Sawadeekap...
My last visit to Bangkok was years ago... even before their International Airport at Don Muang was shifted to Suvarnabhumi in 2006. Few months back when the world's best low-cost airlines (Skytrax said so)- Air Asia had the zero fair promotion, I managed to grab 2 return tickets for RM300, flying from KUL - BKK in October.
KUL - BKK
Date: 11 October 2009 (Sunday)
Airline: Air Asia
Aircraft: A320
Flight: FD 03572
Seat: 11E & 11F
ETD/ATD: 1040/1045
ETA/ATA: 1140/1215
Flight Time: 2 hours
I did the OLCI the day before so that we just needed to be at the airport 45mins before the departure time. The OLCI was easy and we were automatically being assigned to seat 11E & 11F. We woke up at 0730 and thought that we still had plenty of times as we asked the taxi to come at 0830... but I received a call from the guy at 0815 saying he was now outside our home. So I basically washed down my breakfast (big pao) with coffee and rushed out. We finally left home at 0830.
We reached LCCT at 0920. It took slightly longer than the usual 40 mins as it was raining heavily. The new extended terminal for international flight was now in operation. It was spacious and airy compared to the previous small and stuffy departure terminal. It looked rather empty on the above pic due to the spaciousness of the terminal. 3 check-in counters were opened for this flight and each line had about 3-4 people. We waited for about 10 mins before our turn and I told the agent I had already done the OLCI but without printing out the boarding pass. The agent said no problem and straight away issued 2 receipt type of BP and tagging my single piece of check-in luggage. The whole process took less than 2 mins!
More shops are now available in the terminal.
Now they have more security check points and went through the security was a breeze.
More gates now and our boarding gate was T4.
Now everyone can sit... finding a seat last time was a difficult job.
Bigger duty free shop...
Empty Godiva chocolate shelves...
Our A320 was ready for boarding...
The rain stopped when boarding was called...
I would say the load for today was 70-80%. The door lock was secured after everybody had boarded. The push back started soon after and the crew swung into the safety demo. The plane took off at 1045.
The 29" seating pitch was pathetic for a 5'11" guy...
The seat reclining button was damaged and made it even worse... I had to sit 90 degree throughout the 2 hour flight! Reading newspaper was impossible as it almost stuck to my face when the front passenger reclined her seat!
The flight was smooth when we reached the cruising altitude of 35000 ft.
The rest of the flight was uneventful but when the plane started to descent and fly through some thick rain clouds 25 mins before landing, it became very choppy. Mrs. Chialat was holding her breath whilst the airsickness bag was in her hand ready for the "action". But somehow she managed to swallow back.
Overflew some agriculture land of Bangkok before landing.
Touched down at 1215 and Sunvarnabhumi Airport was now visible. The cheapskate low-cost airline did not pay for using the jet bridge and therefore we had to be transferred by buses to the terminal.
Walking towards the immigration...
2 huge statues greeting arriving guests...
Went through the H1N1 scanning area was no issue but going through the immigration was slow as the "uncle" immigration officer was taking his own sweet time to stamp each passport.
Once the immigration was cleared and luggage was collected, we rushed to one floor below to take taxi to our hotel.
Wow. Fantastic trip to Thailand by the looks of it. Great photos. I cam across your blog while lookign for a feature on Thailand and spent a long time looking through the pages. Excellent!!
ReplyDeletetreatment of alcoholic fatty liver disease treatment of alcoholic
ReplyDeletefatty liver disease treatment of alcoholic fatty liver disease
Here is my website; can fatty liver cured