Flight: BR315 TPE-BNE
ETD: 9:10
ATD: 10:15
ETA: 20:00
ATA: 20:15
Cabin: Royal Laurel Business
Seat: 5A
AC: 787-10 (B-17802)
A 9am departure meant a target arrival time at TPE of a bit after 7. It would have been touch and go with trains and connections at that early hour so I just booked a car online to pick me up at the Okura at 6:15. When I went downstairs a black Camry was waiting for me for the smooth 40-ish minute drive out to Taoyuan Airport which ended up only costing about AUD35.
The departures zone was pretty hectic with long lines at just about every airline’s check in desks, including BR’s priority queue. However as soon as I joined it, an EVA staffer asked if I was in business class. When I said yes, she lifted the rope at the adjacent check in bank and ushered me to the front of a separate, empty queue. While BR’s yellow Priority Check in signage doesn’t distinguish between business class and status holders, there’s obviously a bit of a pecking order and staff on hand to manage the crowds.
I always have a slight moment of anxiety checking in for any award booking, particularly with LifeMiles for some reason. (Though LM has never actually let me down to date with 10 or so various F and J star alliance bookings) This morning I was checked in very quickly, seat allocation confirmed, lounge pass proffered and instruction given to stand by a monitor at the end of the check in row and watch until my bag is x-rayed and admitted down the conveyor belt - which it duly was.
Fairly long lines at security moved lightning fast. Taiwan must be second only to Japan in terms of airport security efficiency! I then headed to a staffed immigration desk seeing as signage was ambiguous as to whether or not Australian passports were eligible for the e-gates. There was no one else in line ahead of me so I scored a passport stamp (increasingly rare these days!) and was airside only 5-10 minutes after checking in.
EVA operates 4 lounges at TPE. The most exclusive one, called The Club, is reserved for their WP-equivalent frequent flyers. Next is the Infinity Lounge for guests in business class on EVA. Sharing an entry with this J lounge is a Star Alliance Gold lounge called The Star. Opposite this is a smaller lounge that is a bit of an orphan called The Garden. In hindsight perhaps I should have headed straight to the orphan lounge because according to a helpful write up on ET that I only referred to shortly before boarding, The Garden is the least busy of the lot despite being technically at the bottom of the pecking order.
At the main Infinity / Star lounge entry I was actually pointed to the Star Alliance side as the staff said there was more space there. Even so it was pretty crowded, however I was able to get a stool at a bench overlooking the check in hall I’d been in only moments before. The overall decor and ambiance were decidedly cafeteria, which is perhaps fitting seeing as the large buffet had an impressive range of local and western breakfast options with people filling provided plastic trays with various dishes. After 45 minutes of so in this fairly noisy, bright space I decided to try my luck and ducked across to the adjacent Infinity Lounge. Where the Star was bright and cafeteria-like, Infinity was dark with neon highlights. I’ve been in the BR lounge in BKK which has similar night club themed decor. There I didn’t mind it so much, perhaps because the BKK lounge has decent natural light, but here it felt a bit oppressive at 8am. It was very full, but I found a spare table in the back corner. The buffet spread here was also impressive and identical to the Star next door. Apart from the dark decor, the ambiance in here was the same, so in spite of an announced gate change and delay to boarding I decided to just head out and roam the terminal for a bit until boarding was eventually called about 50 minutes late.
At the gate, priority boarding was strictly enforced and there was just a smallish gaggle of white Australian DYKWIAs swarming the podium while the majority of Taiwanese pax were sitting patiently waiting for general boarding to be called.
Today’s ride being towed to the gate at around the time boarding was originally meant to commence.
I was greeted warmly at door 1L and made my way to seat 5A. The J cabin on the 787-10 was pretty much identical to the -9 variant of a few days prior, just with an extra two rows of seats. At least half the seats in the J cabin would remain empty on this flight. Judging by the number of people waiting at the gate, I’d estimate that Y was fairly full, but not chockers.
Pre-departure drink orders were taken and promptly delivered. Seeing as it was the last flight of the trip, I of course had to have champagne at 9:45am! A little odd that it was served with chocolate though…
Like the shorter cough-TPE sector, there were no individual menus, instead the FA serving my aisle came through with a single menu and knelt at each seat and took orders for the main meal to be served after take off and “breakfast” as she called it to be served at about 6:00pm Brisbane time. When asked what I wanted to drink I enquired about whether there was a wine list. She shuffled the menus in her hand and eventually found a page with wines on it. Now I like to peruse a wine list and consider my options for a first, second and maybe third glass throughout a meal. I didn’t get past the champagnes before I sensed she wanted to move on to the next passenger, so I asked for the Laurent-perrier Grand Siècle that was listed alongside the less prestigious Duval-Leroy NV. (Grand Siècle had been served in F on BA earlier in the trip). That was simply repeated back to me as “a glass of champagne”. I didn’t spot a bottle of the good stuff at any point during the flight, so I don’t know if any was actually on board, though I did spot top ups being offered from the D-L.
That glass of bubbles was served promptly after the crew were released from their seats during the climb, along with an amuse bouche of a fig stuffed with soppressa and a salmon mousse cake with a sprinkling of caviar. Impressive for business class!
