This flight concluded my time in Rome for the canonization Mass-turned-papal-funeral trip. By the time I got on this flight, I was ready to go home after some Roman and Vatican adventures. For this flight home, I wanted a little bit more of a comfortable flight so I opted to book Main Cabin Extra. Check out this review of American Airlines B777-200 in Main Cabin Extra from Rome to Dallas/Ft. Worth!

Flight Info

Summary

• Main Cabin Extra with more leg room made this flight a little more comfy
• Three meals served during this flight
• WiFi was expensive, but fast enough to do social media things

Booking American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

For background on how I booked this leg, check out this blog post as well as my review of Main Cabin on the flight from DFW to FCO. 

The difference in booking this leg was that I decided to upgrade from Main Cabin to Main Cabin Extra a few weeks before departure. The cost to do so was $110.02.  In my arsenal of travel credit cards, I hold the American Express Hilton Aspire card, and it has a quarterly airline credit of $50. I hadn’t yet used it on anything this quarter so I figured I could use that credit to upgrade to a confirmed Main Cabin Extra seat. 

I’ll also mention that because I have Gold status with AAdvantage, I technically can select Main Cabin Extra seats at check-in 24 hours before departure. But I didn’t want to wait that long, and I knew that demand for flying out of Rome back to the US would be high because of the various tourists and pilgrims out and about in Italy so being able to select an ideal Main Cabin Extra seat right before departure could have been challenging. Also I wanted to make sure I selected an aisle seat and not one in the middle!

Note that Main Cabin Extra technically isn’t a separate cabin on American Airlines flights–it’s just an economy class seat with extra leg room and free alcohol on domestic flights.

Whenever I pay for ancillary fees or upgrades like this, I do not get an employee discount. So it was good that I had airline credit through a credit card to help offset the cost.

Packing for American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

Similar to the flight to Rome from DFW, I just had my backpack and cross-body bag. I put my backpack in the bin, and had my cross-body bag underneath the seat in front of me.

I still had my First Class slippers, eye mask, and noise canceling headphones loaded into my cross-body bag, and that made them more convenient to access in order to be more comfortable during the flight.

Check In and Security/Customs at FCO

Because I had stayed at the Hilton Rome Airport the night before departure, I had a really easy time getting to the airport. I didn’t take a bus or taxi–I walked! The front of the hotel has a pedestrian bridge that connects to the terminals at FCO. And it was just 8 minutes from the front desk to the departure hall of Terminal 3.

Once I got to the departure hall, I looked on the boards to see where American Airlines had their ticket counters. Apparently they were at O441, which was on the far end of the hall in a section designated for US-bound and Israel-bound flights.

I got in line to check in with the Priority desk because I am AAdvantage Gold, but a guard stopped me and started asking me questions. He asked basic things like how long I was in Italy, why I was in Italy, and whatnot. I explained to him the original purpose of this trip, and how that got messed up, and how I ended up going to Pope Francis’ funeral. He understood the funeral part, but was hung up on the canonization Mass that I was supposed to attend. He finally figured it out and was amazed and started asking me more about Carlo Acutis and asked more questions about him–wild!

This all took a few minutes, and then I was finally able to see the ticket agent. Talking to the ticket agent only took a few minutes as well as they verified my passport and printed my boarding pass.

From the last trip I took to Rome (July 2017), I remembered Security and Customs taking forever with long lines for both. But at 7:30AM in the morning, there weren’t a lot of people going through security so it only took like 5 minutes. They didn’t ask me to remove anything from my bags other than my iPad.

For Customs, FCO had plenty of open lanes and they use an automated passport control system that scans your passport and your photo taken. It’s a similar system I’ve seen at airports like HKG and SIN. This part only took about 6 minutes to get my exit stamp from the Customs officer.

Once through, I meandered my way through the terminal to get to the lounge.

The Prima Vista Portus Lounge at FCO

After doing some light research the night before, I settled on trying the Prima Vista Lounge. Because I have Priority Pass from the Chase Sapphire Reserve card, I was able to access this lounge.

The Prima Vista Lounge can be found airside in the non-Schengen portion of the terminal towards the E51-E61 gate area, across from the security checkpoint. Kind of hard to describe, but I think it’s decently straightforward to find.

I arrived at about 7:45AM and checked in with the front desk after they greeted me warmly. They scanned my boarding pass as well as my Priority Pass membership card that I had pulled up from the app.

Inside the Prima Vista lounge are various spaces to hang out in. After walking past the front desk, there were restrooms to the left and seating by the windows. There is a main seating area with food and drink along the right wall. By the windows are semi-private podlike seats. The main seating area has armchairs with side tables that have charging ports. There’s also a meeting room in the back corner with a conference table. I also noticed another seating area designated as the quiet zone separate from the rest of the lounge. And I also saw there was a separate dining area with more seats.

I couldn’t take too many pictures because of the amount of people in the lounge. I wouldn’t say it was full, but most of the seats in the main space were occupied. I did end up in the quiet area because no one was in it at the time I sat down.

For food, the Prima Vista lounge was serving breakfast. All the typical breakfast times were available seemingly catering to more of an American palate: eggs, bacon, pastries, fruits, yogurts, etc. 

I didn’t really get food as I was full from the breakfast buffet at the Hilton Rome Airport earlier in the morning. I did settle for a few drinks though.

There was a bar and coffee menu, and fridges were available that contained both still and sparkling water bottles. 

For other amenities, there was free WiFi. The passcode is available at the front desk. I did connect to it and ran a speed test for the WiFi, and it came back with:

• 3.41 mbps download
• 3.76 mbps upload
• 68 ms ping

That’s pretty slow, but it was serviceable enough for me to upload a few Instagram stories and browse around on my phone during my lounge stay.

I saw there was one set of restrooms, and one shower. I’m not sure what the protocol was for the shower, but I’m assuming you would have to talk to the front desk to use it.

Overall, I love the darker aesthetic of the lounge and the elegant finishes to match. The chair was comfortable, and the food spread was pretty great even though I didn’t eat. I also loved that the lounge had windows to the outside although they didn’t appear to have good views of the adjacent gates nor tarmac.

At about 8:30AM, I used the restroom, refilled my water bottle (a mistake I’ll share below), and headed to Gate E41 for my flight to DFW.

Boarding American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

Boarding for this 10:00AM flight to the DFW was scheduled for 9:10AM as stated on my boarding pass and on the departure monitors. 

The gate was E41, and from the Prima Vista Lounge, it required me to take a people-mover train from T3. I just followed the signs. It took me about 12-15 minutes overall.

When I arrived at the gate at 8:45AM, I saw there were a lot of people seated in the gate area, and a good handful were lined up to talk to the gate agents. A few security guys (dressed similar to the one when I checked in at the ticket counter) were walking around and talking to passengers asking similar questions.

The gate agents made their usual announcements periodically as boarding was approaching, but I was particularly amused by the announcements in Italian! Sounds so cool! Lol.

At 9:08AM, they made the announcement that boarding was about to begin so everyone gate lice’d the boarding lanes, and at 9:10AM they called for Concierge Keys to board.

While I was waiting for Group 4, I saw one of my church friends from back home also waiting around! So I briefly caught up with him and his family while waiting for Group 4 to be called.

Boarding seemed to go slow, but I saw that Group 1 had 40+ passengers. And at about 9:21AM, I scanned my boarding pass with Group 4. While walking down to the jet bridge, I noticed they had set up secondary security checks for security to go through bags. Luckily, I wasn’t selected… this time.

Departure in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

I got into my seat at about 9:23AM. My backpack went in the bin and my cross-body bag went under the seat in front of me. Weirdly, most of the overhead bin space was already taken up by others who had boarded before me, but I was still able to find space in the bins just above my seat.

Departure was scheduled for 10:00AM.

While waiting for the remainder of the passengers to board, I saw that I had OTHER church friends on this flight, and one of them was seated in 28D, the opposite center aisle seat from me. So we chatted and shared our Italian adventures. I noticed another friend passing by in the aisle too and briefly caught up with her. 

Between those times, I was taking notes and pics for this review.

Boarding completed at 9:49AM, and the boarding door closed immediately after that. We pushed back a few minutes early at 9:58AM.

Weirdly, we idled after pushback for about 10 or so minutes, then we got into the pattern for take off, but that also took another short while.

We finally took off at 10:24AM!

Cabin in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

This is the same cabin as my incoming flight to Italy. The only difference being I had a different vantage point due to sitting in the aft Main Cabin and on the right side. Aesthetics and lav locations remain the same.

Also the aft Main Cabin is the slightly bigger one of the two cabins.

You can check out the layout on Aerolopa.

For cabin temperature throughout the flight, I found it to be nice during boarding and takeoff. But as the flight went on, it got colder. I ended up putting on my pullover and utilized the blanket provided. Had I not put on those layers, I would have been miserable throughout the flight because of feeling cold.

As a fun fact, I did look up above my seat and noticed that there were five air nozzles and lights.

