Review of Fiji Airways flight from Nadi to Dallas/Fort Worth in Economy

It took a lot of searching to find the best combination of flights based on the flight from Apia or Tongatapu to Nadi, Nadi to a US city (or Vancouver) and from there to Orlando. There wasn't a whole lot of flexibility with time so this was the chosen flight.

This flight report begins not in the airport, but at the hotel where I stayed near Nadi. The hotel had a Fiji Airways "lounge" (it was just an office) which I thought would be interesting to see.

Check-in wasn't available for US flights, but it was still a cool little facility that I had no idea existed before I saw the sign.
It was just a little office that also had a printer and a fridge with a couple of bottles of water.

They were able to change seats, unfortunately otherwise it wasn't possible to select any seats for free.
Later, in the evening, it was time to head to the airport. The last two times I went to North America it was into Los Angeles and out of Washington-Dulles, this trip broke the tradition: into Dallas and out of JFK.

International departures tonight, with Fiji Airways dominant. The LAX flight is also FJ-operated. I'm not sure why the Nauru Airlines flight has economy on the logo.

It was a fairly smalll terminal, most passengers will probably be connecting through from Australia and New Zealand.

There were separate counters for each flight, with the Fiji Airways counters on each side of the terminal divided by Air New Zealand in the middle.

The signage was a bit confusing and unclear. Before joining the check-in line you needed to join the TSA check line, but there was just a lady telling people that, but despite the large sign about it, it didn't say that there was a separate line or where that was.

The TSA check was just the same lady who asked a few of the normal check-in questions (who backed your bags, do you have any of xyz things your bags, etc)
The line moved very slowly and the whole check-in process took around 40 minutes. Rather surprisingly they were able to provide tags for the onward American Airlines flight to Orlando despite that being on a separate ticket. Unfortunately that didn't go too well which I'll cover in the next flight report.

The greenery decorations were nice.

Water couldn't be taken through security but apparently they had a lot of people dumping out water in the plants… 😅

Security was quite innefficient. There wasn't nearly enough space on the belt for everyone to put their bags, and the trays were all stacked up behind with the security agent handing them to people one by one. Several people also pushed ahead and cut the line.
Luckily there wasn't much of a wait for immigration and I got through with a while until boarding, so some time for planespotting, though there weren't many planes to spot and with workers moving around outside, it was hard to get good pictures as well.
An A350 (not ours) going home.

Our A350-900: Island of Vatulele, registered DQ-FAN and 6.5 years old - the same A350 I saw when arriving from Melbourne. It was first owned by Hong Kong Airlines for around 8 months and then Hainan Airlines for close to 4 years, not entering service with either. Fiji Airways acquired it in August 2023 and has flown it ever since.

And a 737 MAX 8 heading to Apia, where I'd just come from the night before.

It's even boarding from the same gate!

Boarding was meant to start at 8:30 PM. At 8:33, they announced that it would be delayed due to operational reasons - presumably the slightly late arrival of the inbound aircraft from Melbourne (it had been sitting on the ground for a while already….).
The gate area isn't very big, and all the seating is together rather than at each gate. This makes it fairly crowded and loud.

The airport wi-fi stopped working so I connected to the FJ Lounge wi-fi, I'd gotten access on the flight to Apia so I could still connect. That disconnected by itself after a while so I reconnected to the airport wi-fi, apparently the half an hour limit didn't apply if reconnecting.

Just after 9 PM, boarding for business class started.
Around the same time, a delay for the Los Angeles flight was also announced because of "late inbound aircraft arrival" (our flight was "operational reasons"). Fiji Airways really needs to work on scheduling, they seem to be extremely delay prone and since they operate a lot of flights a delay on one flight carries over to the next.
Boarding was meant to be done by zone, but they only called up to E (I think the zones went to H or something) and then just called everyone.
As on the flight to Apia, after going through the gate there was an open air balcony before the jetbridge with good views of the plane.

The line in the jetridge moved fairly quickly.

The cabin and seat design on the A350 was different from on the 737 MAX 8s, but it still looks pretty nice.

My seat, 41A.

The headrest had a similar design as the 737 MAX ones, though.

