What to Expect from China Airlines A350 Business Class: Amsterdam to Taipei Trip Report

today I'm flying China Airlines business class on the Long Haul from Amsterdam to Taipei we're on their gorgeous a350 in this very unique looking cabin and this is all new to me I've never flown China Airlines before and I haven't been to Taipei in 10 years plus I've got my good friend Pete along with me for the ride so this is lots of fun this flight kicked off an amazing trip to Taiwan Hong Kong and the Philippines and there's videos coming up from all of that but for now let's head to Taipei and at the end I'm going to tell you how I booked this flight for just $263 by the way if you're new here I'm Gabe Lee you might know me from the Flight Radar 24 YouTube channel I've started this channel as a place to put more travel trip reports and Airline reviews while the flight radar channel is more focused on behind the scenes cockpit flights that kind of thing my goal is to bring you the best in travel delivered in high quality videos whether you're planning a trip and doing research or just want to come along and enjoy the ride with me I insist on flying and traveling well and I want to help you do the same it's going to make your head look like an egg shape that's fine okay welcome to Amsterdam skip pole airport I'm here for a very special flight today not only because of the airline but also because I've got Pete with me here who is a longtime friend today we're flying 13 hours Amsterdam to Taipei on a airline and aircraft I've never tried before Pete doesn't really know what we're flying but you found out that we're on China Airlines from The Uber we had to put in the airline to get the drop off right for the Uber so you know that much but you had never heard of China airl i' never heard a China airplanes and Pete is not uh you know crazy no well but you fly you travel mind airplanes but but you're not he's not studying the airplanes like like I do and like many of you watching I like to fly rin a he flies rin a a lot right mhm If Only They had a freaking fly program well yeah I want to see how Pete reacts to what we're about to fly I know all about it I haven't been in it but I've seen tons of photos and reviews um so I kind of know what to expect but he really doesn't yeah and also you don't often fly Long Haul business class no so we're going to go check in let's do this okay great good what do you think of their uniforms they're quite starchy looking they're kind of um quite tra it's not it's not very Glam it it looks more it's true it's it's like suppressed a little bit yes a little bit institutional but it's kind of at least it's unique color yeah that little purple thing so we stood in the queue for passport control for about 20 minutes and that was stressing me out but you were so Zen about it I think I can learn a thing or two from you well I'm just used to queing aort skap so this is um the fast track experience does not come naturally to me you've just accepted that fate when whenever it presents itself yeah yeah and I'm like hyper hyper aware of sort of like optimizing every step of the way so when I get stuck in a que I can't get around or have some priority way of you know not being he turned you into a monster yeah I've become a monster it's a lesson to us all I want to go to the lounge and look at the Del houses uh I don't know why you wouldn't want to do that but yeah some little janky porcelain houses mean nothing to no one oh my God oh my God oh you go straight for the AR huh yeah aren't they lovely you know they are kind of nice quick moment in the lounge now we're headed to the gate I think they're about to start boarding how are you feeling I'm really excited to see this cabin it's kind of a unique way they've made the cabin look the seats are pretty much like a lot of airlines have these seats um they're nice but they're nothing so special like nothing so new to me Taiwan is pretty unique in that it has three really good Airlines home home based you know so you've got EVA Air or EVA Air they're green planes got China Airlines and you've got a new one called starlux kind of space themed yeah I haven't tried any of those actually except for a short flat on Eva space themed aine yeah wow I mean not really on board but they have a kind of space thing going on mhm yeah their lounges are called something like space travel Lou or something weird like that but anyway they're all great and they're all quite different cuz what I'm normally looking out for when I board a plane is um can I sneak my slightly oversized bag which I haven't paid for cuz I haven't premium I haven't bought priority boarding with rer can I get that into an overhead bin or uh am I going to have to put it between my legs well you can you you can drop all those worries today okay I'm I feel lighter take a load off yeah exactly you have nothing to worry about [Music] great this cabin is beautiful I'm amazed at how so many different patterns can actually work really well together it makes most aircraft cabins look pretty bland