I used to fly this aircraft type A LOT like ten years ago before American Airlines retrofitted the B777-200 fleet. In the old configuration before the retrofit, the seats in Main Cabin were a 2-5-2 configuration, meaning there were FIVE seats in the middle. I guess I never noticed that AA never updated the panels above the seats so they are still in the old configuration with five nozzles and lights.

Seats in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

My seat was 28H, which was on the right side of the aircraft and was an aisle seat in the center section. 

This was the same seat model as my incoming flight to Italy, and it has the same features. The big difference is that this seat is Main Cabin Extra so the seat has more leg room (34” vs 31” seat pitch), and a little more recline (4” vs 3” recline).

I should also mention that the placement of the seat legs of Row 27 is such that 28G and I had to share the same underseat space. Luckily this wasn’t an issue as 28G didn’t place a big backpack under there.

And because this was an international flight, the seats are equipped with a blanket and pillow in Main Cabin.

Entertainment and WiFi on American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

The system and content on this flight were the same as the incoming flight. My particular seatback monitor was fully functional, and I didn’t observe anyone else having issues with their units.

On this flight, the WiFi actually worked! Well, it didn’t work on the ground, and that is by design for this fleet type. However, the WiFi signal became operational about 30 minutes after takeoff. 

I also confirmed that the WiFi stops working once below 10,000 feet. So keep that in mind before swiping right or watching the next TikTok while on approach to landing.

How much is WiFi in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra?

The price is the same for everyone regardless of class.

For the 2-hour pass, it was $29.

For the All-Flight pass, it was $35

I ended up paying for the $35 All-Flight pass (for science!). I was a little concerned the payment wouldn’t go through as I manually entered in my credit card info, but it did. 

How fast is WiFi in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra?

After running the speed test, the numbers came back as:

• 52.6 mbps download
• 5.52 mbps upload
• 870 ms ping

Wow, that’s a pretty great download speed but abysmal upload and ping. I actually discussed this with a coworker who works with WiFi analytics, and the results look like this because of limitations of the hardware and the system bottlenecking in a particular way. Interesting stuff.

Service in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

I thought the flight attendants provided good and efficient service. There were 6 of them taking care of Premium Economy and Main Cabin, 3 on each side of the aircraft. 

During boarding, they handed out disposable earbuds for people to use during flight. I was surprised at how many people still accept these, but I suppose most people have Bluetooth headphones, and the entertainment systems on this aircraft type are not Bluetooth-capable.

Otherwise, here was the timeline of their service after takeoff (hh:mm):

• 00:16 Started handing out special meals
• 00:25 Drink and meal carts started heading towards the front of Premium Economy
• 00:48 Got my meal
• 00:55 Got my red wine
• 01:13 Finished food; lighting scene changed for sleep but only my side dimmed
• 01:17 Service items taken up 

Halfway through the flight, they served the mid-flight snack:

• 05:24 Carts passed by
• 05:40 Got my sandwich and white wine

And lastly, for the pre-arrival meal, they served everything pretty quickly:

• 09:58 Morning light scene turned on; carts passed by
• 10:04 Got my hot pocket

Overall while I did think they were friendly and efficient, I kind of thought their service was a little transactional and not personable. I don’t have a problem with that since I frequently travel using my flight benefits, and I can understand that having about 200 people to serve requires efficiency. But still–if I were a loyal paying passenger, a little more engagement would be nice.

Food and Drink in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

There were three meals served on this 11 hour flight. I thought this was interesting because on the DFW to FCO flight, there were only two meals. So maybe 10+ hours is the magical flight time to have three meals served.

I believe there were pretzels and Biscoffs, juices, and water available in the galley area after the main meal service was done, but I didn’t verify that this flight.

Overall, I thought the meals were good and at decent timings. I never felt hungry or thirsty.

Dinner

The choices for dinner were either chicken or pasta. Considering I had the chicken on the way to Italy, I was curious to see if the pasta was good on the flight out of Italy. So I selected that.

Pretty similar offerings as the incoming flight and same presentation: main entree, roll, side salad, crackers and cheese, and a dessert.

The pasta came with a red sauce. It seemed balanced, but I thought it could have used more spice or salt. For the pasta itself, I thought it was decently al dente, but not something you’d tell Nonna about.

For the roll, it was ciabatta. It was hard on the outside but soft on the inside. I thought it tasted great with the included butter.

The salad with olive oil and balsamic dressing was pretty good. The radishes added a nice crunch.

I noticed that the crackers and cheese were of different brands than my incoming flight, but were pretty similar and very good. The cheese spread this time was creamy and very spreadable.

Lastly, the brownie was just okay. It was light and kind of airy, but not moist either.

I paired all this with the red wine, which was a Cantor red blend. The tray also came with a small bottle of water.

Mid Flight Snack

For this, there were no options. Everyone got the same ham and cheese pretzel roll sandwich and vanilla bean ice cream.

The sandwich was kind of salty and soggy, but otherwise tasted alright. 

For this meal, I selected a white wine. What confused me was the flight attendant added ice to my white wine. I realize that white wines do taste better chilled, and some varieties are good with ice. But…I tend to drink my wines neat (which…”neat” is not how one describes drinking a wine lol). So I was thrown off by this. I mean…I still drank it and it was good, haha.

Pre-Arrival Meal

Not really a meal but more of a lite snack. We actually had two options this time: beef or cheese hot pockets.

I selected the beef hot pocket. It was kind of warm, the pastry was a little doughy, but the beef filling was pretty good. I paired this with another red wine. No ice cubes this time.

Lavatories in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra

Like my incoming flight to Italy, there were five lavatories total for Premium Economy and Main Cabin, with three of them at Door 3 splitting Main Cabin and the other two in the aft galley area.

With my seat being 28H, the closest lavatories to me were the mid-cabin lavs on the right side, which has two. I’ll reiterate that most of the reason I like aisle seats is so that I can leave for the lavatories without bothering another passenger, and I don’t mind being the one bothered by middle seaters.

Again, these lavs have a decent amount of space to them. The mid-cabin lavatory on the left side of the aircraft is accessible, so it has more space and other features for persons of reduced mobility.

During the 11.5 hour flight, I used the lavatories four times (hh:mm after takeoff) and their cleanliness:

• 01:10 / right side mid-cabin: decently clean, but had to wait a while due to post-meal rush
• 01:50 / right side aft: decently clean
• 04:40 / right side mid-cabin: sprinkles on the ground, paper debris in the corner
• 08:45 / right side mid-cabin: sprinkles and paper on the ground, but a flight attendant actually stopped me from going initially so she could refill paper products lol

What did I do in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra?

Besides eating and using the lavatories, I did a few things.

For movies, I watched Sonic 3 and Moana 2.  I was mildly entertained by both, and I think the first movies were much better haha. But enjoying these movies at 35,000 feet and a wine in hand made the movie-watching experience enjoyable!

I also worked on taking notes for this flight for this review as well as drafting blog posts for this trip.

Lastly, knowing that I would be arriving in the afternoon in DFW, I didn’t want to sleep too much on this flight so I could fall asleep easier at my usual bedtime. Still, I did close my eyes for a while a few times towards the last half of the flight. I didn’t even use my eye mask! 

Other Stories to Share

One observation I had during this flight was people periodically opening their window shades to look outside, realize how bright it was, then close it. MULTIPLE TIMES! There was a younger guy at a window seat kind of near me, and he kept doing that. With this being a purely daytime flight, and with the cabin in dark mode, we definitely had a handful of blinding light moments.

So when I was in the Prima Vista lounge, I grabbed a bottle of sparkling water from the fridge. I didn’t finish all of it so I put the remaining in my Yeti water bottle. What I didn’t think about was that I put a carbonated drink into my water bottle…which I then opened to drink water on the flight. The difference in pressures made for a loud champange-like pop sound. Luckily no one heard it but me. I think. And luckily nothing destructive happened.

The CRAZIEST thing to me though was running into multiple friends from my church back home during boarding. Multiple! We didn’t coordinate being in Italy at the same time nor did we have the same reasons for going, but it just somehow lined up that a handful of us were on this DFW flight to go home. Soooo wild to me haha.

Arrival at DFW

The scheduled arrival time at DFW was 3:05PM. 

The captain made an announcement at about 10 hours and 44 minutes into the flight for the flight attendants to prepare for landing as we had about 25 minutes left in the flight.

On the descent, it did get a little turbulent when we were at about 12,000 feet in the air with about 50 miles left to go. I think there were isolated storms in the area.

Mr. Opens-The-Window-Shades kept his window closed, as did most passengers, so I couldn’t see outside on our approach for landing. But I knew it was north Texas so lots of green and open spaces until reaching the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex.

We touched down at 11 hours and 11 minutes then arrived at Gate D27 about 40 minutes later at 2:50PM. I think because we arrived a little earlier than scheduled, we didn’t have a gate just yet and had to wait. Or traffic was backed up. I’m not really sure!

So from gate to gate, FCO to DFW, the total time ended up being 11 hours and 52 minutes.

