We Tried Qatar Business Class, This is what Happened!

a few weeks ago my wife Sandra and I traveled to Au 9 in Thailand for a second honeymoon and also to gather some information and b-roll for some of my recent videos Sandra was tasked with the planning of the trip and she eventually chose Qatar Airways for everything except for the last leg which would be handled by Bangkok Airways the journey would involve six different legs starting in Barcelona Spain continuing by adowa in Qatar and then onwards towards Bangkok and then finish with a final flight to kirabi in Thailand now when I looked at the trip I realized that we would be flying on three out of the four different longhold types that Qatar Airways have in their Fleet the Boeing 787-900 the triple seven and finally the Airbus A380 the only one missing would be the Airbus a350 which we had both actually traveled on before but this was an opportunity that I just couldn't resist so we decided to book business class tickets on all four long-haul legs to just see what it would be like and also to be able to tell you guys about it coming with your champagne honey I was playing that this might come as a surprise to you but even though I have been a pilot for over 20 years I've never traveled in business class before many airlines which do long-haul provide special prices for their staff on business class making it you know somewhat affordable but sadly my employer has no long-haul operation so even though we enjoy discounted travel on our own route Network we have to pay full fare on all other airlines so I just want to tell you here from the very start that Qatar Airways did not sponsor this video in any way they weren't even aware that we were going to travel with them instead the ones who made this trip possible was my patrons basically my fantastic wonderful Patron crew which I'm so grateful to have behind me now before the trip started I reached out to you guys via the community tab on YouTube to ask if you would be interested in my perspective on traveling as a pilot with different airlines and what your questions would be the response was a resounding yes and I got several great questions that I will try to answer in this video but if I miss something please let me know in the comments now I will be showing you clips from this trip but I didn't want to show any people or employees at Qatar Airways since I didn't have their permission so the eclipse might be a bit short in nature anyway this is my very first attempt on a v-log type video like this so I would love to hear any suggestions that you might have after the video now let's go [Music] yeah now to start off with Sandra said that the Qatar Airways website was really easy to navigate when it came to her booking the trip they also have a really great mobile app that I recommend you to download if you're going to be traveling with them and a lot of different airlines are really upping their game when it comes to these apps now they're really helpful qatar's app for example provided updates in real time with travel information like Gates and boarding times which was really handy and it also keeps track of your bonus points on something they call avios which is a type of frequent traveler reward system it's very old school I like it the first leg from Barcelona was scheduled really early in the morning and since we live outside of Girona we had to get up around 3 15 in the morning to drive one hour and 20 minutes down to watch Barcelona and El Prado Airport now here comes my very first frequent travel tip for you always count on more time than you think both to get to the airport and also when you're actually there it is just so much better for your travel comfort and general well-being to be early at the airport rather than turning up late and feeling rushed a lot of the discomfort that people associate with traveling nowadays comes from the constant feeling of stress and not knowing how long the cues are going to be a check-in or security Etc so do yourself a favor here and be there much earlier than what the minimum recommended time is especially if you're going for a long trip like this if it turns out that you have a lot of time to kill when you get to the airport well then you can always just take a cup of coffee in one of the coffee shops or stroll around the shops and look at things to buy or just find where your gate is early in good time that actually brings me to my next point which is lounge access this won't come as a price to you if you are traveling a lot especially if you're doing two or two work but at almost all major airports around the world you will have airport lounges these are more quiet and civilized areas away from the stress of the you know departure areas and the shops and if you travel on business class tickets you should always have free access to these but even if you're traveling in economy you can in most of the cases pay yourself into one of these lounges and it's surprisingly affordable in some cases costing as little as 30 dollars per person now since me and Sandra are always early for the reasons that I just told you we tend to try to get access to lounges because it's just quiet you get free Wi-Fi no matter where you are and you will also find like some snacks like food and drinks inside which can actually be worth the entry price just in itself when we arrived to Barcelona Airport we went straight to the launch after having past security Now the Barcelona launch was nothing special but it was nice and comfortable with a nice view over the departure shop areas and it's reasonably close to our gate as well I know Barcelona well from a pilot's perspective since I've operated from board Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 there and as a pilot the terminal mostly is just an obstacle course that you have to get through in order to reach your crew room or your gate where you can start a pre-flight preparation and here we come to the first question that you guys sent in and that was can Pilots go through special security entrances to skip the queues even when they're traveling as a passenger and the answer here is a generally no at least we can't do that in Europe now there are special crew security entrance points where crew that's going to operate go through exactly the same security screening as you the passengers do but those security screening points are only to be used by crew who are actually operating and they can't be used as you know for passengers which is exactly what you are when you're