There was a pillow and blanket at every seat. The blanket was wrapped but I unwrapped it before taking this picture. Both were comfortable.

Standard A350 seat design. The screen here says oneworld connect, although Fiji Airways has become a full OneWorld member already. There was a working USB-A port and headphone jack on the screen.

The tray table was foldable with a space for cups when it was partially and fully unfolded.

Along with the main seatback pocket, there were two smaller pockets in front, one of which contained headphones.

The other small pocket was a perfect fit for my Air Mauritius amenity kit (which they handed out on a 6 hour daytime flight), since Fiji Airways didn't give one.

The main pocket had a sickness bag, shopping magazine, and safety card.

And the normal air vents and lights.

The headrest was fully adjustable.

After everyone had boarded, our flight was delayed further with the announcement that we were awaiting 8 passengers who had just landed from Sydney.

Let's have a look at the IFE in the meantime.

The wi-fi info section was just the wi-fi ad video that they played later on.

There was a great selection of movies (a lot more than what's photographed), it was a bit different to the catalogue on the 737-8s with even more options. Plenty even for a long-haul flight.

Not so strong on the TV front, but still more than the 737s and plenty of content, though many shows had only random seasons and episodes.

Didn't look like much to listen to or read, though I didn't look at either section in detail.

The games section was completely different from on the 737-8s, but with a much worse selection. They did, however, work before take-off.

And finally, the "onboard" section which was completely empty.

Great selection overall and I had to add things to a playlist to narrow them down before choosing what to watch. There were 2 minutes of ads before each movie but it was a separate video that played automatically and could be skipped.

The plane was only around 60% full… and I got an empty row!

There were two cameras, camera 1 and camera 2. Camera 1 didn't work at all throughout the flight. I used one of the seats next to me for the map and the other for the camera (2).

The person behind me was playing a game (I assume) and kept jabbing the screen very forcefully. After around 20 minutes I finally asked him if it would be possible to be a little gentler with the screen, he said "yeah yeah" and stopped.
At one point I started wondering if the Apia flight would leave before ours. I think it was scheduled to depart around an hour later, but we weren't going anywhere.

But finally we pushed back - before them - and passed another A350 on the way out.

There wasn't much of a view since it was so dark.

Lighting was changed before the first service began.

The wi-fi and duty free ads were played as the crew handed out menus.

I had a special meal so the menu didn't really matter for me, but it was still nice to get it and made the experience feel just a little more premium.
The menu was also read out, and it was announced that the bar would be open until 40 minutes before landing (it was the same on the other flights). Everyone was asked to close their window shades as we would be flying into daylight.
"Supper" service began with Fiji water.

The FA handing out the water seemed a bit distracted, I said thank you but she ignored it.
Special meals were served first, and there was a bit of turbulence just as I got my meal. The tray came with a glass of orange juice. The other meals were served around 15 minutes later, and by then I was already done.

Almost exactly the same meal as the Melbourne-Nadi flight!

The main course was a little different.

The salad was the same, and it was canned peaches instead of a few types of fruit.

The meal was decent, the main was a bit bland but the salad was great, the bread was good too, the peaches weren't great. Overall the meal was average, maybe slightly above average.

The FA doing the next service was much more friendly than the first one. He offered me water (he was just doing the water service) and told me about the other cart coming if I'd like some juice (or other drinks).
I took the water.

I also got apple juice from the other cart. It was the same lady from earlier and she once again ignored my thank you.

A while later we crossed the international date line, traveling a day into the past.

Trays weren't being cleared so I used the bathroom and got some pictures of the cabin on the way back.

It wasn't until around 1 hour and 20 minutes after the beverage service, and maybe an hour 45 minutes after the meal service, that the trays were cleared. I'm not sure why it was such a long time, there was a little bit of mild turbulence in between but not much and not nearly the whole time. It was pretty annoying to have them sitting there for so long, even with the extra seats.
The lights got turned off so everyone could sleep.

And I discovered this under the seat.

There was a water service around that time.

Welcome to the middle of nowhere.

