In the final hours of 2018 Cathay Pacific published what have become known as the fares of a decade. Mistake fares happen, but are becoming ever more rare. Which each mistake there is a mad dash to book them as quickly as possible before the fare dies. The old adage is book now, figure it out later. The idea is that the fare is only going to be valid for a short time so you need to at least get one or two booked. From there, you can figure out time off, hotels, etc. later. That’s exactly what I did at 8PM CST on New Year’s Eve.
Fast forward to a few months later and the day had finally come for me to fly all the way to Vietnam to begin my first of many Cathay Pacific Premium Cabin mistake fare flights. As with most mistake fares, you don’t get to pick and choose where you’re going. Instead, you go where the fare takes you. In this case, the fares began in Vietnam and ended back in the US. Not the worst places as one of those stops was home, but still not the best (US to Vietnam would have been nice).
My Itinerary
To begin my journey back to the United States I first booked a flight that left Hanoi on Tuesday night for Hong Kong. So, I of course first needed to get to Hanoi.
Just days before Tuesday I ended up booking a Japan Airlines First Class ticket from New York to Tokyo (NRT) in First Class which departed New York on Sunday. I arrived in Tokyo on Monday morning where I connected to a Japan Airlines Business Class flight that departed for Hanoi on Monday evening. Ultimately, I arrived in Hanoi late Monday evening where I booked the O’Gallery Premier Hotel & Spa for the night.
The next morning I woke up early, walked around Hanoi for several hours and then went back to the hotel to grab my bags. Before long I was back at the airport and boarded a flight on Cathay Dragon to Hong Kong.
I arrived in Hong Kong on Tuesday evening around 9PM local time. As I was connecting to flight which departed Wednesday morning I decided to overnight in the airport. This involved sleeping in the frigid terminal, trying to sleep upright in a lounge chair, and ultimately staying awake most of the night.
Finally, on Wednesday morning I boarded a Cathay Pacific First Class flight bound for New York. It was a long extended weekend that ended up being quite the adventure.
The Reviews
As you can tell, I crammed a lot in a short period of time. With that I ended up making several stops along the way and came up with a few things to review. Over the next few days I’ll publish the following reviews:
- Lufthansa Senator Lounge JFK Airport Terminal 1
- Japan Airlines First Class 77W New York To Tokyo
- JAL First Class Lounge Tokyo (NRT)
- JAL Sakura Lounge Tokyo (NRT)
- Japan Airlines Business Class 787-9 Tokyo to Hanoi
- Cathay Dragon Business Class Hanoi To Hong Kong
- Cathay Pacific First Class 77W Hong Kong To New York
Within the above reviews I plan to add a few more items that maybe don’t justify full reviews. For example, I plan on embedding the Cathay First Class lounges into the First Class flight review. I’ve reviewed most Cathay Pacific lounges before so I don’t see a reason to re-write them now. Likewise, I lounge hopped at Tokyo Narita, but most of the lounges were unimpressive and therefore might not require a full review.
One thing that I find interesting is that the JAL First Class Lounge in Narita no longer exists. Since my visit JAL completely renovated the space and therefore my review will be irrelevant. However, I’m going back to Narita in a few weeks and will be able to compare the old and new spaces.
Final Thoughts
Unfortunately I’ve been sitting on these posts for a while now. I actually took this trip way back in February of this year. However, I finally have time to sit down and write the reviews again. So over the next few weeks you should be seeing these reviews and a few others coming.
