Over the Pacific on Cathay
Cathay
Pacific Lounges HKG
With my filed and completed report in hand, I made
my way upstairs to Zone B for my onward flight.
I was not sure if I could check in with the First Class area as an OneWorld Emerald so I checked in with
the otherwise deserted Business Class counter.
First the agent told me it was too late to check in for my flight as it
had already departed. I told him that it
was only 12:05AM and that the flight was delayed until 2AM. The agent was confused as to why my luggage
was not checked to my final destination and was able to print out my boarding
pass (seat 16A) along with a lounge invitation.
He had to check with his colleagues to see what I needed to do when I
got to New York since he has never encountered my problem before.
He did not print my onward boarding passes with
American Airlines unfortunately. He did
make sure that I had an aircraft that featured the new Business Class configuration. I made my way to the North security check
point as it was the only one open at that time.
The airport felt like a ghost town at this time of the night and a lot
of the flights were either delayed or canceled. My flight and the Cathay
Flights to Amsterdam/Paris, Dubai/Jeddah, and San Francisco were all delayed
until 2AM. It took about 5 minutes to
get through security and go through immigration to airside and it was 12:30AM
when all of that was done. Even though I
“stayed” in Hong Kong for 45 minutes, I had an arrival date of April 25th
and a departure date of April 26th due to the nature of the flight.
I noticed that my departure gate changed from gate 1
to 521 for some reason. I made my way to
gate 1 to see a lot of people leaving (presumably to gate 521). After asking one of the agents, he confirmed
the change was due the weather causing the aircrafts to be all over the
place. Plus, I noticed that at gate 1
was a Boeing 747 (so obviously not my departure aircraft) and I was not bound
for San Francisco or other Cathay Destination this is served by a 747 aircraft.
I checked in at the Wing and was advised by the
attendant that I could use the upstairs for more seating areas if needed. I stayed downstairs on the Business side to
take advantage of the showers available and it was truly refreshing to have
that before a long haul flight. There
were not any good food options left by the time I was finished with my shower
at 1AM. I went upstairs to the First
Class section and was surprised to see a new area due to the current
renovations. I grabbed some real food
(fried rice) and sliced fruit along with a Coke Zero and bottle of water to
enjoy as I was hungry. I found a Solus
chair to sit and used the WiFi to check my email. I left the lounge at 1:30AM and inquired at
the front to see if boarding was starting soon.
The agent told me no but they would make an announcement when it was
time.
 |
| Snacks |
 |
| Waiting area by Gate 3 |
 |
| Bathroom |
 |
| Bathroom |
 |
| Empty Airport at night |
I then headed towards The Cabin by gate 21 as I felt
the Wing was too crowded due to all of the delays. The agent greeted me but told me all of the
hot food options were cleared. I sat
down to use the computers for a while but left at about 2AM when I felt that
boarding was starting despite no announcements were made. It took about 5 minutes to get to the
departure area for aircrafts in the apron position.
When I arrived there was a long line snaked
all over the departure area. I asked one
of the agents to see if boarding had started and she advised me to go to the
end of the long line. I replied to her
and inquired if Business Class was boarding yet… after taking a closer look at
my boarding pass, she directed me to the end of the shorter line. We had one more ID check before getting on
the bus and I waited 5 minutes before we were finally taken to the plane. We had to walk up the steps to get on the
aircraft.
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