Last year, in a gala ceremony held at Farnborough Airshow, Skytrax presented the 2016 World Airline Awards and Emirates sat at the top.
The Airbus A380 is a double-deck, wide-body, four-engine jet airliner manufactured by the European manufacturer Airbus. I’ve heard and read great reviews about the airline company but I didn’t have the chance to ride with them when I flew to and from Dubai a couple of times.
So when me and my brother were planning our trip to Australia, he suggested we should go with Emirates since he’s a Skywards Member and have enough miles to upgrade us both to Business Class. I didn’t think twice since I know it would be a great experience and would definitely be something interesting to blog about.
This is the first time I traveled with my brother so I was pretty excited about it. There are no direct flights from Kuala Lumpur to Melbourne with Emirates so we booked the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore-Melbourne flight.
Inside the Lounge
I must say I enjoyed the perks of traveling with him because I get access to the lounge. *grin* There’s free food and drinks, free wifi, you can freshen up, take a shower and just relax before your flight. The Emirates Lounge was closed in Singapore so we stayed in the Qantas lounge.
The lounge was pretty big and had a couple of food stations. Most of the dishes were vegetables and I enjoyed their salad station.
Here I am trying to squeeze in some work before going on a 7-hour flight to Melbourne.
We were one of the first passengers to board the flight as we didn’t have to go through the regular queue.
Blurry photo. Literally how I was seeing it. *yawn*
Inside the Plane
The flight attendants were very friendly and they were each assigned to different passengers. Mine was Beautiful Lucy. Hello Lucy! She was also assigned to the man opposite my chair and she asked if it was his first time to fly with Emirates. She asked me the same thing and when I said yes, she quickly showed me EVERYTHING I need to know to get the most out of my flight. She was very cheerful and even told me to take pictures especially in the onboard bar.
And here it is.
Each seat also has a mini bar with popular drinks but since I’m not into sodas, I only had the water and juice.
Remote and socket. Really useful in long haul flights!
Each seat has a tablet (not sure if it was an iPad) but I didn’t really use this one except for checking the time and distance (which I can also do from the screen in front of me).
They handed us Bvlgari kits which contained Bvlgari products: Body Lotion, Face Emulsion and Perfume (Women). It also had a pocket mirror, hair brush, dental kit, towelette and I’m sure I forgot something. LOL. We also had free socks and sleeping eye mask.
Here are our kits. Mine is the silver one.
These headphones were pretty cool and comfortable to use. I used it most of the time during the flight.
And here I am trying to look a little awake as this was already midnight 🙂
Almost wrapped up in my seat. They gave us a pillow, a really comfortable blanket and a thin mattress.
Seat controls. You can move closer or farther from the screen and if you want to go to sleep, you can go for the third option and lie down like you would in your bed. Cool 🙂
Under the screen was another space where you can use as an extra legroom or, in my case, for my bags.
Still awake and didn’t use the free sleeping eye mask.
Food
I’m not fussy about airplane food but Emirates clearly knows what delicious means. You also have an option to be woken up for breakfast or not.
Here’s some food from the mini bar.
They served mixed nuts that were by far the best ones I’ve ever had. It was warm and crunchy especially the Macadamia. Best paired with hot tea.
Our favourite: Cheese plate. 🙂
Delicious sandwich and champagne.
Starters before the main meal. Bread was delish! (My brother’s)
There were a lot of food choices in the menu and a decent list of wine. They gave us the wrong menu the first time so I had to change my orders.
Starters for my main meal. Bread, salad and soup.
And my main course is, ofcourse, a Lamb dish. I’m the only one in my family who enjoys lamb. It was tender and the flavour was just right.
Chocolate cake for dessert. They handed out chocolate blocks as well. *yum*
And last meal before we arrive, breakfast time!
Entertainment
As you can see on my screen, I had 3845 minutes before we land so I was able to watch a couple of movies, series, listen to music and play some games.
I started watching Bad Moms but I didn’t finish it.
Can you guess what show this is? 🙂
I ended up watching The Girl on The Train and it was so intense I barely slept on this flight LOL.
There were many games available and I tried a few but I played Bookworm for a while.
’cause this is my kind of game. 🙂
Also played Tetris in-flight (I must admit I had so much fun playing this one).
I enjoyed this game because it was challenging especially since the controls were different from what I’m used to.
Squeezed in some American Dad episodes because sleep was so elusive during this flight.
Limo Service
We both had free Limo service with our booked flights but since we’re going to the same place, I didn’t use mine. Our chauffeur was waiting right outside the airport. Very convenient.
It was quite a long walk from the airport to the parking lot and the weather was chilly.
The limo service was a huge bonus. Commuting is not one of my best skills so I’m really grateful for this service. We were picked up with a Hyundai Genesis and the trip to the place we’re staying in Melbourne was just as comfortable as it was in the plane. *smile*
Overall Experience
Flying in Business Class with Emirates to Melbourne was a great experience.
What impressed me the most was the level of comfort, quality of the food, friendly crew and the awesome entertainment. Sure there are areas where they can improve but overall, I had an excellent flight and looking forward to more flights with them!
I’m excited to try other A380 flights with different airlines so I can compare.