Thursday, September 4, 2014

Bali Back to LAX on EVA Business Class and Premium Economy

It was really sad for me to leave Bali, but I had been away from home for about 11 days and it was time to go home. That many days is about my limit. I started wanting my creature comforts from home. Not to mention that I miss my dogs on long trips like these. Luckily enough our flight didn't leave Bali until the afternoon and we spent one last morning at the beautiful pool. We checked out of the hotel around 2:00pm and had the hotel van take us back to the airport and within 15-20 minutes we were back at DPS airport. I had used miles on this first leg for business class seats and we were checked in very quickly. As I had mentioned in a previous post, this airport is brand new and actually not really completed yet so there was some weirdness in the terminal with construction. After paying the departure tax and getting through security, we found the business lounge that EVA uses and it's just a sectioned-off area of a departure lounge right next to a gate. There wasn't much to eat and the drinks were limited. It was also really warm and the furniture was a little gross and dirty. At one point the lounge was very crowded and the food went very quickly.


Our plane arrived from Taipei slightly late and we boarded a little late too. The airside part of the terminal looks like a Balinese village with the hut design. It's really neat. On this flight to Taipei we would be flying on a A330-200. The flight to Taipei was a good 5+ hours and is almost directly a northern direction. The distance is about the same as flying from Los Angeles to Hawaii or New York. Since we were seated in business class, what they call Premium Laurel Class, we boarded first and found our seats in row 2.



When we took off we headed directly north and flew over the rest of the island. The airport is on the southern part of the island and the volcanoes are in the northern part. As we passed over them, the scenery was beautiful with the sun setting. Apparently there is a lake in the crater of the volcano just below. 




Below is a shot of the tons of legroom we had in these seats that were fairly old. The entertainment system was a little old too. The seats reclined to be almost flat but angled. 


Surprisingly the meal service was a little lacking for such a long flight. The presentation was pretty though. I love the salt and pepper shakers that look like little rocks. I wanted to take them and as I write this I'm thinking that I wish I had.




The dessert was a fruit plate and although I love dragon fruit, I was a bit disappointed and was expecting some cake or something sweet. They had ice cream though.





We arrived at Taipei around 9:30p and we had about a 2.5 hour layover before our 13 hour flight home. We found the same lounge we had used about 10 days prior and had a snack and did internet. Our flight left just before midnight. Luckily we were once again seated in EVA's premium economy cabin called Elite Class. I requested a bulkhead seat which they only release at the airport. We had pretty good legroom and had slippers and an amenity kit waiting at our seats. Our flight was on one of their older 777-300ERs.


Once we took off, they served dinner which was ok and nothing special. It was a little strange to be eating a meal so late.


Several movies and about 9 hours later they served breakfast and this was about 2 hours before we landed. Our flight was landing around 8pm, so having breakfast felt odd but that would've been the next meal after the dinner the night before.


We landed on the longest day of the year and by the time we were on the ground the sun had set. All together we had flown 20,481 miles on this trip. Vietnam and Bali were amazing and I can't wait to go back.



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