logo
This economy class feels unusually spacious (unless I'm imagining it)

This economy class feels unusually spacious (unless I'm imagining it)

The Age28-04-2025

Row 42 is part of a three-row block, immediately behind premium economy, that's classified as 'preferred' seats, primarily because they allow the pleasure of a quick exit on landing. Is it worth the extra $80? Probably not. Seats are in a 3-3-3 alignment, and each seat is 18 inches (46 centimetres) wide with a pitch of 32 inches (81 centimetres). It feels surprisingly spacious, with a good 10 centimetres between the seat in front and my knees, and no jousting of elbows with my neighbour. For a time, I wonder if it's really as spacious as I'm imagining, or is it the plane's wood-trim partitions creating a sense of space? The former, I decide, as I comfortably cruise through the night into Asia.
Entertainment + tech
The wide seatback screen offers four movie channels, from new releases to family and favourites. Movies on the favourites channel are of the flavour of Father of the Bride, Indiana Jones and a multitude of Marvels. TV selections include a dedicated manga channel, and there's a good selection of CDs, including blues and jazz, Japanese, classical, opera and a Solid Gold Hits that looks like it was curated by your Uncle Wayne – Bon Jovi, Air Supply, ABBA. The screen also features an e-reader, though it wouldn't load on my flight and eventually crashed my system. Onboard Wi-Fi ranges from a 15MB Lite package ($US3.25/$5) to a 24-hour package (US$21.95/$34.50), with the neat touch of being able to reconnect a purchase from a previous flight.
Service
What I want from a 12.35am departure is a quick turnaround of the first meal. It's all going to plan when the dinner tray wheels out 30 minutes after takeoff, only to be foiled by turbulence. Eventually dinner arrives, and we're then left to sleep through the rest of the flight before a gentle breakfast wake-up.
Food
The dinner meal is a choice between steamed black-bean fish fillet and – curiously – Hungarian pork goulash with mashed potatoes. While it's not the most Hungarian of goulashes, I think you can deduce much about a flight's food through its mashed spuds, and these are good. Together, the two meals (including breakfast of stir-fried chicken and shrimp noodles) are among the better economy feeds I've had in recent times. The drinks selection even has the enticements of a passionfruit lemon cocktail, a highball and an oolong blackcurrant cocktail.
Sustainability
China Airlines has been using sustainable aviation fuels on new A350-900 planes since 2017, touting an 8 per cent reduction in emissions. The airline has set a net-zero carbon target of 2050. *
One more thing
If you're transiting through Taipei (China Airlines flights connect to the likes of London, Rome and Vancouver) and have a layover of more than seven hours, Taipei Taoyuan airport offers a free half-day tour of Taipei.
The price
From $1125 return for economy.**

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Stunning Japanese hike is like stepping into an (animated) movie
Stunning Japanese hike is like stepping into an (animated) movie

Sydney Morning Herald

timea day ago

  • Sydney Morning Herald

Stunning Japanese hike is like stepping into an (animated) movie

A related topographical quirk is Yakushima's location within the East China Sea's warm Kuroshio Current. Even in winter, the seawater averages 19.2 degrees, ensuring the island maintains a mild subtropical climate with cool summers and warm winters. The islanders like to explain the divergent topography thus: 'Oceanside, Yakushima is like Okinawa, but in the mountains it's like Hokkaido'. And: 'In Yakushima you can decorate a snowman with hibiscus flowers'. Another local saying: 'In Yakushima it rains 35 days a month', is equally revealing, although understandably, not as popular on tourist brochures. From the ferry port, it's an easy stroll to clifftop Hotel Yakushima Ocean & Forest where I am based for three nights. This 60-year-old officious looking place, formerly a government building, is now privately owned with a recent and decent facelift that makes it feel something like an alpine resort. Its 90 rooms all have ocean views, the best of which are Western-style with balconies overlooking the salt-sprayed cliffs. But it feels right to be in a Japanese room where I sip tea cross-legged on a tatami mat, knowing that my mattress will be dutifully rolled out on the floor come bedtime. Ideally, you'd stay a week on Yakushima and explore the entire clock via the island's loop road, but in two full days I'll tick off just the north-east coastline (about 1 o'clock to 4 o'clock) detouring inland for the hike. Along this part of the coast it's relatively flat with low-rise village houses and small-town infrastructure dotted amid a Tetris of citrus, tea and potato crops. Bougainvillea blooms along the roadside next to papaya trees and banana palms. At the inlet where the Anbo River meets the ocean the beach is sandy blonde, its warmish waters attracting swimmers, snorkelers and scuba divers. My guide, Mizuha Higashi, aka Mish, leads me upstream instead to a little wooden jetty where we slip into kayaks for a paddle along the waterway. It's a forest bathing exercise, the river banks dense with giant rhododendrons, camphor and beech trees. I paddle around the roots and rocks on the water's edge, peering into its translucent depths. Heading back downstream, Mish points out the simple waterside house where Hayao Miyazaki and the lead artists on the Princess Mononoke film based themselves while studying the film's forested world. Its significance resonates the following day on our hike through the Shiratani Unsuikyo Ravine. From the trail head, the dirt path continues along a crystal clear stream over big granite boulders and across a little storybook wooden suspension bridge. As we ascend, the forest foliage thickens, filling in the canopy above us like puzzle pieces. In the gaps, thin shards of light illuminate miniature ecosystems of ferns, fungi and cushiony wet moss where cedar tree seeds germinate before taking root in the granite rock. We walk on passing azaleas, sakura cherry trees, evergreen mountain ash, hemlock and fir. Towering century-old camellia trees with bright orange trunks appear young against the millennial cedars; their gnarly girths, too wide to hug, dot our path like woodland gods. Generally, the Taikoiwa Rock trail is 5.6 kilometres – about four hours, but recent rain means a harder, longer (10-kilometre) detour that takes us along the Kusugawa Sidewalk. This natural rock path was painstakingly constructed 300-400 years ago during the Edo Period, so loggers could access the cedar trees. Back then the tallest, straightest cedars were harvested to make hiragi – lightweight wooden roof shingles that were also used as currency to pay land taxes. The less desirable cedars, including the ko-sugi – those that grow from the 'parent' stump of the felled cedars – remain today and are what makes the forest so magnificent. Stepping over slippery tree roots and trickling water channels, we continue to Kuguri-sugi cedar, its split trunk parting like curtains we can walk through, and Nanahon-sugi cedar, another wizened woodlands dame, 18 metres tall and said to be 2000 years old. Finally, at almost 900 metres, we enter the Moss Covered Forest of Princess Mononoke, where in the darkness a cool white mist shrouds us in stillness. The story goes that the Studio Ghibli artist Kazuo Oga had a favourite spot here where he would spend endless hours sketching the landscape and imagining its mythical inhabitants. As Ashitaka says in the film, 'this place is magical … a place for gods and demons'. And it is. This is a forest preserved in time, a world carpeted in lurid green moss where dragonflies flit, minuscule flowers bloom and giant tree roots hide the would-be tiny houses of forest creatures. As if on cue, we see a young Japanese couple taking in-situ photos of tiny figurines – the film's tree spirits, known as kodama in Japanese folklore. These endearing white ghosts with tiny bodies, cute misshapen heads and glowing eyes exist only when the forest is healthy and so become the film's symbol of hope for the natural world. Enchanted, we snap our own photos, then trudge on, eager to get to Taikoiwa Rock, the trail's balding rocky summit. Up here among the clouds the stillness prevails, at least until 'silence boy!' echoes around the mountains. THE DETAILS Fly + ferry ANA ( and Japan Airlines ( fly from Sydney to Kagoshima via Tokyo Haneda from $1220 return. Yakushima is a two-hour ferry ride from Kagoshima city. Loading Stay Hotel Yakushima, Ocean & Forest ( has six room categories and an onsen. Double room rates (some including a traditional Kaiseki dinner) from 12,000 Yen ($A130). The writer was a guest of JNTO.