it's a pretty typical reverse Herring bone seat there's enough room in a few places to store things and a big screen and sturdy table right little um little game boy yeah I'm going to do it straight away dear passeng the for electric devices into the fly mode and make sure Wi-Fi function has be according to the ca regulations and for your own safety when seated we'll get more into the seat a little later for now check out this stunner of a takeoff for in oh [Music] one funny thing about China Airlines is that music is playing throughout the flight in the labs the cabin colors and lighting make it a really cozy place to lounge around how about the eagle talon lamp I'm loving this you also get slippers of course and some Soo headphones the seat is well padded and comfortable and the foot well is not too cramped either my name is and this are today's menu and to list would you like to take a look thank you got aity kit it's kind of a unique one it's in a little paper almost a paper case we'll take a look at that in a minute and menu I got an email about pre-order so I decided to try that out I usually don't pre-order but I thought it might be worth doing I guess since it seemed clear that I wanted one option over the others and I wanted to make sure I would get the Chinese breakfast I think I probably didn't need to worry but uh especially the Chinese breakfast I wanted that instead of the western one so I'm most interested now in the uh in the wine list but I'm also going to check out what's in the menu in terms of starters and all that the question is do they whack on all the cabin lights and wake everyone up for breakfast 2 and 1 half hours before or do they go about it in a a little bit more of a restrained way so people can sleep they must be aware she seemed to be aware that people are wanting to sleep on this one so hope for the best always love looking at the drinks list lunch service starts with champagne in my case China Airlines are serving Didier chopan one I've never heard of but which tasted great cheers I hadn't heard of this champagne before but it's actually really tasty very happy with [Music] that plus some Japanese style rice crackers in a little bag and in am Muse Bo The Coasters really sweet cute little coasters I had gotten a sunglass one before just sort of drawing of sunglass on it before and they also have one with a little airplane it's so nice let check it [Music] out there's the other coaster with the sunglasses cute it looks like a date with some stuff inside not bad at all unexpectedly kind of Nordic flavors a dill in there my nice then there's a lobster and asparagus appetizer a little soup in between and beef with egg noodles plus a cheese and fruit course and ice cream or I could have chosen caramel shortbread cake I'd say this was not the most memorable meal I've had in the air but it was an impressive amount of food and it all tasted good silverware is nothing special but I like how it says China Airlines here on the back delicious not really a soup person but this is so good they also come around with a bunch of nifty Taiwanese package snacks so I asked to try them all also on the menu Johnny Walker Blue which I normally would only expect in international first class so naturally I had to have a [Music] glass it's fun that you can chat between seats that's not a feature I've seen much on the other hand the selection of movies is pretty poor there are a couple of interesting options but it's not very extensive there's quite a bit of weather up here we're still passing through turb haven't been able to get up take the seat bels off yet but interestingly this I thought this was the amenity kit I actually knew they had these special kits I'd seen photos of them but I forgot about them so look what's inside here North base gold colors for sure but it's a real case I think all amenity kits should be reusable for a long time you know I like the little carabiners as well kind of very basic eye shades hand lotion sanitizing gel and lip balm looks like probably ear plugs China airlin Box little strap for I guess connecting to you like hanging around your neck I can walk around taipe with this around my neck do you think I should do that hair brush toothbrush standard contents are a little underwhelming I have to say nothing surprising or exciting in there really we do get for the case but I was hoping for something a little more interesting inside maybe something a little more unexpected or premium it doesn't like that good um okay so quickly impressions of this aircraft and business class I think a big part of it is the the Privacy um like I've only flown business one time before and it was in an old fashion and you know just a row of like fancy armchair kind of seats but the thing of like she can't see anyone else when you're sitting down which is really nice you kind of Rite and you know watch crashy movies with impunity and if you want to get up you never have to deal with anyone it's like your own your own world yeah that's that's really really nice obviously the seat