Feb 23-25: London-Singapore-Tokyo

As mentioned before, I wasn’t feeling well, so I spent most of the day resting, and made my way to the airport in the evening.

There was a choice of 2 lounges in Heathrow Terminal 3: the London Lounge, and the Silver Kris Lounge.

The London Lounge is a joint venture between SAS & Air Canada, and it shows, with the lounge very large, and the décor & furniture looking like it was straight from Ikea. For after dinner, there were cheese & crackers, vegetables/corn chips + dip, and biscuits etc.

The Silver Kris Lounge was smaller, but had hot food (curry + rice, dim sum), as well as noodles (on request).

The flight departed on time, supper (a choice of beef, chicken green curry or an Indian style lamb curry) was served promptly, then everyone went to sleep – this helped the flight pass by quickly.

Breakfast was served before arrival into Singapore. However, this was one of the few occasions I declined the breakfast (which was a choice of Eggs Benedict without the muffins, or braised noodles). This was because the flight landed at 7pm, and my connecting flight would be departing at 11:25, with another lounge visit in between.

The Singapore-Tokyo-Singapore flights were on a separate reward ticket (the one for 30k points in business class), and would be the first time in Business Class on a decent (ie non American) carrier.

ANA uses the Terminal 2 Silver Kris Lounge in Singapore (which Star golds are not allowed to use), and while the lounge is of a decent size, is rather dark. There was curry (again), with rice, roast chicken with potatoes, and chicken drumettes, as well as an Asian soup and a Western soup, as well as the normal bar items.

In typical Japanese fashion, the flight to Tokyo started boarding at 11pm, and was finished within 15 minutes. The flight in Business was about 50% full.

There was a very cool feature on ANA on takeoff & landing, where they show footage from a camera mounted on the nose, so we got a pilot’s eye view of takeoff and landing.

After takeoff, service was prompt, with a choice of sushi or sandwiches, after which many people went to sleep, as the flight was a 6 hour flight. Breakfast was served a couple of hours before landing, and I chose a Japanese breakfast, which was the typical rice/miso/fish/pickles etc.

We touched down at 6:40, but took ages to taxi to the gate, which meant that we arrived at the gate at 7. Customs & immigration was quick, and I was in the arrival lobby by 7:10.

Business class passengers flying on ANA flights were allowed in the Domestic ANA lounge as an arrival lounge, so I had a look, as the train to the hotel didn’t leave until 8:15. The lounge was rather Spartan, with a choice of 3 breads, and the usual bar items. Needless to say, I checked emails, then left.