A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-return

[Berlin]

This was our very first Star Alliance redemption trip and what a journey it was! I'm usually a fairly loyal One World customer but this smart way of getting onto First class is just too good an offer to resist. So here we go- our big annual holiday with my partner and a couple of stuffed toys to Europe. Speaking of... A very special friend of ours came all the way with us, holding up his Aussie flag throughout the trip



Mr. Wombat was obviously as excited as we were, his first ever flight out of Australia and all. We ourselves were more excited about the prospect of free flowing Dom and to enjoy the A380 on yet another airline. So far, I've enjoyed the big bird on SQ, EK and QF and I was very curious to try it on one of the "smaller" operators. Our route was to include SYD-BKK in F on one of Thai's rusty old 747s, then the A380 in F from BKK to PAR, followed by LH in J from PAR-FRA and onto FRA-LHR. Yes, the infamous trifecta of awful European airports back to back and, needless to say, of course the latter had to go wrong but more about that later. We then jumped over the channel from LHR-AMS on a separately purchased BA ticket in J and returned LH J TXL-FRA and then onto Thai in F A380 FRA_BKK and 747 BKK-SYD.



First of all, we had to get through Sydney airport. We decided to use Towncars for the first time both ways to and from SYD airport and were very satisfied with both the cars and drivers- well worth the extra money to avoid those awful dirty Sydney cabs with their crook drivers who barely speak English and do all sorts of nasty stuff. This way, we had a very friendly driver and the entire ride was pleasant and relaxing. At the check in counter in Sydney, we first got in touch with the not-so-smooth-as-silk chaos that Thai service should turn out to be on the entire trip- a bit like I remember traffic in this very country: Looks like everything is about to crash any minute but somehow still works. Most of the time that is. In Sydney, it was actually sub-contracted Thais taking care of the check in which I found quite interesting and even more interesting was the way our check in lady stuck all the luggage tags on top of each other. Many many hours later, a very stern looking German lady in the LH lounge in Frankfurt should make very big eyes seeing this masterpiece of Thai handy work :shock:Before we could board the plane, we had some time to kill in the NZ lounge which was very full and busy at the time. We both loved the Hot Dog bar but only had one Steinlager each, knowing that there was lots of high quality booze to come afterwards. We had a nice view over the termac, waved good bye to Sydney and then it was already time to board.


I know that some Boeing fan boys on here violently disagree with this, but I have never been a big fan of the 747 and the old and rattly Thai version certainly doesn't do anything to change this view. Looking like a rust bucket with a big fat ugly cancer on the nose (I always found the 747 with the half-done job of adding a second story ugly as...), it welcomed us with the moldy smell of the 80ies. Of course, it wasn't one of the few updated planes of the type but had the older interior with hideous purple fabrics in it. Saying all that- we actually found those seats quite comfy regardless of the looks and I loved that nifty electronic ottoman which seems to magically float towards you upon the touch of a button. That is, however, where the fascination ends as the rest is just way too old including one of those long forgotten RGB video beams for showing the safety video and a tiny toilet from hell with carpet on the floor. How you can put carpet onto the floor of an airplane toilet is a riddle to me- just imagine how many people's body fluids would have gone onto it over the years: Yikes! :shock:



I've read a lot of reviews on Thai prior to this trip and the summary of all that which I had in my head pretty much was Service so-so, food pretty ave and ground service in BKK awesome. As ever so often, it turned out to be pretty different: Service was so-so alright but in a very special Thai way, the food was mostly stunning and the ground service in BKK hell on Earth. But one thing after another... Service on our first lag turned out to be the worst of the four Thai flights we did. The supervisor in the First cabin was an overweight Thai lady who not only wasn't very pleasant to look at, but also clearly didn't care all too much about her job. The others were okay but chaotic and for me it was very funny to see how 5 or so staff members manage to do the job much worse than 1 or 2 do in the similar-sized First cabin of a certain Australian airline. Don't get me wrong- these are First world problems and we truly enjoyed the champagne and food and none of the service was plain bad. You just couldn't help but think that one person never knew what the other as doing, often you had to ask for something twice or more to finally get it and staff seemed to randomly float between classes of service which certainly didn't contribute to a consistent feel.