I’ll also comment here that because it was an afternoon arrival into DFW, many other international flights (especially European) arrive in the afternoon too, US Customs and Immigration at Terminal D was terribly, terribly backed up–even the Global Entry line! I actually had to wait in a 30-minute line for Global Entry, which I’ve never experienced before lol. Luckily I didn’t have any checked bags so once I got cleared by the Customs officer, I beelined my way out of there to get back to my car parked at work to go home.

Bottom Line

Flying American Airlines B777-200 in Main Cabin Extra was a great way to finish out my Roman adventure with a papal plot twist. Because the flight had three separate meal times, I never felt hungry or thirsty. The extra leg room let me stretch out, and the functional WiFi allowed me to stay connected with friends and family while on the flight. While I didn’t intend to get proper sleep on this flight, I still found the seat and cabin to be comfortable enough even though the cabin got cold mid-flight.

While I thought the flight attendants could have been more personally engaging, I did appreciate their efficient and friendly service.

For all the little inconveniences, my pilgrimage mindset kept me in check. But even then, I really didn’t have much to complain about this flight, even if my white wine had ice cubes in it.

Thankfully American Airlines has nonstop flights between DFW and FCO, making any kind of Roman adventure easily accessible!

What do you think of this flight from Rome? What would you have done differently?

The post Review: American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra FCO-DFW appeared first on Where Is Randell?.

Flight Info

Summary

• Decently comfortable seat for 9.5 hour flight with functional features and enough knee room
• Onboard meals were pretty decent; service was friendly and efficient
• WiFi was inoperative the entire flight

Booking American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

Knowing that there’s only one flight a day between DFW and Rome on American Airlines during non-peak season, I just used AA’s website to search for the flight after logging into my AAdvantage account.

When searching for the flight, I made sure to check the “Redeem miles” box so that I would get results to be able to use my AAdvantage miles.

Given that I wanted to arrive a few days before the canonization Mass set for Sunday April 27, 2025 (way before I found out about Pope Francis’ funeral) to be able to figure out on-the-ground logistics in Rome beforehand, I made sure to set the date for the Wednesday or Thursday before.

I ended up booking Wednesday April 23, 2025 for my departure date because it was a little cheaper miles-wise than Thursday.

Because I am an active airline employee, I can get a 20% discount on paid and award tickets for myself. The cost to book this as a round trip ticket in Main Cabin was originally 63,500 AAdvantage miles, but it ended up being 50,800 AAdvantage miles after my discount. The taxes/fees remained the same.

Packing for American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin and Rome

This flight had a 2:40PM departure time, but it was basically an overnight flight since the scheduled arrival time in Rome was 8:00AM. This meant that my goal for the flight was to try and sleep so that I could hit the ground running once in Rome.

To make the flight easier, I brought my usual eye mask and noise cancelling headphones. 

Also, I had bought waterproof athletic shoes after seeing that Rome was expecting rains during my trip. My plan was to wear these shoes on the plane, but waterproof footwear typically aren’t very breathable (I learned this the hard way on my Rio de Janeiro day trip). So I also packed the AA slippers I got in Flagship First Class from my day trip to Buenos Aires.

I know Roman streets and sidewalks are full of cobblestone so bringing a carry-on luggage with wheels was not an option. Therefore, I only brought my backpack and a larger cross-body bag.

Check In at DFW Airport

Because my flight wasn’t until 2:40PM, I actually went to work in the morning. I had to wrap some stuff up anyway with suppliers and teammates.

The nice thing about working at an airlines’ headquarters building is that it also has a travel desk that functions like the ticket counters at the airport. Minus the checking in of checked luggage, of course. 

So at about noon, I visited the travel desk at work and got my boarding pass printed out. There was no line. The agent verified my passport and printed out my boarding pass. I do like collecting paper boarding passes and having them as backup in case the mobile boarding pass doesn’t work. 

I had my housemate pick me up to take me to the airport as he had just landed from his own trip.

When I was in the car, I doublechecked the DFW Airport app to see how busy the A21 security checkpoint was as that is where TSA PreCheck is for Terminal A. It wasn’t busy according to the app. And when I got dropped off, I found it had about 5 people in line, but moved along quickly. I was through security in less than 5 minutes.

Admirals Club

After passing through security, I beelined to A24 where the Admirals Club is in Terminal A. Again, I have access because of the Citi Executive card—the only credit card in AA’s portfolio that includes Admirals Club membership.

I’ve visited the Terminal A Admirals Club multiple times (here and here), so I’ll just talk about this particular visit.

I got in at about 12:35PM.

In terms of how busy it was, I saw that it looked like most of the seats were taken, but I didn’t have trouble finding an empty one. Being midday in the middle of the week probably helped.

Once I found my seat, I had a look at the food available:

For food and drink, I saw that Argentinian empanadas were the main option (!). I made sure to get a few, and I paired this with naan bites and the jalapeño lime hummus. To complete the lounge experience, I grabbed a glass of brut from the bar too, but it took a while because they only had one bartender and lots of people in line.

I found the empanadas to be pretty good, but the meat filling lacked some flavor. I thought that maybe it could’ve used chimichurri or something. And the hummus was good, but didn’t have a spicy kick like I thought it should’ve had. The naan was fluffy and savory with the garlic.

Maybe they were on lunch break, but I didn’t see the usual chips and guacamole station set up. That was a little disappointing.

I also noticed from this trip that the Thai coconut broth soup is back in rotation. Probably my favorite soup I’ve had in the Admirals Club! But I didn’t get any this time.

Boarding and Departure for American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

Boarding was scheduled for 1:50PM. So AA recently updated their app and changed how it looks and works. Now the (iOS) app utilizes widgets to let you know boarding info and other flight updates. I liked this so I could quickly glance at my phone and know what time boarding is and how much time I have left.

I arrived at Gate A24 immediately after leaving the Admirals Club. How convenient that my gate was right at the club! Haha. 

Weirdly, looking around the gate area, I didn’t see what amounted to be a 777-200’s worth of people waiting around knowing that this flight is supposed to be full. I knew weather within the past day may have affected some, but still. 

Right on time, boarding started at 1:50PM. And also the agents announced that we would be doing the biometric scan (face recognition) to board this flight. Unsurprisingly, once boarding started, a big mass of people grouped up around the boarding lanes.

AA started their new boarding order on May 1 so we were using the old method with preboards and Concierge Key passengers boarding first.

As Group 4 was getting closer to being called, I inched my way past the gate lice and ended up being one of the first few Group 4 boarders in line once called. I scanned into this flight at 1:57PM and by 2:00PM, I was in my seat.

While waiting for other passengers to board, I tried helping my row mates load their luggage up into the bin but can only do so if lying on the wide side and lengthwise. But another passenger kinda wanted to argue with me that I should stand them on the short side like books like on other aircraft. But I know those aircraft have bigger bins that allow that. And this is not one of those aircraft types. I almost wanted to say “trust me, I’m an engineer [that works for this airline]” lmao

Later during boarding (I’m thinking like Group 6 and on), the flight attendants announced that there wouldn’t be room for rollaboards and asked everyone to see about getting their bags gate checked. Oof.

Of course, because I was Group 4, I didn’t have trouble at all and easily claimed the bin above me.

Cabin in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

On American Airlines B777-200, the Main Cabin is split in two areas at Door 3. My seat was in the more forward cabin. In total, there are 212 seats according to Aerolopa.

The seats in Main Cabin are mostly arranged in a 3-4-3 configuration, but some rows are 2-4-2, typically at the front bulkheads or rows in the tail section. The 3-4-3 configuration on a 777 makes for a decent seat width, but larger passengers will have trouble, especially at front row seats that have the in-arm tray tables.

Also, the front bulkhead seats do have underseat space from the last row of Premium Economy as the bulkhead does not touch the floor. 

This particular aircraft is pretty old, but the interiors didn’t look too beat up in the Main Cabin. The aesthetic is stereotypical AA dark blue with gray and red accents for the seats, an off-white for the side panels, and grays for the bulkhead partitions and monuments (like closet, lav, and galley walls).

For the temperature of the cabin, I found it to be warm at the beginning, but once we leveled off in cruise, I started to feel cold. Luckily I had a pullover packed with me, and as I mention below, the seat came with a blanket.

Seats in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

My seat number was 21D. It was an aisle seat in the center section several rows forward of Door 3 on the left side.

The manufacturer of this seat was Safran Seats, and this was model 5751. I always nerd out if this is the seat I’m flying in on any flight because l previously worked at Safran Seats (though I didn’t work on 5751, but did work on a new seat model meant to replace it).

5751 is designed for long-haul international flights, and has the following features:

• 9” Panasonic monitor (touchscreen, has headphone jack and USB A)
• Retractable handset (has call button, reading light controls in addition to also controlling the in-flight entertainment system)
• Bi-fold tray table (also extendable)
• Universal power port (110V)
• Literature pocket
• Adjustable headrest (up/down, wings fold in/out)

Since I wasn’t in a Main Cabin Extra row with extra legroom, my seat had the following:

• 3” Recline
• 31” Row Pitch
• 17.1” Seat Width

In Main Cabin on international flights, the usual amenities are:

• Pillow
• Blanket
• Disposable earbuds (handed out by flight attendants)

As far as what I thought about 21D, I was quite grateful that everything about the seat was working. Sometimes things don’t work like when I flew World Traveler class on British Airways 787.