Despite the fact the crew were up and about and we’d leveled off smoothly at cruise, the seatbelt sign stayed on for another hour or so…and was duly ignored by passengers. It went off for a bit but was re-illuminated when we hit a bit of equatorial chop and again stayed on for much of the rest of the smooth flight. I’ve heard that this was common on Mainland carriers, but obviously BR’s SOPs also err on the side of leaving it on for most of the flight.
For lunch I ordered the braised pork belly which was tender enough to slice with chopsticks and absolutely delicious, though I wasn’t entirely won over by their quasi-European plating and presentation. Better to keep it authentic in my opinion! I asked for a glass of red with my main and was told the options were “French or Australian”. I went for the French. A glass was brought and I was presented with a bottle of Crozes Hermitage but didn’t have time to register the chateau it was from. I wish I had because it was a beautifully lively, floral expression of Rhone winemaking.
Seeing as the crew had dimmed the windows almost immediately after takeoff, there wasn’t much to see outside and the dark cabin and lack of interesting IFE (and a few drinks) induced a bit of weariness so I napped a bit just to pass time. PJs had been handed out along with arrival cards by the chief cabin attendant before lunch was served, though her greeting was in quite broken English and not very personal compared to the more junior FA doing most of the work in the A aisle. I wasn’t intending to have a full sleep, so I didn’t change into the PJs. When I got home and chucked all 5 pairs I’d collected on this trip into the wash, I realised the EVA Medium size is probably too small for me anyway.
Around two hours before arrival the cabin was roused and “breakfast” was served. I can’t remember what the western option was, but I went with congee which was a big meal, not a token offering like QF hand out as the second meal on their day flights in the opposite direction to Aisa. I accompanied it with oolong tea to drink seeing as I had to drive from Brisbane to OOL* upon landing.
Serving the second meal a full two hours before landing meant that when trays were cleared we still had a full 90 minutes to go. That time always feels like limbo and dragged a bit. I do wonder what the rationale is in boardrooms when these service flows are designed! Though that’s not as odd as some of the rude middle of the night interruptions I’ve had on long routes across the Pacific (cough … KE … cough) where lights are turned on full blare for an hour mid-flight before enforced darkness again.
Like the flight from Fukuoka to Taipei, I was fairly happy overall with EVA’s offering though it’s just not quite up there with the likes of CX, SQ or NH. The cabin is slightly bland and it’s annoying not having a menu and wine list to look at. I also found it hard to get comfortable in the seat in a lounging position for watching IFE. It was ok more or less fully upright and comfortable enough for sleeping, but none of the in between positions really suited me. Again, not something I recall being an issue on QF’s version of the same seat for some reason.
This was my first time arriving at Brisbane international. Obviously my impression is biassed by the fact we were the only flight being processed at the time we arrived, but what a civilised terminal compared to SYD or (especially) MEL!! I was landside in 20 minutes after the door opened, which included time for 2 short questions from customs because I ticked Yes to the question about having been in agricultural areas. (Cow cough on boots is impossible to miss when hiking in Switzerland!). The agent wasn’t interested in cleaning my hiking boots for me and I was sent to the exit. I then just had to take the terminal transfer bus over to domestic where I picked up my car from the Park and Fly counter (again a shout out to this service at BNE which costs not much more than 3rd party off airport long stay parking). From there I drove to Rydges at OOL and flopped into bed as soon as I arrived…so close (75 minutes) yet so far from home!
*The drive to OOL instead of all the way home to the hinterland hills of the Northern Rivers was because a few days earlier I booked an impromptu trip to Melbourne to go and inspect a few properties ahead of my impending move to The Dandenong Ranges.
So here’s a bonus mini TR appendix. When I was looking at last minute flights from either BNE or OOL to Melbourne and back, QF and VA were both stupidly expensive. JQ was also charging silly prices, though I ended up on JQ for the return MEL-OOL leg in the end because of schedule mostly and I just couldn't justify the price differential with the one VA option at a similar time. But that JQ flight has been expunged from memory! My luxury #RTW39 trip most definitely did not end on a delayed, 100% full A320 flying to the Gold Coast on a Saturday night!
For the flight down from OOL to MEL I saw that Rex business class was only $280 which was a good $100 less than Y on VA and $200 less than Y on QF. (Both VA and QF wanted north of $1000 for J). It was my first time on a Rex jet service and I have to say at $280 it was wonderful! The crew all looked very very young but the service in J was on point. A sausage roll on cardboard plates isn’t going to win any catering awards but actually when you look at everything on the tray (main, bread, apple tea cake, chocolate) plus the quality of the Fiano in my (plastic) glass, I reckon this is certainly competitive with QF or VA’s offerings. Based on this little glimpse of Rex’s mainline service, I wish them well as they expand, but until they have a proper lounge network and FF scheme, I doubt that I would go out of my way to fly them apart from when J is at bargain basement prices. They’re a funny airline…they used to charge almost the same amount at times to shuttle between Lismore and Sydney via Grafton on 30 year old Saabs but had public meltdowns in the media when they pulled the route because everyone drives half an hour to BNK instead for sub-$100 fares on JQ and VA instead of paying those prices on Rex.
