A bit of fiddling round on the web revealed that rather than fly from Beijing to London in one trip it is about 30% cheaper to split it into two flights, travelling via either Ethiopia, or the United Arab Emirates. I think Ethiopia needs more than a couple of days, so I chose to take an almost free stopover in Dubai for a few days.
Leaving Beijing after 90 minutes sitting on the tarmac the crew ignored the usual safety briefings and concentrated on lunch, which was a choice of chicken or fish. Both appeared to consist of just rice and diced carrots. China Southern obviously doesn’t share the same caterers as the Air China flagship line, where passengers are treated to fresh noodles and dim-sum.
It’s obviously an airline aimed solely at Chinese passengers as the in-flight magazines were rare in that there was no English translation past the headline, so when one caught your eye there was no way to read on further. There were movies, but the English subtitles were flashed up too fast and too dim to read, so that didn’t really help pass the 9hr flight time.
On the odd occasions I looked up from my book we were flying over a beautiful range of snow-capped mountains, which I presume were part of the Himalayas. By now I was feeling quite thirsty, but there were no drinks forthcoming until dinner 7 hours later. Dinner was a choice of just chicken, which this time was macaroni and diced carrots and again no chicken.
As the flight began its descent we were treated to a series of self-massage guides to restore energy, balance Qi and achieve ‘euphonious melody’. I’d rather have had a glass of water but all the Chinese seemed compelled to follow along with the motions.
Dubai airport has a huge distance between the boarding gates and the main terminal, so I was glad I’d packed light. The lax rules on carry-on baggage became some peoples undoing as they were left to struggle what must have been at least a kilometre with more bags and boxes than they could carry. Trolleys were only available if you’d booked one in advance with the Marhaba agency which costs an additional $21.
Finally reaching passport control there were huge queues, although Arabic families with children were allowed to bypass these, as were customers of the increasingly appealing Marhaba service.
Arriving at baggage reclaim the bags were already on the way round the conveyer belt. A few seemed to have fallen off near the curtain where they magically appear, but nobody near them bothered putting them back on. Again the Marhaba stewards were picking off their clients bags without delay, leaving the rest of us to wait for half an hour until I realised that mine was one of those that had initially fallen off the belt.
Another half hour later the airport transfer shuttle bus finally appeared and I set off for the hotel.
If anyone fancies flying with a Chinese budget carrier don’t be put off, but I’ve a few suggestions:
- Take a good book – there’s no worthwhile entertainment
- Take drinks – there’s no checks to stop you and you won’t get much on the plane
- When you arrive, forget the downsides and enjoy your massive savings over other travellers.
Always good to try new things.
So, what was the saving over (let’s say) an Emirates flight?
An Emirates flight ranges between £550 and £800. My two flights were £210 each, so the difference can be spent on a reasonable hotel in Dubai.
Qatar or Aeroflot do fly from Beijing to London for less than £400 if booked a couple of months in advance, but the departure or arrival times are pretty unsociable.