Before going to sleep I went to the back and asked if they had any amenities or snacks. The FA there was very friendly and helpful, he apologized and said the only amenity available was a dental kit and gave me that. The snacks were cookies, cheese puffs and some crunchy things, of which only the last were clearly vegetarian, so he offered more of them to me. All of this was only available on request and packed away so I couldn't take pictures of it. It might be a good idea for them to put the tootbrushes in the bathrooms and have a snack service in the middle of the flight or something, I don't imagine too many people bother asking.

There was one last beverage service before I went to sleep. I asked for water, which she gave me, but spilled some of it on me and didn't seem to notice. I said thank you anyway which - surprise! was ignored once again.

I ended up sleeping for longer than I expected. Just a few minutes after I woke up, the lights got turned on.

Almost at the American coast.

Breakfast service began soon afterwards with a towel. This time my thank you actually got a brief smile and nod.

The towel was very refreshing and pleasant, it really woke me up and was a great addition to the flight experience. 
Breakfast was served exactly 3 hours and 3 minutes before arrival. Since this was a fairly long flight it was better than having it closer to arrival.

Assuming bk means breakfast, I realized that mm on the other meal must have meant main meal. It was very similar to the last meal and also came with orange juice.

The spinach was different from the curry.

There was one regular container of fruit and one of just watermelon.

I got some water from the cart with another ignored thank you.

The meal was decent, nothing amazing but not bad at all.

For some reason the map stopped working properly. It keept freezing and when I tried to zoom and/or move it - which had worked before - it just closed. I was trying to zoom in closer to watch as we entered the United States.

There was another water run, but I missed it since I was waiting in the line for the bathroom. The duty free cart came by at the same time.
After I went back to my seat I connected to the free messaging. The prices weren't awful for full wi-fi either.

I started wanting a drink before landing since there wasn't any more service. I tried the call button more than once but after 15 minutes when no one came I went to the back. Unfortunately I was just a couple of minutes too late, the bar was closed and they didn't have soft drinks available either, so I just got water.

While the map stopped working on the middle seat screen, it did on the aisle screen so I used that instead and the middle for the camera. Camera 1 still didn't work.

Nice views of the wing and engine. It's a simple color scheme but great designs.

The lighting was turned off before landing.

Some nice views of Fort Worth suburbs as well.

I really like the wing.

And there's DFW!

The stars and stripes flying in the distance, big enough to see from the plane. Welcome to the United States.

Delta taking off alongside us.

American dominant here, of course.

Delta is off!

Finnair A350 heading to Helsinki.

More AA widebodies than I expected.

We have arrived.

Yeah, AA is really dominant here.

Another A350 like ours, this one Qatar Airways. I flew a Qatar Airways A350 just a few weeks earlier.

avianca, which I'd flown in 2022 when it was still capital-A Avianca and I would like to avoid doing so again. This one is avianca El Salvador.

People started getting up before we were at the gate and whille the seatbelt sign was still on. After a couple of minutes they were told to sit down.

Pink lights were turned on but sadly there was no Vinaka screen as on the other flights.

Couple of pictures of the seats on the way out.

And some of our plane and the Qatar one from the jetbridge and escalator going up.

Immigration was incredibly fast with Mobile Passport Control, there was no line and it was only a matter of seconds to get through. The way it works is after putting in your information beforehand, you take a selfie shortly before going through immigration, and there's a machine which takes a picture of your face - and you're through. I believe it's only avaialble for US nationals so my US passport was very useful.
Bags also didn't take long to arrive, thankfully, since the flight had arrived late and I had an onward domestic flight.

The baggage claims all had model aircraft which I loved!
On our belt:

I used the bathroom (which was surpisingly clean and technologically advanced for a US airport bathroom) and took pictures of the planes from some other belts on the way back, including a rather strange BA livery.

In the baggage claim area there was a Fiji Airways staff member making announcements, something along the lines of "Passengers on Fiji Airways flight FJ890 from Nadi can collect their bags from belt number 4. Thank you for flying Fiji Airways," and concluding with "Vinaka"… the last bit of Fiji on this trip!
This report ends here and I'll cover the rest in the American Airlines DFW-Orlando flight which was, of course, a pretty major step down from Fiji Airways. Thanks for reading!