 

[Berlin]

Thai 747 SYD-BKK food service

We had pre-ordered our meals on the Thai website which is one of those things that look like that could never work but in the end turn out to be indeed smooth as silk. I heard quite a few horror stories about the food on Thai, even in First, but it seems that the airline has upped their game recently (or we just both have bad taste )- the food was excellent and the pre-ordered meals turned out to be much better than the standard choice on the menus. They all looked a bit boring and small-ish on the tiny thumbnails on the Thai website but turned out to be much better in real. Before the main, we got some lovely entrees and then the caviar service which is just very special the way it gets served from a trolley with all sorts of condiments and a shot of Vodka to get it all down.


As mains, I had the Beef Rossini which is beef fillet topped with a slice of Fois Gras. Now-that is the way to serve a steak on an airplane as the rich and fatty slice of liver turns even the dryest airplane steak into an enjoyment. We knew there would be lot of further stuffed geese and duck livers follow during our time in France so it was the perfect start to our journey


My partner had pre-ordered the Lobster and also was very happy with his meal.


He was even more delighted afterwards when he saw the desert which was a "Death by chocolate" type thing:


I'm more of a cheese person and, unfortunately, the cheese selection was pretty awful, even for business it would have been a disappointment: They got my hopes up by serving it from a trolley like earlier the caviar but the cheese itself looked like just having been grabbed from the local Coles, you could even still see the shape of plastic container it obviously came from on some of the cheeses and in line with this, quality was generally extremely low and disappointing. The same goes for the crew's reaction when I dared for something else to nibble on a bit later in the flight, I ended up with a few packs of J class peanuts and a J class cheese plate which, funnily, was of better quality than the stuff they served off the trolley in F.

 

[Berlin]

Flounge in BKK and A380 BKK-PAR

We had heard a lot of great things about the First class lounge in Bangkok so were really excited about the experience and subsequently even more disappointed as things didn't work out that nicely at all. First off, we ended up being shoved to a tarmac position far away from the gates which was only the second time ever I've been de-boarding a huge 747 with movable stairs rather than one of the proper terminal aerobridges. Turns out that at the late night time of our arrival, at least every second proper gate in the terminal was totally deserted so the only reason for parking that huge plane out there is... Thai chaos. And so it went on. After an awful bus ride, we were picked up by one of those electro buggies and taken to the lounge. What sounds so awesome in reality was just a nightmare- shouting Thai staff shoving you back and forth, hassling you through the terminal and into the lounge and the entire time you felt rushed and stressed and had to fear that they might "loose" you in case you dare and fall behind a bit. The lounge itself, even worse- there are a couple (very few) decently private looking living room style areas which you can grab, if you're lucky or not, if you're not. No chance to get a massage or anything else in the treatment area and total chaos in the main area of the lounge. Far too many staff with far too little clue and again, absolute chaos when getting back to your connecting flight: Everyone had been concerned not to be picked up and missing your flight and none of the many staff members could give you any decent answer.


At least the food and drinks were quite nice- once you managed to grab one of those few Ipads you use to choose your meal/drink on. Very late and shortly before the connecting flight, out of nowhere a crew member showed up and "organised" the same stressful and chaotic way back to the plane. My partner and me agreed- it would be so much less stressful just to make your way without any "help", was it not for the monstrous airport terminal which seems to be only used at opposite ends. I always wondered how a brand new airport in Asia can come out so much worse than, let's say, Hong Kong or Changi in passenger surveys and now I know it. Chaos, inefficiency and- to top it all off- ugly design, it actually looked how I would imagine DXB to look if someone cratched all the fake gold off everything: Like a huge tomb made out of concrete!

Finally, very tired, the A380! And how lovely it was, the hugest airplane toilet ever, a nice comfy seat and very nice food. Unfortunately, the stupid excuse that passengers apparently don't want the privacy of a separate suit is as much as a lie as on QF's A380 with their weird swivel seats, it would have been so much nicer to not see strangers anymore in adjacent seats! They also had a funky looking remote control screen by the side of the seats which only illuminated blue when you touched the button but somehow wasn't made to work, almost a year in since Thai started to fly the aircraft. Service, on the other hand, was much much better than on the 747 with really lovely staff who seemed to care and nice little flowers everywhere.