traveling on normal tickets no matter if you're a pilot or not so about one hour before our departure time me and Sandra walked over to the boarding gate and here comes the first real difference between traveling in economy and in business class because when the aircraft had been prepared for boarding the business class passengers were boarded before everyone else on the first leg we were going to fly on the Boeing 787 900 which meant that we could turn left when we enter the aircraft instead of right as I've done for my entire adult life up until this point well except for when I turn left to go to the cockpit but since we got to board first there was plenty of time available for us to find our seats in good time and put our hand luggage up and there is not that many business class seats so basically you get almost an entire overhead bin for yourself meaning that the size of your hand luggage doesn't really matter as soon as we had found our seats we were greeted by some really nice cabin attendants who offered us some use or champagne and since I was finally flying as a passenger obviously I went for the champagne I don't recommend drinking much alcohol as a passenger especially not on long-haul flights that's if you are like me you'll wake up with a headache when you were just kind of halfway there and that's not nice but having a glass of champagne to start with really just perks off the whole experience the Qatar Airway is Boeing 787 is equipped with their award-winning Q Suite business class seats and man it is something to behold when you're used to economy seats the seeds are situated for a breasts and they are all set at an angle meaning that they have enough room to be folded down into complete flatbeds the reason they're called sweets instead of seeds is because you can actually close a little door next to you except during takeoff landing and this means that you basically have your own little room which I thought was just absolutely fantastic if you're sitting straight up your head does pop up slightly above the suit walls but as soon as you start lowering your seat down the feeling of privacy really kicks in the seat in itself can be set to almost any position that you want using a set of electronic controls next to you straight ahead there's a huge in-flight entertainment screen with movies TV shows games and external camera views which of course I really appreciate it Qatar has really outdone themselves with these sweets anything you could possibly want in terms of comfort is right there within an arm's length there is a wireless charging dock a small compartment containing a water bottle and some noise canceling headphones now I did try those and they were really good but they couldn't match my own Bose qc700s they're also charging outlets for multiple types of charges including USB but no USBC as far as I could see so that could be worth remembering then there was a handheld controller for the in-flight entertainment system and the games that they had on there but you could also use it to control the lights in the suite and for calling the cabin crew to the left of the chair I had a small table where I could put my personal stuff and there was also a small Leather Pouch with some amenities including face and body creams a sleeping mask and also some socks below that larger table there was a smaller drink table and under the huge screen I found the dining or working table people that could be folded out and when you did so it became really big perfect if you have a laptop or if you want to use a huge dining set as it turns out under the table there was a little hole for your legs when the seat was turned into a flatbed now the hole was not very wide but big enough to be able to lie comfortably down to the right of the seat there was a foldable armrest which had to be down for takeoff and Landing a little folder holder for your safety cards and food menus and of course the sweet door we were also given two pillows and a really thick proper blanket and even a set of pajamas for when it came time to sleep later on for sitting up which is really nice but it's a really cool thing when you want to sleep guys is they have this this massive thick quilt right it's really thick really heavy and it's really comfortable personally I thought that that was a bit silly at first but it turns out that it's much nicer to not have to sleep in your proper clothes up until this point this was all quite overwhelming for someone like me who is just used to sit down in an economy seat and the whole boarding experience was really a dignified and deeply pleasant experience far from queuing and the rushing that I was normally used to before the pushback we were given a full a la carte menu for whatever meal that was appropriate for the local time of day which in our case was breakfast and also a wine list to come with that we were told that all of the food could be served whenever we wanted it on demand throughout the flight and in whatever amounts that we wanted to be honest this was almost a first class rather than a business class experience up until this point and that could possibly be explained with the fact that Qatar Airways only offers business class and no first-class service on all of their aircraft except for on the A380 but we're going to talk more about that later on when the cabin crew had taken our orders it was time for the digital safety briefing and although it was very pleasant and unintrusive as a pilot I have to say that I thought it was a little bit confusing because the briefing included showing similar items to the safety equipment instead of the actual items that they were talking about an example would be for example a flight attendant pulling up a curtain in a bedroom when they were talking about keeping the window shades up for takeoff I am all for making the safety announcement as pleasant as possible to watch but I'm also a big fan of Simplicity when it comes to stuff that you really need to remember if it comes to it as I was watching the demo the aircraft started to push back and the Indians were started now I hardly noticed the engine start because the air conditioning system on the 787 is not driven by bleed air which it is on the 737 so instead of the aircraft getting quiet the background sound stayed exactly the same during the whole star process and on top of that the 787 is really really quiet it's almost spooky a lot of you asked how it feels to be sitting as a passenger when you are flying as a pilot does it feel strange can