We live in Iceland and we went to Australia for the end of the year holidays to see relatives who live there – we hadn’t been there for five years. And as Australia is quite far from Iceland – the distance between Keflavík and Melbourne would be 16,960 kms if there was a direct flight – I went to a few places in Asia before and after Australia.
I booked the following flights:
Keflavík to London, Icelandair, business class, B737
London to Abu Dhabi, Etihad, business class, A380
Abu Dhabi to Jakarta, Etihad by Wamos, business class, A330
Yogyakarta to Kuala Lumpur, Air Asia, economy, A320
Kuala Lumpur to Manila, Philippine Airlines, business class, A321
Manilla to Sydney, Philippine Airlines, business class, A330
Canberra to Melbourne, Qantas, economy, B717
Melbourne to Hobart, Virgin Australia, economy, B737
Hobart to Melbourne, Jetstar, economy, A320
Melbourne to Manilla, Philippine Airlines, business class, A330
Manilla to Kuala Lumpur, Philippine Airlines, business class, A320
Kuala Lumpur to Bangkok, Malaysia Airlines, business class, B737,
Bangkok to Hongkong, Emirates, first class, A380
Hongkong to Manila, Air Asia Philippines, economy, A320
Manila to Panglao, Cebu Pacific, economy, A321
Cebu to Singapore, Singapore Airlines, business class, A350
Singapore to London, Singapore Airlines, business class, A380
London to Keflavík, British Airways, business class, A320
We stayed at the Sama Sama Hotel at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Its name does not say much to most people but it’s a truly luxury hotel at a very moderate rate within walking distance from the airport.
I had checked in on-line but I could have also checked in here:
Fast track security was available although it was quite slow.
Fast track passport control was available in theory although there was no agent there so I had to go to the line normally reserved for diplomats. It took quite some time to get through.
The airport was not crowded.
I went to the Malaysia Airlines’ Regional Golden Lounge.
The front desk staff was very friendly.
The lounge has apron views.
There is enough seating.
Soft drinks and juice.
A hot breakfast buffet was available.
I had a freshly made noodle soup.
The bar was not open yet at around 8am.
Morning departures.
There’s a nap area with sofas divided by semi-open walls. I couldn’t take a photo inside as there were people resting there but it’s a very good feature of the lounge.
Large model planes at the terminal.
Our plane, a B737-800, registration number 9M-MLV, delivered in 2014.
Theres was an additional security control at the gate.
Priority boarding was available although other passengers also boarded with the first group.
The cabin looks beautiful. The modern seats are in a 2+2 configuration in three rows with a total of 12 seats in business class.
Load was only 4/12 with nobody in row 1, only me in row 2 and three other passengers in row 3.
Legroom is excellent.
You can set your seat recline here.
A pillow and a blanket were waiting on the seat.
A cabin crew member introduced himself and the other crew member working in the business class cabin - very professional. They always called me by my name at every interaction.
A hot towel and a welcome drink were offered.
Push-back was at 08.58 for a scheduled departure time of 09.00.
An expected flight time of two hours was announced.
The view during taxi:
Take-off was at 09.08 from runway 32R.
Some views after take-off:
A view of Subang Airport (SZB) from the air. It’s an interesting place. It was Kuala Lumpur’s main airport from 1965 until 1998 when KLIA opened. Nowadays it’s mostly used by Firefly’s ATR72s on passenger flights within Malaysia and to Singapore-Seletar (Singapore’s smaller airport) and by Raya Airways’ cargo flights. Subang Airport is only about 20 kms from KL Sentral while KLIA is 57 kms away.
A printed menu was distributed before take-off.
Breakfast includes cold items (yoghurt, pastry, fruit salad) and a choice of three hot meals.
I had Nasi Goreng with Chicken Satay. It was delicious.
Yoghurt and Seasonal Fresh Fruits.
There was a choice of several pastries. The one I choose was quite good.
There is no built-in screen but in-flight entertainment is available as downloadable movies on your own device. You need to have your own headphones. There are dozens of mostly Hollywood and Bollywood movies.
There’s also a good flight map that seems to show the aircraft's previous flights as well.
Views as we’re getting closer to Bangkok.
The cabin crew thanked all business class passengers for flying with Malaysia Airlines.
We landed in Bangkok at 09.53.
Some interesting planes seen during taxi:
Japan Airlines
Air Macau has a fleet of 22 A320s and A321s.
Myanmar National Airlines is the state-owned flag carrier of Myanmar with a fleet of eight ATR72s and two B737s.
We were at gate at 09.57 for a scheduled arrival time of 10.15.
Nice to see a report on the new MH 737 cabins. They really managed to keep the cabin feeling spacious despite the densification of adding 14 seats. The only thing that is regrettable is that they took out the seatback IFE screens; however, they did a good job putting in streaming IFE and well-placed eye-level tablet holders. The catering is impressive and having a printed menu along with 3 choices of mains on a short 2h flight is definitely above average.
Great report as always. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you for your comment. Malaysia Airlines offered a 5 star service on this flight.