Review of China Eastern flight from Phnom Penh to Shanghai in Economy

Flying out of cambodia

Three pictures of this beautiful country!

Back in 2016 a very good friend of mine had the idea to go to Cambodia amongst us 6 friends… He used to work there and knows well the country. What we didn't know at the time and found out later is that he also proposed his girlfriend on a beautiful beach!

Flying blue Miles earned with this flight: 504
Status earned: 5 XP

I know it seems a bit of a detour for this routing but look at the price !

The flight is operated on an A321, that has a configuration of 178 seats, which is quite ok for this kind of cabin… If you compare with A321 of Air France / Lufthansa / British Airways where they fit a good 30 more people for the same fuselage..

You can tell Business class is fitted with proper business seats, not just with the same layout but with the middle seat free. 

at phnom penh airport

The airport is fairly small and really well organised, signs are clear and really you can't get lost!

We arrived at our gate and I realised there was no jetway, another transfer bus was positioned instead.

And for the stamp collection!

onboard the a321

Our bus arrived and parked on the side of the plane and we boarded with stairs - good old fashion way.

Aircraft: Airbus A321-231
Registration: Couldn't remember sorry!
Engines: 2x IAE V25200
Age: 10 Years
Layout: 178 seats
Observation: With the old livery

The AvGeek bit

China Eastern airline has an impressive fleet of 566 aircrafts, amongst which 329 are out of the A320 family: 35 A319, 180 A320, 37 A320Neo and 77 A321s; that is really the backbone of the domestic aircafts. It has to be noted that it was the first chinese airline to order Airbus aircafts. China Eastern airlines was born at the same time as China Southern and Air China, all three for the former heavily regulated national airline. The airline is the second busiest airline in China, after China Southern however is the most present Chinese carrier internationally, strengthening bonds with Delta, Virgin and AirFrance KLM. 

The Cabin seemed quite modern and the seats were nice. I think it is a nice thing that CEA decided to position toilets in the section of the cabin just near the emergency exits.

There wasn't any IFE but rather a screen for approximately every 5 or 6 raws. The cabin crew played the safety video demonstration on these screens.

We took off very shortly after, unlike Pudong where taxiing alone takes about 20 min and waiting your turn to take off amother 15, here at Phnom Penh things go quite fast!

And still very shortly after the cabin crew started providing us food, despite this red eye - night only - flight. This was a good plus, which absolutely contrast with the military and absolutely frozen welcome from the crew.

The box itself contained a variety of snacks as you can see. 

It really felt like the crew of tonight was hired for his grumpy face skill sets.

And you have guessed this is the usual magazine review!!

With the impressive network of MU…

Even thought there is no IFE, there is a movie section in the magasine…

We approached almost 3 and a half hours later to Pudong and landed smoothly. I am sorry not to give any more juicy details but given the time of flights I was barely awake and didn't take that many pictures.

at shanghai pudong airport

For once we arrived at parking stand equipped with jetway.

And we were back again to this transit area…