Additionally, I thought it was comfortable enough for a coach class seat for a long-haul flight. I purposely chose an aisle seat knowing that I do like to get up and use the lavatory without bothering anyone. Had I flown non-revenue standby, there would have been a higher chance of me getting a middle seat.

Entertainment and WiFi in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

Main Cabin seats have a 9” touchscreen. Premium Economy and Business get larger ones. Regardless of class, it’s the same content available. 

I didn’t really bother thumbing through the entire selection but American Airlines’ widebody entertainment system always has entertainment, flight map, seat-to-seat messaging, kids section, drink menu, and WiFi connection instructions. 

For entertainment content, I recommend going to entertainment.aa.com to see what is showing on your next flight. Note that the content changes at the start of every month.

On this particular flight, I saw that most of the new releases were more obscure movies I’ve never heard of. Luckily, previous new releases that I wanted to watch were still available on the system.

Navigating around the system was very responsive, and I could have used either the monitor itself (touchscreen) or the handset to move around in its menus. 

WiFi Service

This is where this flight fell short. But I should mention that since this was AA’s B777-200 aircraft, WiFi actually doesn’t work on the ground at the gate by design due to system limitations. It only works once up in the air.

I tried multiple times throughout the flight to look for the “aainflight” WiFi signal, but it never showed up. Honestly, I didn’t care since I rather like my time being disconnected when on planes, and I don’t typically work on flights even on a work trip.

But I can understand that some people would want to have WiFi access to the Internet especially on a long flight such as this one.

Starting in January 2026, AA will start offering free WiFi. But for now, had the system been working, it would’ve costed something like $25-$35 dollars depending on length of access pass you purchase.

Service in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

For Main Cabin service on AA B777-200 from DFW to Rome, there were six flight attendants. During meal and drink service, they split between both sides. I found them to be friendly and efficient during their service, but not personal. Basically minimal talking or actually engaging passengers apart from taking food and drink orders.

When they started their meal service, I noticed they actually handed out all the special order meals first and had slips of paper for each. I’m assuming this is some new system to make sure catering got everything correct, which I can appreciate for other passengers. It looked like no one around me with preorders complained.

The standard for AA international flights in Main Cabin, from my observation across different flights, is for the flight attendants to serve Premium Economy first. They get a slightly better hot entree. After serving Premium Economy, the flight attendents then work their way towards the back of the plane.

Also there are separate carts for drinks and meals.

About 55 minutes after takeoff, I got my meal, but then service immediately got suspended due to turbulence. This lasted about 15 minutes, which service then resumed. And that’s when I was able to get my red wine.

For the pre-arrival meal, they turned on the “sunrise” light scene about 8 hours and 19 minutes after takeoff. This meal was served in the same way, but Main Cabin gets a bagged meal that isn’t plated so the flight attendants were able to hand these out faster. 

I got my pre-arrival meal at 8 hours and 37 minutes.

Towards the end of the flight, we faced the kind of turbulence that caused the whole plane to drop and gain altitude relatively quickly in a short amount of time and so they suspended their final trash pick up runs before landing. They announced this, and even recommended leaving trash in the literature pocket. The turbulence was really that bad and not them being lazy by any means. 

Food and Drink in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

Due to the length and timing of this flight, there was dinner and a lite breakfast. And in-between, the flight attendants had put out water, juices, and pretzels out in the aft galley area for passengers to take at any time.

Dinner

So when I was at work in the morning, I was joking with my coworkers about the meal choices being chicken or pasta. And sure enough, those were the two options on this flight! 

But to start, the flight attendants handed out those bags of mini pretzels before bustin’ out the carts. 

When I got asked, “chicken or pasta?”, I selected the chicken.

The chicken was good (left side on the pic above). It wasn’t dry or overcooked, and the tomato sauce seemed balanced. Accompanying it was seasoned couscous, and that tasted minty and herbed, but it was good too.

The side salad was not soggy, but was very plain. Just a few peppers with the leafs of lettuce for some crunchiness. The balsamic dressing was decent.

The dinner roll was soft and slightly dry, but the butter made it okay.

The crackers and cheese were good, but the cheese was not very spreadable though soft.

And probably my favorite part was the cinnamon churro bar! It was so good! It was sweet with a cinnamon spice flavor.

Along with my meal, I requested the red wine, which was some sort of red blend from a brand I didn’t quite catch. It was good.

Overall, I thought this was a good meal. None of it made me think, “yeah ew, this is gross airplane food”. And admittedly, I tend to eat every bit of in-flight meals. I didn’t feel sick or bloated after eating this meal.

Pre-Arrival Breakfast

This seems to be AA’s popular way of doing a lite meal for a morning arrival on a long-haul international flight — their “Bite Into Delight” bags with pre-packaged stuff.

Within the bag was a Chobani Greek yogurt, Wildest Coconut Cashew granola, and Nature’s Bakery Fig bar.

For my drink, I requested coffee. I know that airplane coffee is typically considered gross, but I felt like I needed the caffeine in order to be functional enough to get through immigration and over into the city of Rome!

I enjoyed all this, and I especially like putting the granola into the yogurt and mixing it up before eating it.

Lavatories in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

Main Cabin has a pretty generous amount of lavatories available. There are three located at Door 3, which include an accessible lavatory on the left side. And there are two located near the aft galley.

The ones closest to me were the Door 3 lavs.

I found them to be spacious enough and not coffin-like like on most of AA’s narrow body fleet.

During the 9.5 hours flight, I only used the lavatories twice. Once after dinner service, and that time the left mid-cabin lav was decently clean looking despite seeing many people use it towards the end of meal service. The other time I used it was about midflight, but I ended up using the aft left lavatory. I saw some sprinkles on the ground with bits of paper debris. 

In-Flight in American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin

Besides eating and attempting to sleep, I also took notes for this flight and watched movies. 

During dinner, I watched Lord of the Rings: War of the Rohirrim. And during the last few hours of flight, I watched Kraven the Hunter.

Sleep

I did attempt to sleep on this flight knowing that we’d be landing early in the morning and I had a full day on the ground in Rome. My first and only attempt was after dinner service. 

To make myself more comfortable, I brought my eye mask. And as I mentioned earlier, I brought my First Class slippers so I put those on. And because I got cold in the middle of the flight, I also had my pullover that I put on.

I wasn’t able to actually fall asleep. Just a lot of dozing off for about 2.5 hours before I decided to just stay up.

But what also made it tough to fall asleep was people bumping into my left shoulder a lot. I couldn’t really explain why that kept happening other than maybe I was allowing my arm and shoulder to spill out into the aisle more than I should have. So in order to somewhat correct that, I felt like I need to scrunch up in my seat.

Stories to Share

For the most part, this was an uneventful flight. Some crying babies at different points, but I had my noise canceling headphones on so that minimized that.

I did notice a Catholic priest sitting in the row in front of me and towards the window. I figured that I’d see more like him given the events surrounding this trip.

But the one major thing to share that was crazy was the turbulence in the last hour of the flight. This was a B777-200. It’s a big plane. But whatever turbulence we flew through caused very noticeable updrafts and downdrafts that were actually kind of scary. I think we flew through some clouds as there was bad weather somewhat nearby. Luckily, apart from some gasps, no one got panicky around me.

Lessons Learned

Aisle seats can suck. That’s the one lesson learned from this flight. I probably should have counted the times people bumped into my left arm and shoulder, but it was kind of a lot lol. I’m not sure why that was the case on this particular flight as I typically like sitting in aisle seats, and this hasn’t been a real problem for me.

Arrival into Rome

The scheduled arrival time was 8:05AM. However the in-flight systems said 7:30AM.

The captain made an announcement at 9 hours and 20 minutes into the flight that we would be landing in about 25 minutes.

I didn’t see much outside since I wasn’t by the window but what little I could see, I saw that it was morning and there were clouds.

We touched down at FCO at about 7:25AM local time then arrived at Terminal 3 a few minutes later. We deplaned via stairs and were bussed to the terminal. 

The total gate-to-gate time was 9 hours and 53 minutes.

Bottom Line

My tolerance for long flights is probably higher than most, and long flights in the back of the plane can be daunting for some, but I didn’t find this flight to be uncomfortable. The seat was adequate and functional enough to keep me comfortable all flight, and it helped that I didn’t have a large bag under the seat for me to take up my leg space so I could actually stretch out decently.

During the flight, there was plenty for me to stay occupied including meals and entertainment. The food was decently good as I didn’t waste any of it. While the service was friendly and efficient, I wish the flight attendants were a little more personable with passengers. The movie selection was okay, but I was still able to find movies I wanted to watch or saw that movies I like were also available on the system.

Turbulence towards the end of the flight was probably the most I’ve ever experienced on a widebody aircraft, and it was actually a little scary. But the pilots got everything under control for a smoother landing into FCO.