One real waste of space is the strange "lounge area" and self-serve bar at the front of the F lounge: On none of our flights, the staff even bothered to stock the latter so it was just standing there with nothing in. Likewise, no one ever used that lounge area but at the same time every First passenger was lining up to use the big (huge) toilet up the front and politely declining to use the much smaller one at the back of the cabin. Clearly, some pencil pushers must have come up with this cost saving measure to build in a totally useless space-waster of a "lounge" instead of having two of the big bathrooms on both ends of the First cabins.



Food (and caviar) was excellent like on all the flights with the pre-ordered swiss-style veal with mushroom sauce and German Spaetzle-pasta being (almost) as good as the real stuff you get in German and neighboring countries. Mjam!


At the end of the flight, all the crew came around to every First passenger and very kindly thanking us for our business which was a very nice touch. Ready we were after a good night's sleep to embark on our adventure through Europe's worst airports- and as expected, Frankfurt of course even managed to top off Paris and Heathrow when it comes to awfulness!

I will continue this report at a later time, give me a day or two to get around to it

 

[Berlin]

PAR-FRA-LHR Lufthansa J

Due to seat availability on our USAir redemption ticket, we were fored to track the long way through Europe to get to our first destination, London where my brother happens to live. I was already not too happy to go through Charles-de-Gaules, Frankfurt and Heathrow for all places in the world and it was indeed a bit a of a disaster. Paris at first was still okay thanks to the express card we had been given on our First class flight so we were in the Schengen area in no time. We went to the LH business lounge which is surprisingly big in Paris but unfortunately rather oddly located in the basement giving you a bit of a claustrophobic no window under the earth kinda feel. The lady at the front desk however was very friendly and we could get good German draft beer for breakfast. Disaster started when our connecting flight got delayed for mechanical issues. We only found out at the gate and only because we overheard it from other passengers, there was absolute chaos and zero information given. Back to the lounge- luckily we had this option- and the lady there filled us in. Apparently there was a piece of equipment missing and they were hoping to get it from Air France rather than having to fly it in from Frankfurt. In the end, the delay was a bit more than an hour but it all seemed as if with a bit of luck, we still should get out connecting flight in Frankfurt. The extremely unfriendly LH guy at the gate was one of the good old German #@$ards that you all too often still find in my home country and grumbled at my partner that this big bag of hand luggage "surely can't get on board". We of course feared for the health and safety of our beloved Wombat but luckily, the guy came to senses when he realized that we are Business passengers. Maybe look at the ticket first you... :evil:

Oh dear, Frankfurt- I always ALWAYS hated this airport, as a child already actually. Endless hallways, strange cramped elevators to reach different levels, chaotic signage, long queues and never working conveyor belts, that is what I remember all to vividly. And guess what- 20 years later, we encountered endless hallways, strange cramped elevators as the only way to reach another level, really bad signage and queues from hell with no priority for J or F passengers even (unless you're on LH itself in First, they get the super special Mercedes at the gate treatment). Breakfast on the flight was actually quite nice, very German but decent enough portion for such a short flight in J.



I found it quite interesting to compare LH with BA- Food is similar, seating is as cough on both with Economy seats and the middle one simply blocked (we really sometimes forget how good we have it here in Australia, those QF J class seats suddenly seem like heaven on Earth!) and service friendly on both as well. LH has newer planes which mostly look better maintained than BA but the latter still wins in my opinion as I personally prefer the stern truly friendly and sometimes quite humorous British service over the hard-trained "Now you better finally smile" kinda LH approach plus LH only serves coughpy German sparkling while BA has those cute little champagne bottles- even on the shortest of all short J flights from London to Amsterdam we should get this treat but I'll talk about this later.

