8:00 am Bangkok, Thailand (BKK) to Hong Kong, Hong Kong (HKG)
Thai Airways Flight 600 First Class Seats 2J, 2K
Duration: 2h 45m Boeing 747 1,063 miles traveled

We got up early for our 8am departure, wanting to take as much advantage of the Thai Airways Bangkok departure experience as possible. We caught the shuttle over to the airport just before 5am, and had the driver stop at the first dropoff area, the First/Business Class check-in. The driver took our bags out of the back of the van, I nodded over to one of the waiting porters who came over, I told him first class and he loaded up our bags and brought us over to the first class checkin lounge.

We had a seat, handed our passports over to the Thai Airways agent, and waited. And waited.

I finally got up to ask what was taking so long, it had been 15 minutes! The agent told me everything was fine, he’d be over in just a moment. Five minutes later he brought us boarding passes… for our BKK-HKG segment only, and we were continuing on to Seoul on Asiana. Apparently he couldn’t get his system to print the Asiana boarding passes, and we’d have to visit the transfer desk in Hong Kong for those. Our bags were checked the whole way, though, and he and a porter took our carryons and walked us over through first class passport control.

Once through the immigration formalities, naturally with no one else waiting, we walked down an escalator and our concierge invited us onboard the waiting golf cart for the short drive through the business class lounge to the first class lounge. He walked us inside, let the staff know who we were, and we were escorted to one of the private rooms on the side with a coach, chair, and flat screen TV.

We visited the food room, where we pointed at the items we were interested in. I had some wonton soup, as I usually do, and they also brought me a cappuccino.

I let them know that I wanted to visit the spa, and chose the hour-long full body massage

I only waited a moment in the spa waiting area, as soon as I sat down and they brought me a cold cloth and drink I was escorted into the first class area to my treatment room.

I was invited to take a shower, standard practice there but perfect as I hadn’t yet taken one before coming over to the airport from the Novotel. The towels are comfortable and the showers have full-sized L’Occitane bath amenities. I was the first person using the facilities of the day, the amenities were full, the only complaint I had was that the water took quite awhile to warm up.

During my shower the masseuse waited in the treatment room. I enjoyed a wonderfully relaxing massage, nearly unaware that I was in an airport. On rare occasion though an announcement could be heard coming from the terminal.

After my massage it was back into the bathroom for another quick shower to wash off the massage oils, while again my therapist waited in the next room until I was ready so she could escort me the 50 feet to the post-treatment area.

They advertise the full body massage as 75 minutes I think, and with a shower before and after it takes about that long in total. The actual massage is more like 55 minutes I’d guess. I went over at 6 am, and was back in the lounge at 7:20 am, about 15 minutes before they came over to take us over to our Hong Kong flight. (I seem to recall my last massage being a little longer, perhaps they adjust the time based on how much time remains before a flight? It wouldn’t surprise me in the least though I’ve never asked.)