I wouldn’t be afraid to recommend flying from DFW to FCO in Main Cabin with American Airlines. For those seeking a less-privileged, no frills-yet-comfortable experience, then this flight was a good way to do it. Especially with using miles for an award ticket!

Would you have paid money or used miles for this experience in Main Cabin? Let me know down in the comments!

The post Review: American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin DFW-FCO appeared first on Where Is Randell?.

Not gonna lie—I’m stressed. But excited! Work is ramping up as we hit busy times for various projects, and because these projects have had some delays, they’re now kind of lining up on top of each other. Whatever. It’s fine. Everything’s fine. 

Despite all that, I’m super excited! This upcoming week I’ll be going to Rome for the first time in like 8 years! I actually booked everything back in November rather impulsively, but that’s the beauty of not using money to book flights and such, which I’ll share below.

Background on this trip to Rome

Several years ago (during the pandemic, I think), I learned about a young man who died of leukemia when he was 15 years old, in the early 2000’s. But in his short time on this earth, he was a remarkable individual. His name is Carlo Acutis, and he’s from Italy. 

I find Carlo to be remarkable because of his enthusiastic love for his faith and willingness to share that with others. A devout Catholic, he frequented going to Mass and was not afraid to befriend others and share his faith with them. He had a particular devotion to the Eucharist, and he created a website that talks about various Eucharistic miracles around the world (where the Communion wafer literally turned into flesh). The website is still online.

Additionally, Carlo was a nerd! Like…he learned programming languages so he could create that website. But what really resonates with me was that Carlo was also a video gamer! Apparently he played games like Mario, Pokémon, and Halo (I’m a fan of all three!), and he owned a PS2! (Which… those video game series aren’t on that console so hmmm…). I read books on Carlo, and he was self-aware enough to temper his playing of video games so as not to become addicted and distract him from God.

For more info about Carlo Acutis, here are 10 things to know about him.

With all that background, the reason why I’m going to Rome is because of Carlo Acutis’ canonization! This means that the Catholic Church will officially declare him a Saint (capital S)! He’s the first millennial saint to be canonized! (And first video gamer!).

Pope Francis announced his canonization date back in November 2024. As soon as I saw news about that, I immediately booked airfare and hotels. I’m glad I did that because I knew that the longer I waited, the costs would go up.

What my itinerary looks like

Let me slide in here and say that having points and miles is a great flexible way to book travel. I tend to hoard hotel points and airline miles, usually saving them for aspirational redemptions (like the world’s longest nonstop flight). But in this case, I’m glad I had enough hotel points and airline miles saved to book this trip impulsively. I’ll briefly talk about each booking and a little bit of my thought process for each, but the details of how I booked them will be shared in the reviews and trip report. 

Flight: American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin DFW-FCO

First thing’s first (let’s buckle those belts)–gotta get to Rome. As I am DFW-based, I needed a way to get to Rome.  Luckily, American Airlines runs a nonstop DFW-FCO flight. It wouldn’t have been a problem for me to connect to AA’s other hubs and onwards to Rome, but having a nonstop flight makes this convenient.

Because I’m approaching this trip with a pilgrimage mindset and trying to keep costs as low as possible, I opted to book only in the Main Cabin. I used miles. Besides, for review purposes, I don’t think I’ve reviewed AA’s B777-200 in economy yet.

Hotel: The Spring House Hotel

For the hotel, I wanted something Hilton since I’m a Hilton loyalist and Diamond member. Luckily, Hilton has added more hotels to its portfolio in Rome since the last time I was in town (which was 2017). I opted for The Spring House Hotel because it is conveniently located near St. Peter’s Square just outside the walls of the Vatican. That’s an easy walk. When I went to Mother Teresa’s canonization in 2016, I had stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn across Rome, and it took a while to get to St. Peter’s via the tram and walking. 

Also, I’ve never stayed at a Tapestry Collection brand of Hilton. These are a curated selection of hotels that “offer guests unique style and vibrant personality”. So I’m excited to see what makes it unique and different from the standard brands I’m familiar with.

Hilton lets you book with a combination of points and cash. And I did just that in order to book The Spring House. I didn’t want to burn a lot of my points in one go so this was an ideal option for me.

Hotel: Hilton Rome Airport

I’ve stayed at the Hilton Rome Airport before back in 2017. It’s a good Hilton hotel for the “one last night before my flight tomorrow” stay. And that’s exactly how I am treating it. I’ll be checking into this hotel after the canonization so I’m sure I’ll be tired and sweaty from the day’s activities and will be interested in chilling out.

For this hotel stay, I actually booked it with cash. My thought was I wanted to earn points to get my balance back up closer to 1 million Hilton points, lol. It’s gonna be an expensive one night stay, but that’s alright.

Flight: American Airlines B777-200 Main Cabin Extra FCO-DFW

Actually, I booked my flights as a round trip. But two weeks before this trip, I ended up semi-upgrading my Main Cabin seat to Main Cabin Extra. I figured the extra leg room on the way home would make it a little more comfortable. And I don’t recall this type of seat and aircraft being on my review queue.

The American Express Hilton Aspire credit card that I used to book the Hilton hotels above has an airline credit benefit. Basically every quarter, I can get up to $50 credit on purchases directly made with an airline on certain purchases. So I justified paying the upgrade to Main Cabin Extra knowing that I’ll get a good portion of it back in airline credit. It’s the same benefit I used to upgrade into First Class on my way home from Alaska last year.

Bottom Line

I’m excited to go on this trip to Rome for Carlo Acutis’ canonization. With two flights and two hotels booked, I’ll be reviewing each and posting those here. 

Honestly, apart from checking into each of these portions of this trip and attending the canonization, I don’t have any other rigid plans. I’ll have time to explore Rome for two days before the canonization. We’ll see what I end up doing!

So how would you have booked this itinerary? Lemme know down in the comments!

The post Booked: A Canonization in Rome! appeared first on Where Is Randell?.

Flight Info

Summary

The world’s longest flight clocks in at about 18 hours with over 9500 miles of flight distance, and Business Class on Singapore Airlines’ special configured A350-900ULR aircraft delivers a delightful and comfortable experience to help passengers endure such a long flight.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Booking Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

Booking this flight was part of a grand scheme to synergize the following: 1) visit all of my family members in 2024, 2) attend Pokémon Go Fest 2024 in NYC, and 3) knock out a bucket list item of flying on the world’s longest nonstop commercial flight. This is the second flight from this trip, and you can read about my incoming flight to New York in American Airlines B737-800 Main Cabin Extra from DFW to JFK.

Really, the Pokémon Go Fest opportunity showed itself first, then I forced the other two to happen within the same trip, haha. 

To be honest, I’ve been wanting to book this flight for several years now, but the pandemic and other logistics put this on the back burner. I more seriously considered booking it back in 2023, but I transitioned jobs and companies so I had to postpone. I wanted to experience the world’s longest flight by being bougie sitting up in the front of the plane in Business Class. Luckily it all lined up this time! 

About three months before departure, I transferred 145,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points to the KrisFlyer program. This was the cost of Business class for this flight. How did I earn that many rewards points? For the past several years, I tried to utilize the bonus categories in the “Chase Trifecta”, which includes the Chase Sapphire Reserve (for travel and dining), Chase Freedom Unlimited (for everyday spend), and Chase Freedom (for quarterly bonuses).

Because the transfer isn’t instantaneous, I had to wait a few days before the Chase points showed up as KrisFlyer miles. After they transferred successfully, I sat down to book and saw that some saver awards were available for 115,500 miles. After tweaking my travel plans, I went ahead and booked the saver award! The other nice thing was that this was a confirmed award and NOT waitlisted, meaning that I didn’t have to be anxious about whether Singapore Airlines would confirm the award in the weeks leading up to departure. 

I also looked up how much it would have cost me to book this ticket with cash, and that ended up being $3465.30 USD. This means the redemption was about 3 cents per mile, which is pretty dang good.

In the month or so before departure, I was able to pre-order my meals. Singapore Airlines offer its premium cabin passengers to “Book the Cook” on certain routes that are long enough in duration. The menu is very wide and extensive if offered. More info can be found here.

Here were my options for “Book the Cook”…starting with the main courses:

There were also options for Western cuisine and Asian cuisine.

A la carte entrees were also available to select.

And then for those with special dietary needs, there are a good handful of options too.

I realized I accidentally forgot to take a screenshot of the religious meal options, but rest assured Singapore Airlines does have kosher, hallal, etc.

After flipping through these options for a good, short while, I ended up deciding on the braised beef cheek and the pan roasted golden marinated chicken. You can read more about these below in the Food and Drink section.

Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Aircraft

Singapore Airlines uses a special configured Airbus A350-900ULR for the world’s longest flight. These aircraft are meant to fly efficiently from short-haul to ultra-long-range routes. With the A350, Airbus made significant improvements in performance, weight savings, and other design innovations to make the aircraft a more comfortable ride for passengers while offering cost-savings and sustainability for airlines. The “ULR” designation means “Ultra Long Range”. Singapore Airlines was the launch customer for this particular variant of the A350-900.