It doomed on us that the connection in Frankfurt wouldn't work due to this airport from hell. They told us on the plane already that we'e been re-booked on a later flight onto London and soon we knew why that is: Of course, we had to park far out on the tarmac and get bussed back to the terminal with the great unwashed. The last thing we needed after such a long trip already and a bad wake up to reality after getting pampered so much on Thai First. Frankfurt pretty much was still the same mess as decades ago- you'd think they might have learned some lessons but no ho, not here! You think Heathrow or JFK is bad? Think again- this is what a traveler's nightmare is made of! We had to connect from the A side of Terminal 1 to the B side with, if I got that bit correctly, A being inside Schengen and B being outside Schengen. As the UK is part of the EU but not part of the Schengen zone, the connecting flight to London gets treated as if it's a flight to China or India. Hence- off the plane, following the ever cryptic signs. We wanted to go to the first LH lounge available to get our newly changed boarding passes but were told with a very stern look that we should better head over to the B side first as this "can take a while". We only slowly understood what this means as you- seriously- still have to take an overfilled elevator to get to some basement level, then you pass through an endless tunnel (in which, like 20 years ago, two of the conveyor belts were out of service) and then up again. Wtf- couldn't they have fixed this by now? Overfilled elevators with luggage coming and people coming out from endless flights all over the globe = yuckiness, stink and probably the best chance to catch yourself some weird disease from who knows where. Anyway- not nice. We then finally found a lounge and once again, the lady told us that there would have been one closer to the gate but the "signs are currently off". Sigh. That lady seemed at first like one of those really historic lounge dragons, with glasses hanging on a cord off her neck and all, but -partially thanks to me speaking perfect German- turned out to be really good while constantly whinging about her hellish job (we really felt for her as -seriously- the children's play area was located right behind her desk which did not go too well in terms of concentrating). She managed to re-book the flight onto the new flight and also re-tagged all our luggage after needing about 5 minutes to take apart the mess of glued-together luggage tags we had gotten about 24 hours earlier in Mascot. Needless to say, the German lady was not happy with the inefficiency of her Thai counterpart! Finally, all sorted, quick beer and a Pretzel to remind me of home and off we went on our rather uneventful flight over to London where we had to fight with the jetlag of our life but still managed to squeeze in a pint or two before finally heading to sleep. Hurray- Europe!

 

[Berlin]

LHR-AMS on BA in J

This little hop over the channel we booked ourselves separately from the rest of the trip and decided to stay loyal to OneWorld on this occasion. We originally wanted to simply book in Eco but BA offered us to upgrade to J for an additional 60 pound each which we couldn't resist. My brother dropped us at T5 early in the morning so we had almost three hours in the fabulous First lounge there and our slightly alcoholic Wombat friend instantly made good use of the bar, proudly sporting his Aussie flag



I personally still prefer the QF Flounge in Sydney but would say the T5 lounge in LHR comes close and is definitely way better than the First lounge mess Thai airways offers in BKK. You get champagne, all sorts of other drinks including Blue Label Jonny Walker and, luckily, also some proper Malt Whiskys. The breakfast area was done as a buffet which was okay but not too appetizing so we decided to rather order something from the a la carte menu. The latter is distributed a bit randomly throughout the lounge and you need to grab a member of the staff to order the items which we did. The Eggs Benedict were almost perfect though with this item as well, good ole Neil Perry wins with his much more intensely flavored Hollandaise sauce. Still- a very nice start into the day, particularly with some glasses of champers and the occasional spirit thrown in for good measure.



On the flight itself, we were determined to make use of the 60 Pounds for the J class upgrade as much as we could and the simple but delicious Ham and Cheese croissant wouldn't make it. We kindly asked for those great little champagne bottle and the friendly British flight attendant made sure we got a second serve of this delight shortly after. My partner then had a Baileys on the rocks and I asked for a nice Scotch which I got topped up just before landing. Pretty good effort for a 40 minute or so flight I think and we were slightly intoxicated when we arrived in Amsterdam. Which was precisely the state I intended to be in during our visit in this beautiful city, making good use of Dutch beer and other local specialties to keep you firmly in that same state for the entire stay! :mrgreen:

After this, we rented a car for a wild trip through Holland, Belgium, Germany and France which was a great experience for our native Australian who posed for us in front of the Cologne cathedral, the Atomium in Brussels and other sights on our journey.





As always, all my hotel reviews can be found on Tripadvisor under my member name sydneyberlin and I will post report and pictures from our return trip in a few days time.

 

[Alanslegal]

Nice report Looking forward to reading the rest

We just got back a few days ago and I agree with many of your little comments about TG.

Firstly, it was my 2nd USDM redemption and my partners 3rd, so we have flown a handful of TG F sectors now.

