Burn, United (Miles), Burn: ANA Business Class Tokyo Narita to Beijing

Introduction
Planning
United Global First Lounge Washington Dulles (IAD)
Lufthansa Business and Senator Lounge Washington Dulles (IAD)
ANA First Square Class Washington Dulles to Tokyo Narita
ANA Suite and Business Class Lounges Tokyo Narita (NRT)
ANA Business Class Tokyo Narita to Beijing
IBIS Beijing Capital Airport Hotel
Air China First Class Lounge Beijing (PEK)
BGS Premier Business Class Lounge Beijing (PEK)
Business Traveler’s Lounge Beijing (PEK)
Lufthansa A380 First Class Beijing to Frankfurt
Lufthansa First Class Terminal Frankfurt (FRA)
Lufthansa B747-400 First Class Frankfurt to New York JFK
United PS Business Class New York JFK to San Francisco

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NH 955
Tokyo Narita (NRT) to Beijing (PEK)
Sunday, November 3rd
Depart: 5:25pm
Arrive: 8:35pm
Duration: 4h 10m
Aircraft: Boeing 767-300
Seat: 4A

I arrived at the gate about 15 minutes after the lounge attendant in the ANA Suite Lounge told me to go to the gate, which was still about 25 minutes prior to departure. But this was a gate for a remote stand, and the final full bus had just started leaving when I arrived, so I ended up having to wait around for the other stragglers for the final final bus to leave. Specifically, there were 2 Americans trying to get on this flight, but ANA was considering denying them boarding since they were headed to North Korea from Beijing but didn’t have tickets to Pyongyang in hand as they were supposed to pick them up the next morning in Beijing. Oy. Luckily for them, they did get on the flight, and the final bus to the plane left about 10 minutes prior to departure.

Upon getting on the plane, I noticed that the business class cabin was relatively empty, with maybe only 1/3 of the seats taken. The plane had a regional config in business class with recliner shell seats, but it was perfectly comfortable for a 4 hour flight, especially since I had an empty seat next to me.

Even though I boarded quite close to departure time, we still ended up waiting a while before the plane started moving. And even then, we ended up taxiing for about 30 minutes before takeoff, which meant that our flight’s arrival into Beijing was delayed a bit.

Once in the air, the flight attendants were taking meal orders, but I asked if they could hold a meal for me so I could sleep first, which they were more than happy to oblige. Given that I had eaten about 4 Japanese meals on my flight from IAD to NRT and another Japanese meal in the lounge, I opted for the western option this time of pumpkin and sweet potato mont blanc-style, foie gras terrine, smoked Pacific saury, sauteed salmon with mushroom and port sauce, and a Pierre Herme chocolate dessert (links to the food menu and drink menu for the flight).

I slept comfortably for about 1.5 hours, and upon waking, had a flight attendant deliver my meal. Although it was a western-style meal, it still tasted Japanese to me, if that makes sense. It was pretty good, and certainly better than any meal that I’ve had on an American carrier, but the salmon was a little dry, which could have been due to the fact that I had my meal served an hour after everyone else.

The entertainment options were similar to my previous flight in that they felt slightly limited in content, but I enjoyed watching some Japanese variety shows which didn’t really require any language skills to comprehend.

The service on this flight was superb, and surprisingly, I think the English skills of the flight attendants on this intra-Asia flight were on a whole better than the English skills of the crew on my flight from the US (it was also surprising to me that most of the business class passengers on this flight were American). The crew seemed happy to serve, and their smiles felt genuine. Overall, a great flight.