What makes Singapore Airlines’ A350-900ULR special for this route is that it only has two cabins: Business and Premium Economy! No First Class nor Economy Class. And for an 18 hour flight, that’s probably not a bad thing to have more premium-type seats available, haha.

Check out this layout on Aerolopa to see the aircraft’s configuration.

Packing for Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

I don’t think I specifically packed anything special for this really long flight. Except maybe my eye mask. I have a fancy TempurPedic eye mask that I obtained earlier in 2024, and it effectively blocks out light while still being comfortable to use. It definitely came in handy when I tried to sleep since the cabin, though dark during sleep mode, still had bright-enough lights.

Also, I did only take a rollaboard carry on and a backpack with me on this trip. The rollaboard went up in the bin, and the backpack stayed in the seat with me. I kept things I thought I would need during the flight in my backpack like my toiletries and a change of comfortable clothes.

Check In and Security/Customs at JFK

To check in for this flight, I actually used the app. I received a notification about 48 hours before departure that it would be possible to check in. Weirdly, I couldn’t do it online—I had to check in via the app. Additionally, I had to fill out an electronic arrival card within 3 days prior to arrival. Singapore has a separate government website to handle this task. 24 hours before departure, I was able to add my boarding pass to my Apple Wallet.

By design and savvy travel experience, I didn’t have bags to check as I only had my backpack and carry on rollaboard. I wanted maximum flexibility for later portions of my trip where I’d be flying other airlines using nonrevenue standby as the means of flying, and not checking in bags affords that flexibility.

My cousin and her husband drove me to JFK all the way from southern Newark, New Jersey. They dropped me off at Terminal 4. I went into the departure hall at about 6:50PM and started looking for Singapore Airlines.

Singapore Airlines’ check in booths were in Row 7 so I made my way over there. They had lines for First Class, Business Class, and Premium Economy. I got in line, not realizing that I had gotten into the Premium Economy line which hardly moved. An employee directed me to the Business Class check in line, and that went much faster. 

Ultimately I wanted my paper ticket, and definitely got that when I finally talked to the ticket agent. He also told me about access to the Prime Class and Air India lounges, and printed off an access pass for me to take to those lounges.

Regarding going through airport security, it took me a while to find out where TSA PreCheck was located. Apparently it was all the way to the right at Row 1. The line itself wasn’t too bad, but I had to wait maybe like less than 10 minutes. Fortunately, I didn’t get randomly selected for enhanced screening, and I was on my merry way to go experience some lounges!

Before I went lounge hopping, I actually wandered around the terminal a little bit to get the lay of the land. I had never been to the international terminal at JFK and wanted to see what it was like like restaurants and shops offered.

I couldn’t help but notice this display utilizing airline seats facing a screen advertising a business…

After enjoying random airline seats I saw in the terminal, I beelined towards the first lounge.

Lounges at JFK

First of all, I should mention that by virtue of sitting in a premium class with Singapore Airlines departing from JFK airport, I had access to the Air India Maharaja lounge and the Prime Class lounge. However, these are also Priority Pass lounges! 

And because I also have Priority Pass via my Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card, I also have access to the Chase Sapphire lounge (that also doubles as the Etihad Airways lounge).

One caveat I learned while lounge hopping is that the Singapore Airlines premium class lounge access benefit only works for one lounge and only one time, either Maharaja or Prime Class. This wasn’t a problem because while I did access Prime Class first and used the premium class lounge access benefit, I used Priority Pass for Maharaja.

I actually got to experience all three lounges. If I had to rank them, I’d put them in this order:

• Chase Sapphire Lounge
• Air India Maharaja Lounge
• Prime Class Lounge

Let’s start with the worst…

Prime Class Lounge

The Prime Class Lounge is located by gate A2, basically right before you turn the corner to go down the hallway for the other A gates.

Inside, there are various space including a dining area and sitting areas.

For sitting areas, there are couches all over. The space isn’t entirely too big, but I found there were plenty of empty seats around. The other immediately obvious thing is that there are no windows! The lounge is interior and doesn’t share outside walls with the terminal. It almost gives you basement-level hospital cafeteria feels.

The dining area had various hot and cold foods, snacks, drinks, and a small bar that wasn’t attended but required flagging down someone for help to obtain alcoholic drinks. I did not partake, even though I kind of wanted to.

For food, I thought that none of it looked appealing to me, but I did go for the tomato basil soup to whet my appetite. It was just okay, and just lukewarm. I also saw that they used paper plates for everything, which doesn’t express class in a prime way, in my opinion. Despite being a small lounge, I was still somewhat impressed with the spread of food that was offered.

I didn’t look too hard, but I didn’t immediately see if any restrooms were available.

In general, I thought the lounge was kept well. Sure, some wear and tear on the furnishings and whatnot, but nothing egregious. It has decent amount of space as I didn’t feel like I was having to be shoulder buddies with other passengers.

Honestly, I wouldn’t come here to the Prime Class Lounge again given that there are better options available or if the other options are too full. I only stayed for about 15 minutes. And that’s all I needed, lol.

Air India Maharaja Lounge

The Air India Maharaja lounge is located somewhat near gate A4, but you have to go upstairs. It is right next to the Emirates lounge. I think I recall getting a little confused trying to find where I can go upstairs, but I eventually found it.

As far as spaces go, there’s only really one space. It is all basically like one medium-sized dining area. When I walked into the lounge, it was pretty full. I had a difficult time finding an open seat as people were hogging spaces. After a few minutes, I finally found an open seat/table up against the opposite wall of the lounge from the entrance.

I wasn’t too hungry walking into this lounge, but I noticed that the food offerings were very Indian. A selection of Indian food were available like rice and various curries. Snacks were also available, similar to the Primeclass lounge. I also appreciated how there were self-pour alcohols available.

I didn’t happen to see naan, but if there were any, I totally would have grabbed some. Otherwise, I got a plate of basmati rice and butter chicken. Both seemed kind of cold, which was disappointing.

One of my favorite aspects of this lounge was the fact that it actually had windows! Yes! To the outside! You can actually see the adjacent gates!

For restrooms, I didn’t notice them walking into the lounge, but on my way out, I saw a sign that pointed towards them. I didn’t end up using restrooms here.

I somehow only spent 10 minutes in this lounge between finding a seat, taking pics, and eating some food. Would I go back? Maybe, but like with Prime Class, only if the other options are full. I dig the fact that there are windows, I do like Indian food, but I’m not a fan how it was a struggle to find a seat. Bad timing, I suppose.

Chase Sapphire Lounge

This lounge was the star of the show! Chase has been opening up Sapphire branded lounges at various airports, and I believe the one at JFK was one of the first ones. 

The Chase Sapphire Lounge is located at A2 on the mezzanine level. It is not clearly marked to go upstairs. The alternate method is to make an immediate left after passing through security and head down the hallway.

For access, you need to be a Chase Sapphire card holder with Priority Pass enabled. When I checked in, they told me I had to waitlist and quoted around 30-40 minutes wait time to get in. I gave my cell phone number for them to text back when space was available. I then meandered around the terminal to kill time, then stopped for a while in a quiet place to charge my phone with my power bank.

Once I got the text, I got back in line and was admitted in.

Inside, the lounge has a bar area, seating areas in the main space, some secluded seating areas in a back area, and dining areas somewhat lining the entire length of the lounge. The food and drink areas are in the middle, with restrooms adjacent in the back. The lounge also has a “reflection area”, which is probably just the fancy name for quiet zone.

For food, there were various hot foods and cold foods served as small plates. Desserts as well. However, at every table is a QR code where you can order more premium small plates and drinks too and have that delivered right to your table.

Apparently the Sapphire burger was a popular choice based on what I saw at others’ tables, but I decided not to order premium food knowing that I’d eat well on board.

I did order a cocktail, though! And I grabbed a little food from the buffet areas with hot food. Additionally, there were juices and cold brew offered in addition to the typical airline lounge espresso/coffee machine.

Walking around to the various food areas, I took pics of what food was offered. Looks like a great spread! I love that everything is in these little hors d’oeuvre plates or bowls, like in a fancy hotel executive lounge. Buffet style is more practical, but this has better presentation.

A cart with wraps magically appeared at some point while I was going around taking pictures of things.

After I was done walking around and taking pictures, I noticed some proper tables opened up, and I decided to move my stuff. I had more space to spread out and also bust out my iPad to take notes more efficiently. During this time, I also ordered the “Sapphire”. This drink had a lot going on, but it was tasty!

I used the restrooms once, and I found them to be clean. They offer Apotheke products. For showers, I believe I only saw one shower available.

All in all, this was a great lounge providing a chic experience. Well worth the wait, and I wish I had gone here originally! I would definitely return here again and would recommend this lounge over the other two I visited!

Boarding Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

Boarding was scheduled for 10:00PM at JFK Terminal 4 Gate A4.

After hopping between the different lounges for a while, I headed to the gate about 30 minutes before boarding so that I could refill my water bottle and be at the gate early to not miss out on how the boarding process looks like, haha.