Service on board is definitely a hit and miss. They do try hard but for some reason just lack the attention to detail. For example, when setting up for a meal service (eg. on the 747's) they would swing your IFE screen out of the way, pull the table up, lay a table cloth down but never ever re-adjust the IFE screen back. Another time, my pre-ordered lobster was served to the lady in 1A and not me. I ended up with 1A's fried rice :evil: Another flight, they did not serve me my breakfast :evil: On a recent SYD-BKK flight a friend of mine who had also pre-ordered lobster did not end up having lobster :shock: Service levels can be hot and cold, some attendants are great, some can be pretty ordinary. A few days ago coming back into SYD on 16/9 on TG475, my breakfast consisted of fruit and OJ. They had forgotten about my hot breakfast and only realised after clearing my table. I wasn't hungry anyway but these are just little faults.

On-ground service at BKK has always been pretty good for us. We are always met by an assistant and depending the location to the F lounge or immigration, we'd get a buggy. Yes sometimes they get a bit confused when it is boarding time but we always skip the assistance and make our own way to the gate. That 10 minute walk is helpful especially we would be stuck for the next 10 hours anyway.

We had an 13 hr transit on the 15/9 and TG offered us a day room at the Novotel Hotel BKK. We declined as we wanted to go into town anyway.

Food quality is generally good, not great. However I will mention that my lobster on the FRA-BKK leg was fantastic.

The A380 is very spacious like all A380 F's I have been in (only QF and KE) and that lounge area, I agree with you that it is a waste of space and they should have made that a second bathroom. Then again, even I think the QF J lounge (and KE J) on the A380 is a waste of space. KE J has an onboard bar at the upper deck rear with bartender who mixes coughtails which is pretttttty cool Did I mention the duty free shop downstairs?

Anyway, enjoy the rest of your trip

 

[Berlin]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

Seems to be mostly in line with our recent experience- glad to hear it's not me who's simply an over-demanding whinger Will definitely follow your advice next time around and make our own way back to the gate in BKK!

Speaking of A380 on-board lounges, I think EK has done it right as well, with a proper bar area and plenty of room to stand, eat some canapes and if you're lucky, maybe even start an interesting conversation with a total stranger from who-knows-where which is something I always find extremely eye-opening and one of the joys of travel.

 

[smit0847]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

I don't know why you didn't just take the train from CDG into London - it seems like an awful hassle to fly CDG-FRA-LHR just because it's free?

 

[Berlin]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

I don't know why you didn't just take the train from CDG into London - it seems like an awful hassle to fly CDG-FRA-LHR just because it's free?

I'd never give up one of those coughpy J class meals and the chance to fly Plus, we had lots of luggage which luckily, came out almost first in LHR, regardless of all the issues on the way.

 

[ric_melb]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

Really enjoyable Trip Report. I still can't believe you took the wombat; but love all the photos with him enjoying his travels.

 

[RooFlyer]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

Great TR!

Can you say a bit more about the T5 BA lounge? There was a huge brou-ha-ha when they changed caterers a while ago, if I recall correctly. How did the catering presentation look, and thinks like replenishment?

 

[Pollywaffle]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

Really enjoyable Trip Report. I still can't believe you took the wombat; but love all the photos with him enjoying his travels.

I agree.

 

[sergeyvzn]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

I haven't flown Thai in F but have done several trips in J and must say that their J experience repeats all the flaws you mentioned. Recently I did a SYD-BKK-FRA with them and the Sydney to Bangkok leg was quite awful with an old rusty 747, unattentitve FAs, missing drink orders etc. then in BKK my connecting A380 flight was of course departing from the furthest possible terminal pier from the gate we arrived at, I had 1.30 between the flights and I just made it! No info on which gate the connecting flight was departing, I had to drop in a the very first Thai lounge I found on the way and ask their service staff where I was supposed to go. Ran across the whole terminal (no buggy), just had 10 mins before boarding to grab a shower and a spring roll. Then the A380 was fantastic...
glad I flew TK back to Australia, they were great compared to Thai

 

[Berlin]

Re: A wombat on a journey: Thai Airways A380 First Class, LH and BA Sydney-Europe-ret

Great TR!
Can you say a bit more about the T5 BA lounge? There was a huge brou-ha-ha when they changed caterers a while ago, if I recall correctly. How did the catering presentation look, and thinks like replenishment?

Yea- my brother actually warned me for the same reason, seems to have been a huge issue in the UK with plenty of media attention. I don't know how it was before they've changed caterers but there was nothing to complain about with the eggs benedict we had, nice flavour, perfect presentation and very quick. The buffet looked a bit less appetising but not awful or anything like this either and had everything you could ask for on it including black pudding if that's your thing. So, not knowing how it was before, I would say we had a very enjoyable time in the lounge and the drinks selection was particularly nice. Not quite to the standard of QF in SYD or MEL but close I'd say.