you relax or are you constantly checking what's going on the answer in my case is actually both when we push back I recognize the stand that we were pushing from and I could therefore anticipate the taxi routing that we're going to get out to our departure Runway run with two five left we will be taxing parallel to the runway across the inactive Runway 0220 and then proceed to one of the holding points Runway two five right and that's of course exactly what also happened after departure I also knew that we would be required to make a sharp left hand turn at around 500 feet out towards the sea because El Pratt airport is incredibly noise sensitive and if the departing aircraft doesn't make that immediate turn they will trigger noise sensors and the airline would be fine thousands of Euros on the other hand I wasn't thinking so much about what the pilots were doing or feeling I know that they are extremely well trained and I have full confidence in their abilities and professionalism plus since I wasn't type rated on this particular aircraft I didn't know exactly what their procedures would be so I didn't pay too much attention to it and because of that I was able to just fully sit back and relax and really enjoy of just being a passenger looking forward to the long trip I had after departure we climbed out towards the south east and since me and Sandra have been up since 3 15 in the morning we decided to try out the flatbeds and get some sleep we had three legs in front of us and two fairly long ground transfer stops so we would definitely need some shot die now obviously it was Daylight outside of this point so we needed to dim the windows which is done electronically on the 787 these electronic window shades takes a while to dim completely but I promise we will get them but when they are done they get really dark the flatbed turned out to be really comfortable actually now I am 185 centimeters tall or six feet one and I still had enough space to lie completely flat both of my back and on both sides without any real issues really like I mentioned before when the seat is in flat mode you're basically down on the floor so the feeling of having your own room is is really really there actually there's also a button that you can push with a don't disturb sign that will stop the flight attendants from bothering you as long as you want and unless you have actually told them to wake you up for food they will leave you alone until it's time for landing I probably slept around two hours on this first leg which was really awesome and it was proper good sleep as well when I woke up I decided to explore the implied entertainment system and like I mentioned the screen is huge in these seats and it can be controlled both via the remote or via touch I found that the touch display was way more convenient and since I really don't play that much computer games I hardly even touch the controller at any of the trips the selection of movies and TV shows were wide and included shows from all over the world but even though there were much to choose from I didn't think that the selection was as good as some other airlines of similar standing that I've traveled with before that there were a few Hollywood Blockbusters on there but they were mostly movies that I'd never heard about still there was no issues to keep me entertained during the entire flight there was Wi-Fi available for one hour for free but if you wanted Wi-Fi for the entire trip we needed to pay about 10 dollars for it now I think that that's a reasonable price but I also think that it kind of should be included in the business class price increasing the business class price by ten dollars and getting a voucher to use internet for the entire trip would have been a nice touch I think the Boeing 787 is a wonderful quiet and comfortable aircraft to fly in as a passenger and it likely has the best toilet view of any aircraft I've been on so far I just have to show it if this guy's like a toilet inside of the 787 900 that we're on radiant I mean really really big spacious but the best thing is probably the view the toilets by the way were exceptionally clean and well equipped with little kits of razors toothbrush and creams available in drawers under the sink that is awesome I found the cabin crew to be professional quick and attentive throughout this entire trip when it came to the food it was absolutely outstanding and I love food on the first leg we will served a real jumbo breakfast and I made a mistake and ordered two main dishes which the cabin crew just complied with without batting an eyelash but that resulted in me getting so full that I was practically rolling out of the aircraft when we eventually landed in Doha when we arrived the business class passengers were disembark first and we went into the huge transfer part of the airport to look at some shop sun to chill a bit in the lounge the airport in Doha is practically new it opened about nine years ago replacing the previous airport which is now used for military and government flights the new Hamad International Airport has two runways 4850 and 4250 meters long which isn't surprising giving the fleet the white bodies that Qatar flies in and out with of course Qatar Airways is a hub and spoke Airline and everything about this brand new airport is designed around their needs in 2022 over 35.7 million passengers flew through the airport this is still not up to the nearly 40 million passengers that flew through it in 2019 but unlike most airports this one serves predominantly long-haul flights which makes this recovery quite impressive should be mentioned though that the World Cup likely helped this a bit it's also worth noting here that there are a multitude of lounges available in the airport and it's worth asking where the dedicated business class Lounge is which we didn't do so we ended up in a public launch which was still great and relatively quiet and comfy on the next leg we were planned to be flying on one of Qatar Airways Boeing triple sevens instead of the 787 and I wasn't sure if the business seats would be equally good on the triple seven but boy was I wrong so Sandra asked if the seeds would be different on the triple seven from the uh Boeing 787 that we filmed before and I thought I don't know maybe they're not as good but dude they're huge so sometimes one happy pumping on the first leg we have been seated at the window seats but on this second leg me and Sandra had two adjacent seats in the middle of the cabin instead and it turned out that the