After departing Seattle on Alaska Airlines, Jenine and I arrived in San Francisco at about 10am. With nearly 5 hours until departure, we had some time to kill so we wandered the airport and checked out some of the lounges. Unfortunately, due to some circumstances I should have forseen, we spent about 2 hours just waiting around.
When we checked in at Seatac, we only got our boarding passes for the Seattle-San Francisco flight. No big deal I thought. When we got to SFO, I realized I was wrong because we had to exit the secure area but we didn’t have boarding passes to enter any other terminal. Ultimately, we had to wait 2 hours for the Japan Airlines counter to open.
We had access to 4 lounges and 2 restaurants thanks to credit cards, my Alaska Lounge membership, and class of service for our flight. Our options were Air France-KLM (Priority Pass), Centurion Lounge (Amex Platinum Card), Cathay Pacific Lounge (Alaska Lounge), Sakura Lounge (JAL Business Class), Yankee Pier (restaurant via Priority Pass), and San Francisco Giants Clubhouse (restaurant via Priority Pass). Now that we only had a couple hours, we had to be judicious with our time.
We headed over to Terminal 3 to get some lunch. We stopped at Yankee Pier as it was the first restaurant and there wasn’t a wait. With Priority Pass Select (from Amex Platinum), each person (up to 2 people) get a $28 food allowance (they don’t cover the tip). I had the dungeness crab roll, which I thought was really good. I also ordered Parmesan truffle fries, which were alright but a bit oily. Jenine had the chicken club, which was dry. Those three items and Jenine’s Diet Coke came to $53. We were both glad we didn’t have to pay as the food was just OK and overpriced.
After we left Yankee Pier, we went to the Centurion Lounge so I could charge my phone and we could sit down. The lounge was celebrating their 4th anniversary and had some cupcakes and balloons out for the celebration. We sat for about an hour and then departed. For as much press as the Centurion Lounges get, I found this one to be a bit tired. The furniture was showing its wear and there weren’t nearly enough plugs for the amount of people there.
Finally, we made our way to gate A6 but had to go through security (for the third time).
Japan Airlines 001
San Francisco (SFO) – Tokyo Haneda (HND)
Tuesday, November 6
Depart: 2:50pm
Arrive: 7:15pm +1
Duration: 11hr 25min
Aircraft: Boeing 777-300ER
Seat: 8K and 8H
We were greeted by cabin crew and escorted to our seats – 8H and 8K. Flight OO1 has JAL’s SkySuite seats, which offer a lie flat bed and some privacy, depending on the seat chosen. All seats in business class have direct aisle access. Jenine had 8H, which is the traditional aisle seat whereas I had 8K which was the window seat. My seat definitely was more private and, had I closed the divider, would have really felt like a personal suite. The challenge with the window seat is that the storage is really limited. There isn’t really a good place to put your phone or other belongings during takeoff and landing (except under the foot rest). Jenine’s 8H had a fairly large storage cubby, which held all of my items, some of her items, our blankets, and our amenity kits.
On our seats were a small blanket, a pillow, an amenity kit, headphones, slippers, and the menu. I didn’t use the blanket during the flight but it was large enough to cover my wife. The pillow was memory foam and I alternated between sitting on it and using it as a pillow. For some reason, the headphones come in a red, biohazard looking bag. They are Sony noise-cancelling headphones but they don’t cancel noise very well.
The amenity kit is Tatsumura and contained chapstick, moisture mask, gentle steam eye mask, ear plugs, toothbrush and toothpaste, and tissues.
The seat was comfortable but the cushion was a bit think for me for an 11+ hour flight. I ultimately sat on my pillow for more than half the flight, which made it much more comfortable. When in bed mode, my feet touched the end of the foot well but not in an uncomfortable way. From a width perspective, I wish it was slightly wider but I didn’t feel cramped at all.
The seat control worked well throughout the flight. The headrest only moved when the seat was in a mostly upright position (not when lying down). I appreciated the adjustable lumbar support. The legs of the seat did not extend which was awkward when sitting with the at a 45 degree angle. For me, the legs had to be fairly flat or all the way down otherwise my calves would get compressed. The divider and the reading light were also operated from the seat adjustment panel.
I was worried that the flight would be too hot, as is often reported of JAL flights. I didn’t find that to be the case except for the first hour. Once we were cruising, the temperature regulated quite well. I don’t understand why there aren’t individual air vents as this flight did not have them.
The entertainment system was both great and not so great. There was a fantastic selection of movies available. I watched Deadpool 2 and Dr. Strange because I had seen almost all of the movies they had. the 23 inch screen was fantastic. It was just something to pass the time. The music selection was not great. I found it to be very limited. One of the most challenging parts of the entertainment system was the controller. It was difficult to operate and not terribly responsive.
The menu was in Japanese and English:
The flight attendants were all very efficient. Some were more personable than others but I felt well attended to. When I depressed the call bell, a flight attendant showed up within one minute. Flight attendants came by after we reached cruising altitude and took our meal order for the one standard meal on this flight. I had the Japanese set while Jenine had the Western set.
After flying for a few hours, I opted to try the the Japanese hot “udon” noodles (not sure why udon was in quotes because they looked and tasted like udon noodles to me). The udon was very good and possibly the best thing I ate during the flight.
I did try the apple crepe as well which surprised me a little bit. When the plate arrived, I thought it had a tomato on it. It did. After closer inspection, what I initially thought were grapes were black olives. It was an interesting flavor combination. I’d eat it again but having savory items on a fruit crepe was something I wasn’t expecting.
Other dishes we tried included the spicy marinated seafood (it wasn’t spicy at all) and the ham and cheese croissant sandwich.
I did purchase wifi during the flight. It was $18.60 for the duration of the flight. When it was on, the download speed seemed good as I didn’t have a lot of lag looking at websites. However, the satellite feed went in and out during the flight and there were long periods of time without internet. That said, the price is what it costs on a US domestic flight if you prepay so it was a good value.
Overall, it was a very good flight with good service.
How did we get this flight? Our full outbound itinerary, SEA-SFO-HND, NRT-KUL originally priced out at $9,500 when I booked it nearly 11 months ago. I didn’t pay that, of course. I used 130,000 Alaska Airlines miles and paid a total of $82.40 in taxes and fees. One of the best aspects of the Alaska Mileage Plan is that they allow stopovers on one way awards at the carriers gateway city. In this case, this was all one award even though we will stop in Tokyo for several days.
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