 

[Berlin]

Return journey: LH TXL-FRA and Thai First A380 FRA-BKK

It's finally time to head back home and we had a great holiday in Europe, eating too much unhealthy food and drinking far too much beer, wine and champagne. Actually- can there be a "too much" when it comes to French Champagne and Fois Gras or fresh German or Dutch beer from a little regional brewery straight from the tap? I personally don't think so

Anyway- it's time to get back. This time around, we simply fly from Berlin to Frankfurt and then from there via BKK back to Sydney. Out LH flies leaves from the old main building of Tegel which, as always, makes me slightly sentimental as you never know when exactly that new airport finally opes- I'm with most locals on that one and enjoy every delay of the new airport as Tegel is just much more conveniently located and has lots of sentimental value. As always, check in with LH was a lesson in German service quality (NOT!) and after several lectures about what we apparently did wrong (holding J and subsequent F tickets, mind you) the lady finally checked us in- and did so properly, I might add, as our luggage made it off the belt as the very first ones 30 hours later in Sydney. I think I've just been gone far too long and can't tolerate the infamous Berlin snotter-snout anymore The old LH lounge in TXL was okay but nothing to write home about- it was breakfast time and as always in Germany, you could get an entire selection of spirits and draft beer but no decent coffee or soft drinks. The breakfast selection was fine for me but my Australian partner was not so keen on the cold cuts, boiled eggs and pickled cucumbers which are indeed a regional specialty. Luckily, they also had nice big German-style pretzels which went fabulously with the Beck's on tap at 8am in the morning as even my Aussie partner could not deny

Before we departed, I witnessed a rather unusual procedure on the taxi way- Tegel being so badly overcrowded, there is obviously not enough space anymore in the employee canteen so they're serving food and coffee from a truck which parks right next to the airplanes with the ground staff lining up- funny:


On the plane in J, we received the usual LH fair which I think is quite nice for such a short flight and perfect in size and quality. I could imagine it to get quite boring over time though if you travel with them all the time- all the meals we had were very similar.



To our delight, this time around we got picked up by a very friendly French lady who carried a Thai airways sign and guided us through the awfully long connecting tunnel and emigration area in FRA. It didn't make much of a difference as we still had to walk for ages and, can you believe it, three weeks later the escalators which were broken back then already had still not been fixed. Maybe that is the reason that there are ALWAYS broken escalators at Frankfurt airport: No German efficiency, no where to be seen :evil:

We then sat in the LH Senator lounge for a while which was a pretty dismal place despite the funky looks and the very nice looking bar area. Unfortunately, the bar tenders -both Thai- were the most grumpy and unfriendly bartenders I've ever met, they barely spoke a word! And being Thai- I alays thought Thais naturally can't be grumpy! I wonder if Thai Airways had sent them on a training course with Lufthansa to learn about "German Hospitality"? Despite that bar area, all the food and drink options were pretty much the same as in any LH business lounge and even the "German-style" sausages were turkey sausages rather than pork so they tasted awful. I assume it was to please the dozens of Arab families with their weiled-up wifes who seemed to enjoy the food and I bet Allah would have been happy. I, on the other hand, was certainly not :evil:

Off we went on the fabulous Thai A380. We were spared the boarding chaos as the French lady came back to escort us onto the plane which did indeed help a lot. On the A380, we were welcomed with a true Thai smile and glasses of Dom and we settled in very nicely. Funny, how this time to departure always seems like an eternity if you're seated back in the bus while in First, it seems to go rather too quickly as you could sit there with your Dom for much longer! Mr. Wombat also seemed to enjoy the experience and happily joined his daddy for a glass of fine champagne

 

[Berlin]

Thai A380 FRA-BKK First: Meals

As on the way out, we were quite amazed by the sheer size of the main First class bathroom and loved the nice big seats. Also as on the way out, the bar area and "lounge' up the front was entirely deserted and an absolute waste of space. We had pre-ordered our meals again and as I was really hungry still, I asked to get an item from the standard menu as well which was happily done for me. Strangely, the menu out of FRA is the least extensive pre-order menu of all the legs so I went with yellow noodles and duck which was okay in taste but a little small for my liking and the duck had quite a bit of yuckie bits and bones even through it.