Suites on the triple seven were even bigger than on the 787. they had similar seat controls and amenities but our seats were separated by a screen that could be pushed down and when we did so we basically had our own little apartment all to ourselves I was actually blown away by the comfort and size of the Q Suites on triple seven and I would definitely prefer them over the 787 even though those seats were also awesome we eventually arrived about 30 minutes early to Bangkok due to some friendly Tailwinds and from there we flew on normal tickets with Bangkok Airways down to kirabi which worked out just fine now they have really turned the transfer routings and guidance into an art form in both Doha and Bangkok making it really easy to find but be prepared to walk quite a lot that both these airports are absolutely huge me and Sandra spent some fantastic days in our nine combining work with pleasure and of the nine nights it was time to turn back home again I always feel like the return flights are worse for some reason and to start off with this was no exception our transfer driver picked us up late from the hotel which meant that we didn't have our normal time margins at the airport in Krabi and on top of that the checking process and security was a real mess with long lines and loads of irritated people Krabi is a smaller airport with a single 3000 meter Runway and two very busy terminals there were plans for a third terminal but they were upset by the onset of the pandemic the airport handled just over 4 million passengers per year before 2020 and I think that they will likely be up to similar numbers quite soon since Thailand have lifted all travel restrictions by now our late arrival to the airport and the stress that came with it meant that we felt quite tired when we finally got onto the Airbus a319 for the first leg back to Bangkok this wasn't a great way to start a 20-hour journey but man were we in for a surprise in Bangkok when we landed we were herded into a bus from a remote stand and then brought to the terminal we had already passed immigrations in Krabi so we now just needed to go through some extra security checkpoints before we could get into the launch and get what we were hoping to be some light snack when we found the launch it turned out that the Qatar Lounge in Bangkok Airport was a combined business class and first class Lodge this meant that it was really Swanky and we were treated to a full three-course a la carte dinner with champagne and wine before we sat down eventually and chilled in some really comfy chairs awaiting the first long-haul flight now in a considerably better mood bangkok's Savannah boomi Airport is a bit older than the one in Doha first opening for flights in 2006. it has two runways 3 700 meters and four thousand meters long with a third four thousand meter Runway now on the construction in 2019 65.4 million passengers traveled through the airport but in 2022 its numbers were still under 29 million and that actually makes sense given that it took a very long time for travel restrictions to go away in much of Asia Thailand lifted the last of these restrictions only in October last year this time we were going to be flying on the recently recommissioned qantar Airways Airbus A380 over the Doha and I was really looking forward to see what it would be like once we had boarded we realized that the business class seats on the Airbus A380 unfortunately was not up to the same standard as the one on the triple seven or even on the 787 I recently made a video about the fact that Qatar Airways was forced to take the A380 out of its retirement in order to add some extra capacity to the airline my guess is that because they were due to be decommissioned the company didn't invest in the upgraded Q Suites on them at least they haven't done that yet having said that though the seats were still really comfortable and they did offer a full flatbed configuration and the only real difference was the lack of those walls and the Privacy that they came with but the flight was scheduled at 1 30 in the morning local Thai time so that didn't really matter all that we wanted to do was sleep I didn't even go back to check out the famous bar which is available for first and business class passengers on the upper deck where we were seated I slept like a log for around five hours before we were woken up to a great breakfast about one and a half hours prior to Landing the last transfer stop we spent in the business class Lounge in Doha which was really Swanky but quite crowded before we boarded our last leg again on the 787 back towards Barcelona and that flight went off without a hitch so what's my overall feeling about this trip though were the business class tickets worth the extra price and what was the quality feeling that Qatar Airways delivered well I have to say that it will be really hard to go back to the economy class after this experience now the tickets are expensive costing just over seven thousand dollars for two people but if that sounds doable to you or if you're traveling for work I would say that they are definitely worth it using these tickets turned what's normally the worst part of the vacation at least for non-av geeks into something truly enjoyable just a feeling of being able to sleep in something resembling in normal bed whilst you're thundering towards your destination at 38 000 feet doing 850 kilometers per hour is so awesome and I feel really privileged to have had a chance to experience it I would recommend Qatar Airways to anyone and the aircraft that we flew on were all fantastic I just have to get my hands on that a350 in business class now or actually even better in the cockpit if you have more questions about this or maybe suggestions about future Vlogs or even if you think that this is a concept that I should be doing more of that let me know in the comments below here in the video please also consider supporting me and my team by joining my awesome Patron crew who actually made this all possible you can also send a super thanks or you can buy one of these t-shirts I it really really helps what we do now check out this video next or maybe even this playlist have an absolutely fantastic day and I'll see you next time bye

Channel: Mentour Now!

Views: 283,125

Keywords: mentour pilot, mentour, aircraft, boeing, airbus, thailand, bangkok, travel vlog, vlog, recommendations, how-to, travel, 787, boeing 787

Id: 0-8-ma4n6gY

Length: 26min 18sec (1578 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 29 2023