is extremely comfortable I having like places to stash your stuff is I'm used to like you know having like loads of too many things crammed into the the like um chair pocket the food food was great like obviously being served it on China and glass which just not used to that yeah and having a space to eat it rather than that kind of yeah coach thing where you feel like you're about to spill your water on your neighbor we're about 3 maybe 4 hours into this FL still 8 or 9 hours left to go it's a pretty long one I don't usually do these longer 13-hour flights these days hard to imagine doing even more there are flights that are 16 18 maybe even 20 hours in some cases jet lag is a real potential issue on this one departing 11:00 a.m. from Europe arriving Asia when it feels like midnight in Europe time 6:00 a.m. in taipe having to get through the whole day it's kind of worst case scenario for an eastbound flight in my opinion for potential jet lag issues so I'm not that tired but I'm I'm a little tired I'm going to try to sleep if I can manage to sleep maybe 6 or 7 hours it's going to be such a great thing for the next few days we're going to be in Taiwan we're going to be in Hong Kong we're going to go down to Manila and then fly back to Europe by a Doha so it's a it's a fun adventure coming up a lot of cool places and a lot of interesting flights had a few glasses of champagne I had a Johnny Walker Blue I watched a movie did some stuff on uh the old Instagram and by the way be sure to follow me there as well uh if you're enjoying this stuff because I post there all the time during the trips live updates while I'm on the move in my Instagram story so I'll put the link here and in the description we over Ron right now we're about to fly over at ton I'm going to try and get some sleep try and see if uh if I can manage to sleep right now and uh hopefully for more than a couple of hours we'll see how it goes like I mentioned the seat is nice and soft and in bed mode that's a really good thing although I did find it was a little lumpy as seats can be when you convert them into beds there's a little mattress topper which I had to work out how to attach flight attendant never offered to make the bed the blanket and pillow are great and overall it was quite a comfortable way to rest though the 11:00 a.m. departure of this flight made that a little difficult on a proper overnight I think this would be a very decent place to sleep good night Eagle Talon lamp and good news they did not whack on all the lights 2 and 1/2 hours before landing as I feared there's a mid-flight snack available beyond the package stuff they keep out in the galley the choice is between a small sandwich or dumplings so I have to of course go for the dumplings and the drink I order is a kind of bubbly peach tea which is delicious and at some point I got up and asked for my Chinese style kanji breakfast complete with unpeeled egg which I enjoy very much I think it's my first time ever getting served an unpeeled egg on a plane [Music] [Music] [Music] another hand sh [Music] and what more can you ask for than Sunrise against an a350 wing while overflying Asia not much I would [Music] say [Music] in for your safy please do not use a labatory until the fast SE is turned off and the ENT so how did I book this I used Flying Blue Miles which aren't always the killer deal they once were but are still an important part of my arsenal when booking premium Cabins this Long Haul oneway on China Airlines cost 80,000 Points Plus $263 and it's bookable directly on the Air France and km websites [Music] so there you have it I really enjoyed this flight in some ways I think of China Airlines as taiwan's number three airline in terms of quality I hear evva is amazing and starlux is possibly even more so I'm eager to try all of them but if this is the third best airline in Taiwan and they are doing very well because I could hardly find any fault with this trip and I'd gladly fly them again [Music] [Music] for for [Music] [Music] [Music] all right we flew 10,000 km and now we're in taipe how do you feel Pete I feel pretty good actually I'm exed considered I'm very excited yeah and I feel great from the flight even despite sleeping maybe a total of 4 hours you should actually walk I hate when people stand on these things filming is no excuse I think we'll probably feel a bit worse a bit later oh yeah that's it's definitely in the post but I'm feeling good now yeah it was a nice flight I'm going do some uh immigration formalities and show that we have low swine fever risk then we go look for the closest possible place to eat some Mochi and breakfast buns and that is just downstairs from the main terminal so that's [Music] fantastic [Music] [Music] after that it's an easy Metro ride into town and time for some Taiwanese Adventure [Music] thanks for coming [Music] along

Channel: Gabe Leigh

Views: 8,162

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Id: z-Jo_RNL3j8

Length: 24min 42sec (1482 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 09 2024