I sat down nearby to wait it out, but that made for a grave error as I ended up being like 30 or so in line to board. Boarding started at 10:05PM. I’m not so sure about boarding groups as everyone seemed to have gotten in line according to Business or Premium Economy.

Once on board, I showed the flight attendant my ticket, and they directed me to turn left towards my seat at 16A. After I got settled in, they offered a pre-departure drink of either orange juice or water, which I took water. I was also given a hot towel—nice touch! Japan Airlines doesn’t even do that at boarding time!

Departure for Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

This flight was scheduled to depart at 10:30PM. Considering that boarding started at 10:05PM, somehow boarding was complete at 10:15PM. I suspect that the passenger density is low for the layout of this aircraft so it didn’t take very long. The door closed at 10:20PM, and we pushed back 5 minutes later. We had a long taxi and ended up asking off at about 11:12PM.

This was my first time on an A350, I think, and I couldn’t help but notice how quiet the engines were with a low to mid hum. The takeoff was really smooth, and once in the air, we banked towards the right then left to head north.

Cabin for Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

I feel like I always have to look this up, but according to Aerolopa, there are 67 Business Class seats total in two cabins: 23 and 44. My seat was in the smaller and more forward of the two cabins.

When I boarded the plane, I noticed that there are no bins in the center of the aircraft, nor were there air vents. Luckily, even though I had to share my bin with the passenger sitting across from me, there were no issues with space. I put my rollaboard luggage up in the bin and my backpack in the storage area in my seat. The seats are in 1-2-1 configuration, and my seat was on the left-hand side at the windows.

Seats in Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

My Business Class seat on this Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR flight was 16A, the aft-most seat in the 23-seat cabin on the left side of the aircraft by the window. 

These seats are manufactured by Jamco, but I am not sure what model of seat. These seats have a lot of features!

• Cocktail tray shelf
• Front storage for small items
• Sliding mirror
• Push-to-use coat hook
• 18” IFE Monitor and controller
• In-seat storage containing a bottle of water and headphones
• Literature pocket with safety card, menu, WiFi pamphlet, and shopping catalog
• Laptop/tablet storage
• Reading lights (both sides)
• Headset plugs (both sides)
• Power and connection ports
• Tray table
  • Height adjustable!
• Seat controls
• Ottoman for bed mode
  • Not reachable while seat is upright, and it is at an angle
• Under seat storage
  • Can fit shoes only pretty much

And now some pictures to highlight some of these seat features…

Regarding the seat, I thought that it was very spacious, had a lot of thoughtful features, and I had a few struggles with it. I liked that the seat controls are all on the aisle side so that they are out of the way on the counter/table space, but at the same time I was often paranoid throughout the flight that I’d accidentally hit a button. The most clever feature I thought the seat had is its bed mode—when you fold the back of the seat down, it reveals the bedding and sleep pad. Bed mode also has its own seat belt that’s more generous for putting around your blanket and self. See Sleep section below.

Speaking of bed mode, the footwell is kind of small, and I think taller people would have issues with this (I am 5’ 8”). This is also probably the most frequent complaint about this seat on the Internet. Another issue I had was if I used the pillow for lumbar support, it would push me too close to the tray table’s edge when deployed. It didn’t seem like the tray table had much forward-aft direction movement, but it is height adjustable. Lastly, when I tried to relax in the seat in a reclined position, I couldn’t use the footwell very well because of the angle and how the back of the seat remains facing forward.

Amenity Kit on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

So unlike most other airlines, the amenity kit on Singapore Airlines has to specifically be requested. I missed the boat having boarded in the last half of Business Class, and they had run out of Business Class amenity kits by the time I got settled in my seats.

Even still, the flight attendants were able to give me a Premium Economy amenity kit. Contained within that kit were slippers, lip balm, and an eye mask. A flight attendant did give me the Business Class slippers at least, and those seemed more robust. I didn’t take pictures because the kit was underwhelming, and the materials felt like it used recycled materials, which is great, but also didn’t feel Business Class-caliber.

While it seems like that isn’t a lot of stuff within the amenity kit, Singapore Airlines does stock its premium cabin lavatories with more items. Toothbrushes, razors, sanitary napkins, and motion sickness bags are provided in them or they can be requested from the flight attendants.

Service on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

I am not sure how to describe the service provided by the flight attendants other than it was efficient but also a frenzy? Seemed like there was a good handful of flight attendants serving everyone in Business Class.

I’ve been starting to time the flow of things with these flight reviews. 10 minutes after takeoff, they started with the drink service. At about 22 minutes in is when I received my red wine and warm nuts. At 1 hour and 4 minutes, I got my appetizer and a refill on my drink. Within the next 20 minutes, I got bread from the bread basket as well as my main entree. Just under 2 hours from takeoff, my tray was taken up, and almost immediately after that, they turned down the lights. All in all, the main meal service was done in about 2 hours.

During boarding, a flight attendant came around to confirm everyone’s orders for the dinner service. Apparently my pre-selections didn’t save! However, I was still able to order the same thing I pre-ordered. Later on the flight attendant apologized saying it was a mistake, and reconfirmed my pre-orders. Whew. I wasn’t worried about this at all and knew that whatever meal I ended up with would be delicious either way. And I didn’t pre-order anything super specialized or anything.

Overall, I thought the service was efficient but perhaps maybe not as attentive as my previous experience in Suites Class with Singapore Airlines.

The other meal times were more relaxed as they didn’t require as much set up and plating as dinner.

Mid-flight meal happened around 8 hours into the flight.

Pre-Arrival meal happened at around 10.5 hours.

Food and Drink on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

Singapore Airlines has a “Book the Cook” option for premium passengers like I mentioned in the Booking section above. When you manage your booking online before departure, you have way, way more options of food to preorder than the ones that’ll be in the published menu for the flight. 

Either way, here are pics of the menu, including chefs, amenities, and food.

And here are the pages of the menu featuring alcoholic drinks:

And if you don’t want anything alcoholic, there are many options here too:

I didn’t pre-select anything too far off the main options for “Book the Cook” as I wanted to try what was intended for this flight.

Dinner Service

While the flight attendants were heating everyone’s main dishes, some flight attendants were going through the cabin and giving everyone their selected drink along with mixed nuts. For my drink, I selected the 2019 Chataeau La Cordonne red wine to eventually pair that with my beef cheek. The red wine tasted great with notes of oak spice, dark red fruit, and some earthy tones. The mixed nuts weren’t salty, which was nice.

For the starter, the smoked trout was delicious, and it paired well with the vinaigrette used on the salad. The trout definitely tasted smoked and sour overall, but deliciously so!

The garlic bread is also a popular Singapore Airlines meal accompaniment, and I found it to be soft and buttery.

Now, the braised beef cheek in the red wine sauce was very nice and tender. Somewhat fatty, but also some pieces were dry but the sauce helped. The tomato butter added complementary flavors and a fatty base to the meat resulting in deliciousness. To balance it all out, the cornbread was pretty great. And the spinach and carrots were great as well.

For dessert, I had the chocolate cherry mogador. I found it to be decadent and light with a good balance between chocolate and cherry flavors.

Overall, I loved how dinner was light. I didn’t feel heavy, bloated, or uncomfortable after consuming all this food and drink, haha. 

After dinner, I stayed up for a little while then got ready for bed (see below).

Mid-Flight Meal

Somehow I slept like a rock for 4 hours and woke up hungry. But not too hungry. Seeing that I was awake, the flight attendants offered me tea and a snack, which I selected a banana. Had to have some potassium going.

After making notes and watching some episodes of The Simpsons, I ended up ordering the noodles with braised beef at about 8 hours into the flight. It was basically like a hearty soup with a big chunk of braised beef. The broth and beef were very flavorful, but I found the noodles to just be okay. I suppose they’re difficult to keep hours into a long flight.

I also ordered a SilverKris Sling, which is Singapore Airlines’ speciality cocktail that is a variant of the famous Singapore Sling. It reminded me a lot of a mimosa but with more…flavor? Alcohol? Lol.

Same thing as dinner service–I thought it was all light and good and didn’t feel uncomfortable eating all this food afterwards.

Pre-Arrival Meal

About 10.5 hours into the flight, they served the pre-arrival meal. For this meal, I selected the golden marinated chicken. 

But first came a salad with some shrimp, blackberries, and way too many croutons, haha. It was still good. The FA’s also came around with the bread basket, and I selected another garlic bread and a darker bread.

I thought the golden marinated chicken was really good, but the couscous and veggies didn’t have a lot of flavor to them. 

The dessert for this meal was an apple cake served with berries and sauce. It was very good, but the cake was kind of dense. Almost as if it wasn’t made with traditional flour.

Pre-Arrival Snack

With several hours left before landing, I ordered an actual Singapore Sling.

It was fruity, and I didn’t even taste the alcohol!

And I also went to the galley and grabbed a tomato and cucumber sandwich. I forget what dressing it had, but I found it to be kind of dry except for the veggies within.