After this rather mediocre experience, I thought maybe it's best to order some German-style food from the standard menu, flying from Frankfurt and all. So I opted for German style pork loin which, unfortunately, turned out to be majorly inferior to the excellent German/Swiss style veal we had out of BKK on the way out :shock: It was the driest pork I've ever eaten and both the sauce and vegetable were very generic airplane food which could be served anywhere- in Economy that is! Not good for First, not good at all- Thai catering out of Frankfurt was definitely the worst we got.



Needless to say, that I also made good use of the drinks selection though I must say that the wines have generally been far below in quality to the excellent champagne so I tried to stick to the latter for as long as possible, already knowing about this "trap" from the outbound flights. After a nap I woke up and felt really hungry once again so I asked for some kind of snack and was offered a Chinese-style BBQ pork soup. I have no idea why this one was so excellent out of Frankfurt but it was- definitely the best food I received on the entire flight and very authentic tasting- yumm!

 

[Berlin]

BKK Flounge and 747 BKK-SYD in F

Just before touching down in BKK, we were served breakfast and I was grateful that they offered mushroom-filled crepes for a little bit of a change, they were actually quite yummie:



In BKK itself, the mad rush through the terminal with those little trolleys and an extremely chaotic airline guide was as stressful as on the outbound but we were a bit better prepared, both mentally and with out hand luggage as we already knew what to expect. The time in the lounge was a bit shorter this time and again, this First lounge is nothing to write home about. Also as on the outbound, the 747 going to Sydney was once again parked out on the taxi ways and you had to be bussed to it. Both times, about half the F customers to and from Europe had been with us all the way from Sydney already and I'd guess that ratio is similar in the other classes. Why, then, have those tow planes depart from exact opposite ends of this massive airport and, worse even, have such an important flight (and massive 747!) board out on the fields with those outside roller stairs and busses to and from the terminal is an absolute riddle to me.

Getting back onto the 747 after all that A380 goodness of course felt like a big let down. At least the service was excellent this time around, much better than the crew out of Sydney, and for this relatively short flight (ha- 'only' eight or so hours), we got treated to an extremely extensive meal which pretty much lasted us throughout the entire flight.



Meal service started with breakfast, the third breakfast now within only a couple of hours, and I decided to go for a dish which was like a funny mix of Eggs Benedict and US-style muffin and gravy:



After a break of a few hours, the actual main meal service started and it lasted for what seemed forever. First of came the excellent caviar again and several other courses followed. Service struggled a bit as per usual, especially if a guest didn't want one of the dishes- at one point, I had to politely decline the seafood plate three times in a row :-|

As a pre-ordered main, I had ordered the Beef Rossini again as this steak with the Fois Gras on it had been so excellent on the flight out. To my big disappointment, they had forgotten the Fois Gras and instead served the usual super-dry generic steak that we all know from airlines around the world. Not very nice and quite a disappointing meal:

 

[Berlin]

BKK-SYD and arrival back home

As desert, I selected a fruit platter and we received this weird plate of partially plastic-wrapped "fresh" fruit



No dispair, however, a glass of Dom flushes even the weirdest piece of fruit down nicely!

After what felt like a short flight in comparison to the long legs to and from Europe, we arrived in Sydney in the evening. Despite first class, we were very happy to have finally made it as even the best seat doesn't keep you from feeling jetlagged and tired at the end of it and, yes, all that food and drinks might not really help either but who could resist it all when flying in First? Our hand luggage on the way back had been really really stuffed as Mr. Wombat was joined by a new friend who we couldn't resist buying when going to Disneyland Paris for a day. Don't ask, please don't

 

[dodgeyhack]

Re: BKK-SYD and arrival back home

Noticed a well dressed wombat reading the paper in the foyer of the Stamford in Sydney.
Any relation?

 

[Berlin]

Re: BKK-SYD and arrival back home

Noticed a well dressed wombat reading the paper in the foyer of the Stamford in Sydney.
Any relation?

Mr. Wombat has a fairly big family so it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest. They are all a bit snobby and tend to go for upper class establishments and fine wines- hotels and airline lounges are the places you'll most likely run into them!