Introduction - A Long March To China
December 2019 was the last time I visited my parents in China. Shortly after that was a period that fortunately is now history. It wasn’t easy being separated by law and challenging logistics for three years. Weirdly enough, though, once we’re on the other side of it I retain no desire to look back. I had a bit of a gap on my schedule in March, so I figured it would be a good time to go back.
Just a couple months earlier, China had scraped most Covid-related measures, including the infamous inbound quarantine. While the updated policy was conducive for visiting, the flight availability was a different story. Service between the US and China failed to rebound after the lift of these restrictions, and nonstop options were scarce.
Since I was booking for travel in less than a week, I found an interesting routing from Newark to Bangkok via Heathrow. The first leg would be on United’s B767 Polaris cabin, and the second leg would be on Eva Air’s fifth freedom flight between LHR and BKK. The whole itinerary was even bookable online using Turkish Airlines’ website, so I paid a total of 67,500 Miles & Smiles miles plus ~$200 in taxes and fees.
By getting myself to Bangkok actually provided an advantage, as Thailand was one of the initial countries from which you did not need a PCR test to travel to China. I booked a separate cash ticket on Thai Airways from Bangkok to Chengdu for ~$500 in business class. The flight itself is only around 2.5hrs, but it was operated by an A350-900, which means business class had lie-flat bed. I thought the price was reasonable as intra-Asia premium cabins can be quite pricey.
So in short, my outbound itinerary was as follows:
Review - United Airlines Business Class B767-400 Newark to London Heathrow
Review - EVA Air Business Class B777-300ER London Heathrow to Bangkok Suvarnabhumi
Review - Thai Airways Business Class A350-900 Bangkok Suvarnabhumi to Chengdu Shuangliu
On the return portion, I needed to stop along the way in Singapore, so I booked a cash ticket on Cathay Pacific from Chengdu to Singapore by way of Hong Kong. I paid ~$200 for a coach ticket. I won’t be reviewing these two segments as the flights were rather standard. In Singapore, I stayed at the JW Marriott Singapore South Beach.
From there, I flew Singapore Airlines A380 to Heathrow, connecting on United B772 back to Newark. This itinerary cost 87,500 Aeroplan miles and some modest taxes and fees. The second United review will be relatively short as I’ll only be covering the service.
Review - JW Marriott Singapore South Beach
Review - Singapore Airlines Business Class A380 Singapore to London Heathrow
Review - United Airlines Business Class B777-200 London Heathrow to Newark