All in all, I enjoyed everything I ate on board this Singapore Airlines flight from JFK to SIN. It’s always nice to be able to enjoy finer dining at 35,000 feet! Just lacking caviar, but that’s more of a First Class/Suites Class experience on Singapore Airlines, haha.

Entertainment and WiFi on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

The 18” monitor houses all the entertainment content. I just found it weird that the screen isn’t touch at all despite being close enough to touch! The controller in the seat controls everything on the screen. However, even with the controller I found the system to be very responsive and easy to navigate and flip through.

For content, I saw there were 401 movies, a handful of Live TV channels, 190 TV show episodes, 784 music tracks, and the in-flight shopping channel. Of course there were also flight maps, in-flight menu, WiFi info, and more.

The movies were split up into different genres and categories as well as by languages or countries. Similarly for the TV shows.

The music channels had a wide variety of music in different languages as well.

I didn’t check these out, but games and audiobooks were also available on the system.

Lastly, I don’t think you can connect Bluetooth headsets to the system, but I do not know that for a fact. I utilized my own Bose QC20 earbuds, and didn’t use the included noise cancelling headset.

WiFi

Apparently the WiFi system doesn’t work until cruising altitude. And wandering around the entertainment system, there’s a disclaimer that the JFK-SIN route loses satellite signal over the Arctic for about 2 hours. But we didn’t fly up there due to…not flying over Russian airspace.

How much is WiFi on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class?

It’s actually free if you’re seated in First Class, Suites Class, or Business Class. And depending on your KrisFlyer status, it can be free as well.

Otherwise…

• $15.99 USD for the full flight
• $8.99 USD for 3 hours
• $3.99 USD for 1 hour

How fast is WiFi on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class?

I ran a speed test and found it to be:

• 56 mbps download (dang, that’s really good)
• 5.52 mbps upload (kinda poor…)
• 785 ms ping (yikes, that’s …laggy)

I didn’t really use the WiFi much except maybe attempt to send friends texts or doomscroll a bit on social media lol.

Lavatories on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

This is kind of crazy, but there are only two lavatories closest to the front Business Class cabin located at Door 2 (or in the galley area that splits Business Class). The one closest to me was the left-hand side lavatory, and it was basically right behind me. 

Unfortunately the sink in this lavatory closest to me was inoperative the entire flight, but the flight attendants provided large water bottles for hand washing.

As mentioned above with the amenity kit, standard amenity kit items are stocked in a drawer in the lavatories for Singapore Airlines.

I did use the lavatories quite a few times throughout the flight. A few times before we took off (lol I had a lot of water before boarding) and once before dinner service. I saw that the lavatories were pretty clean at these times. And then throughout the remainder of the flight, I saw that both lavs were kept clean with things always refilled (including the water bottles, haha).

In Flight on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

So what did I do during the flight?

I watched a few things:

• The Flash during dinner
• The Simpsons during mid-flight meal
• Demolition Man during pre-arrival meal
• The Acolyte on my iPad in the last several hours of the flight

Obviously I also ate food! And drank drinks! And used the lavs lol.

I also slept…which leads me to…

Sleep on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR Business Class

I did intend to sleep on this flight. With it being such a long flight, I knew that even falling asleep for several hours (perhaps multiple times), I’d still have time to enjoy the amenities and features of the flight.

The first time I went to bed was about 3 hours into the flight after dinner service. When I started getting ready for bed, the flight attendant helped convert my seat into a bed. It’s really cool because the back of the seat flips down to reveal the pillow, blanket, and bedding. And once the seat is in bed mode, there’s a separate seat belt you can put over yourself and blanket. Most lie-flat seats I’ve experienced use the same seat belt!

To get comfortable, I changed into sweat pants and a t-shirt. I also rearranged the pillows in different configurations to find something more comfortable, but they were big and firm, which I like a lot. 

The one struggle I had with sleeping was the footwell. And this seems to be the most frequent complaint about these seats too from other passengers/travel bloggers. The footwell is at an angle, but the seat stays facing forward so you’re at a weird angle. And the footwell is kind of small. 

Other than that, I was able to sleep pretty solidly for 3 hours after dinner. The bed was comfy enough and firm, but not too firm. Also the cabin wasn’t noticeably warm, which I find to be the case on American Airlines or Japan Airlines flights. I never felt too cold or too hot at any point during the flight.

I did try to sleep again after the mid-flight meal, but it was maybe like 1.5 hours that I was able to fall asleep.

Stories to Share

So you know that somewhat recent travel trend of people “raw dogging” flights? Apparently it was a tiktok trend because OF COURSE. Raw dogging flights is where you don’t do anything on really long flights. Like, stare at nothing. Or similar. With all that said, the old man sitting across the aisle from me watched the flight maps like the entire time he was awake. I mean, as an aviation geek, I can appreciate that, haha, but still…

There was a point where the purser of the flight came and introduced himself. We were able to chat about sleep, long layovers, and Frankfurt. Pretty cool. I love having more personal interactions with crew like that.

Flighty was showing me that this flight goes over the Arctic and down and thru Russia and China before going down to Singapore, but in reality we didn’t do that. We actually flew eastward towards Europe, through the Middle East to India, then downwards towards Singapore. I wasn’t sure if Singapore Airlines had permission to fly over Russia, but either way I’m glad we didn’t.

And lastly, how did I feel after being up in the air for 18 hours? I ended up feeling kinda bloated despite not feeling too burdened by all the food and drink. Surprisingly I was not tired when we landed and whatever sleep I got was high quality enough. Honestly, the flight didn’t feel terribly too long probably because I was comfortable and everything I needed was fairly convenient. At the end of the flight, I also used the lav to refresh myself: brushed my teeth, washed my face, shaved, etc.

Arrival at SIN

We were scheduled to arrive at about 5:30AM Singapore time. An announcement came over the intercom at about 17 hours and 12 minutes into the flight that we’d be landing in about 45 minutes. 

The “prepare for landing” announcement came at 4:49AM local time. 

I couldn’t see out the window because it was dark at the time, but remembering my last flight into Singapore back in 2018, I know that the approach into Changi International is pretty cool with various islands and boats and such so it’s a shame that I didn’t see that again.

We touched down at 5:06AM. The landing was a little shaky but not abrupt. Then we arrived at Gate E22 at about 5:17AM.

Deplaning didn’t take very long as I was at the back of Business Class, and the boarding door was right behind me. And going through Customs at Singapore Changi was pretty easy as they now use automated gates. I was out of the airport and ready for my Grab taxi probably within 10 minutes of deplaning.

Takeaways from the World’s Longest Flight

I have a few takeaways from the world’s longest flight. The flight was long, and probably a few hours longer than the previous longest flights that I’ve ever taken, but between the aircraft, food, service, and seat, I was able to endure this flight comfortably.

Now, I did have one major anxiety about this flight, and that was whether we’d actually be flying over Russia. Given recent geo-political tensions, any flight path through or around Russia is enough to make one wonder. And it certainly didn’t help when Flighty, the in-flight flight map, and other flight maps online showed that this flight as going through Russia. Thankfully, that was not the reality, and despite avoiding Russia, the flight time still maintained its approximate 18 hours.

Despite the really long flight, I never felt cooped up with cabin fever or anything. Admittedly, I have spent a lot of time in the air over the past several years often in less-than-Singapore-Airlines-Business-Class situations so my barometer for flight comfort is more skewed than a typical passenger. Apart from getting up to use the lavatories, I didn’t feel the need to do stretches or anything awkwardly in the aisle or exit door areas. Looking around at other passengers, I think most of them slept through much of the flight, and I saw a few who did laps or stretch. I would imagine that if I had the Premium Economy seat in the back, I probably would have needed to stretch out more.

Looking back, I could have done a better job at keeping myself properly hydrated throughout the flight. That would have helped with the discomfort I felt towards the end with bloating and such. It would not have been a problem to bother the flight attendants for more water or other drinks. I probably could have eased up on the alcohol too, but I wanted to try the cocktails on board! Lol.

Would I recommend this flight to others? Absolutely! I know the flight time is intimidating, but with proper preparation and onboard self-care, I think it can be a pleasant and comfortable flight and dare I say even joyfully enjoyable!

Bottom Line

The world’s longest flight is currently Singapore Airlines’ flight between New York JFK and Singapore. Using a special configured A350-900ULR, the flight comes in at 9,537 miles and about 18 hours of flight time, which is an incredible amount of time to spend up in the air.

Despite the lengthy flight time, Singapore Airlines Business Class provides much to keep a passenger fed, entertained, and comfortable. Service included three delicious meals with an extensive menu of food and drinks as well as light snacks available in-between meal services. WiFi is free, and the entertainment system is packed full of various content to watch or listen. The full-featured seat was clever with its functions, and while it may have been uncomfortable in bed mode due to the footwell, the experience still allowed for restful sleep.

Lastly, booking Business Class with miles on Singapore Airlines A350-900ULR is a fantastic deal! It is incredible value if booking a Saver Award because Singapore Airlines delivers a delightful and comfortable experience on the world’s longest flight.

What do you think of this flight? Would you be wiling to fly 18 hours on a plane? Comment below!

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