Like the classic Clipper Pan Am routes of old, at the beginning of April we will be winging our way from San Francisco to our friends' current assignment Shanghai, China.
Today we booked passage on one of these:
Don't recognize it? It is the livery of Asiana Airlines. One of Korea's two major airlines, Asiana is generally considered to be one of the finest airlines for customer service in the world.
Our original travel preference was for a 13-hour nonstop United flight between San Francisco and Shanghai. However, because of uncertainties about medical bills a couple of months ago, we were unable to commit to the trip when that flight’s prices were at its lowest. With that flight now 40% more expensive, we were forced to look at lower-cost alternatives that still did not unduly extend the total travel time. For a while, we were considering an Air China flight that was only three hours longer because of a stopover in Beijing. However, the online reviews from various sources are uniformly terrible for that airline. If you are going to be trapped in a metal tube for 13 straight hours, basic comfort and cleanliness take on greater importance than they might otherwise for short haul trips.
By the time we started to have real misgivings about the Air China option, only three tickets were left, which took it out of contention. The next lowest cost flight was a combined United/Asiana flight that was significantly longer and had two stops. However, the more we looked at it, the more we realized that it might work very well for us. The first leg is simply a United flight from San Francisco to Los Angeles late in the evening. We were planning to take the kids out of school for Thursday and Friday of the week we left anyway; we realized that we could also travel late Wednesday night if the flight scheduling required it. The second leg of the flight, on Asiana, goes from Los Angeles to Seoul, Korea. After a moderate layover, it is only a one-hour hop to Shanghai, arriving Friday morning.
By taking this flight, we would be able to arrive about eight hours earlier in Shanghai than we originally expected, without taking any additional time off from work or school. More importantly, not only is the flight cheaper than the nonstop we originally targeted, but we may well have a more pleasant travel experience. Everything we have read about Asiana and Seoul’s Incheon Airport suggests that the travel itself might actually be a pleasurable part of the trip, not simply something to be endured. The airport, in particular, sounds like a marvel for the weary traveler. Having the opportunity to refresh ourselves before the short hop from Seoul to Shanghai to see our friends could prove to be very beneficial.
The delights of the Orient await. This trip will undoubtedly be a lifetime highlight for each of us.
That doesn't mean we aren't already looking forward to our next visit to our diplomatic buddies. Their next posting: the Barbados.
China is exotic and all, but there are some real attractive advantages to becoming a specialist in Caribbean issues.
1 comment:
Asiana was still relatively new when I flew with them, but they were an excellent airline, even then. I'm not at all unhappy that you didn't book your flights with Air China -- Asia has some the best airlines in the world, in my opinion, but Air China is not among them! At least they weren't back in "my day" (I logged a lot of miles on Pan Am before United took over their routes -- and their stewardesses).
Seoul's airport obviously has had a major facelift since "my day" since it was nothing like it is now.
This should be a grand trip that you all will remember for the rest of your lives.
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