Melbourne's cafes have always been world-class. But in 2025 they've got even better
Melbourne's cafes have always been world-class. But in 2025 they've got even better

Sydney Morning Herald

time6 days ago

  • Sydney Morning Herald

Melbourne's cafes have always been world-class. But in 2025 they've got even better

When Australians go overseas, it usually sparks a lightbulb moment: we take our morning routines seriously. While many other cities sleep, in Australia we're seizing the day with run clubs and coffee, or stopping at our favourite cafe for babycinos and a shared croissant en route to school and work. Weekend brunch tables are booked well ahead. People's devotion to their daily cafe visit borders on spiritual. There are more than 100 of these cornerstones of our social lives gathered in Good Food's Essential Melbourne Cafes and Bakeries 2025, presented by T2 and published today. The guide celebrates the people and places that shape our excellent cafe and bakery scenes and includes more than 100 venues reviewed anonymously across 10 categories, including icons, those best for food, tea, coffee and matcha, and where to get the city's best sweets, sandwiches and baked goods. These reviews live on the Good Food app, and can be discovered on the map. Skimming the list it's clear that, even if cafes are quintessential, they're far from standard-issue these days. Thick slabs of tamago (the firm Japanese omelette) are almost as likely as swirls of scrambled eggs. Rice and flatbread jostle for space with sourdough. Shades of purple, green and pink are seen in drinks and on pastries. 'Brunch and coffee have always been a significant part of Melbourne culture and the pride of every Melburnian,' says Tuan To, co-owner of Amara in Seddon, which he opened in April with a Vietnamese-skewed all-day menu. 'I thought why not bring [together] the two and create something new yet familiar.' Amara's signature dish might be a steel pan of runny-yolked eggs with pâté, sweet stir-fried beef and pickles. The crusty baguette on the side can turn it into a banh mi-esque experience.

Family trip to Japan worth $10,000 up for grabs for Bunbury and Busselton host families
Family trip to Japan worth $10,000 up for grabs for Bunbury and Busselton host families

West Australian

time03-06-2025

  • West Australian

Family trip to Japan worth $10,000 up for grabs for Bunbury and Busselton host families

Families in the South West are invited to open up their home to host Japanese exchange students for a three night home stay. Educational tourism and homestay management company Gold Educational Tours is asking for families in the Bunbury and Busselton areas to host one of 40 Year 9 to Year 11 students from the Higashi-Fukuoka High School for their stay. The trip is from September 11 to 14 and participating families will receive 24/7 bilingual support throughout the program and up to a $330 hosting payment. They will also be in the running to win a $10,000 family trip to Japan. Cowaramup mum and recent host Natalie Polt said hosting students was an 'incredibly rewarding' experience for her family. 'Our children were of similar age, and this created an instant connection and made the cultural exchange feel natural and fun,' she said. 'We wholeheartedly recommend the experience to anyone considering hosting — it's a meaningful way to build international friendships and broaden your perspective on the world.' Gold Educational Tours director Jason Hutchinson said the trip prize was the company's way of thanking families for their generosity. 'Their hospitality makes these cultural exchanges truly meaningful,' he said.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into the world of global news and events? Download our app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store