. I'm also over on TikTok too, for as long as it lasts anyway, before they ban it, @NoelPhilips. We are landing in Japan! So excited, I wanted to
come here for so long. - [Attendant] Welcome to Tokyo. For your safety, please remain seated with your seatbelt fastened until the Sit Down sign
has been turned off. - My flight from Hong Kong to Tokyo today worked out at a cost
of just over $1,000 US, or around about 795 British pounds, or about 57 cents per mile. Now, I didn't think that was particularly good value for money, considering that for the same price I could have flown on Japan Airlines or numerous other nice
airlines on this route. But let me know what you think to Cathay Pacific down in the comments. Perhaps you have had a better
experience with them than me. I'd love to hear about it anyway. Just let me know down in the comments. All right, welcome to Japan. Wow, what an approaching landing that was. This place looks amazing already. Can't wait to get outta the
airport and start exploring it. Gotta see if they'll
let me in first, though. - And as I got to the immigration line, it turned out that I'd
have some time to wait before I found out whether they'd let me
into the country or not. The line was absolutely massive. Now, with the delay to my
flight from Cathay Pacific, I only had three hours to
connect between my flight here arriving at Narita, and
then flying out again from Haneda Airport on
the other side of Tokyo. So when it took over an hour to get through the immigration line, well, that was a little
bit concerning, really. But eventually, after an hour in the line, my first example of Japanese
efficiency was complete. And I was allowed into Tokyo
to start my Japanese adventure. - Any baggage, no?
- Nope, just hand baggage. Yeah, correct, thank you. All right, finally made it
through, and I am landside. I've got a flight to
catch in about two hours. So I've now gotta get my way across Tokyo. So let's go see if I can
get a taxi or something. There's one here, let's
go and have a look. All right, that wasn't a taxi,
it was a shipping service. Oh, this is a learning curve, right? Obviously, there's a taxi somewhere. Oh dear, nearly got put
packaged bundled up into a box. Eventually, however, I
found the right place to go to get a taxi. And I headed outside to get
my ride across to Haneda. - Taxi.
- Taxi. - Where to?
- Haneda? Yeah, thank you. Do you take cards? - Yes.
- Yes, okay. - International? - Domestic, Edu.
- Huh? - Terminal two at Haneda. And I know I can hear you
all shouting in the comments about how expensive taxis are in Tokyo. I was about to find out, as this taxi ride that
just took 40 minutes across to Haneda Airport
cost me over $250 US, ouch. It was, however, the quickest way to get across to Haneda airport on this day. Because I think that the train takes about an hour and a half to do the same sort of distance. So 40 minutes when I had a
flight to catch was a no-brainer, really, even if it did
bankrupt me in the process. All right, so welcome to Tokyo. Country number 100 for me here in Japan. Finally through that
mammoth line at immigration, in a taxi heading across to Haneda, where I'm gonna pick up my next video. So make sure you stay tuned
so you don't miss that one. Hit that subscribe button
so you don't miss that. But yeah, let's begin
this Japanese adventure. Thanks very much for watching. Take care, and I'll see
you next time, bye for now.
