Airplanes have always intrigued me, so to fly the biggest commercial airliner in the world, the Airbus A380, is an exciting event for me! On my way from Amsterdam to Hong Kong, I flew with Emirates from Amsterdam to Dubai, the first leg of my itinerary.

The A380 is the only airplane with two full-length decks: the lower deck where the economy seats are located and the upper deck for first and business class passengers. That is, Emirates’ A380’s are designed this way.

I was seated in Economy Class on the main deck, in a window seat on the right side of the aircraft. I was quite happy with my seat. 🙂 It was spacious and I had plenty of leg room. When I reclined my seat, the bottom part slid forward a little, adding to my comfort.

I had a personal entertainment system, with a large screen and great selection of newly released movies. I ended up watching Impossible, the movie that tells the story of a family in Thailand caught in the destruction and chaotic aftermath of the 2004 tsunami. A very touching movie.

I was pleasantly surprised that my seat came with a electrical socket and USB connection to charge my electrical devices. This is a great feature, especially for long-haul flights. I didn’t have to worry about my devices running out of battery!

The entertainment system also provided three different camera views, one facing down and two facing forward. This is nice if you’re sitting next to the wing and the window view isn’t great.

Now to the food service. A nice little menu was distributed at the start of the flight, showing the different menu options. The menu looked nice and offered a starter, main course (two options) and desert. I went for the Lamb Biryani. Definitely one of the better meals I’ve had in Economy class.

More and more airlines are installing WIFI services on their airplanes, and Emirates is no exception. It’s provided by OnAir. Instead of buying access for a certain amount of time, you have to purchase a certain amount of data. It was quite expensive, $10 for 30mb. Just about enough for typical smartphone use, checking email, Facebook etc. I ended up buying more to listen to a live radio report of my favorite football team trying to qualify for the Champions League. Unfortunately, they lost :(.

I can only think of one drawback of the A380. Because of the design with two decks, the A380 has a wide fuselage. This means that there is some space between the window seats and the fuselage. One the one hand, this gives you extra space, but the drawback is that it makes it harder to rest your head against it when you want to go to sleep. But, as you can see in the picture below, I still managed to make myself comfortable :).

All in all I have to say my flight was certainly a very pleasant one, probably the best I’ve had in economy class. Find out more about Emirates or check out the Emirates A380 seat map on Seatguru.

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