I just traveled from Bangkok,Thailand to Chicago on their new Dreamliner plane. It was fantastic.

 

I used Flights.Google.com to find low prices. I needed to go to Kentucky to visit family but the cost for a roundtrip business there was over 5K USD and I refuse to pay that.  Chicago and Atlanta are two places that are easy for me to get to family and I don't mind a drive for 5 or 6 hours.

 

The seats were comfortable and the huge windows which were automatically controlled were very nice. Going over the north pole was beautiful and all white. The food was the best business class food I have been served on an airplane since Northwest was in operation. The great thing was a nice big seat for a nice big butt! Loved it! And, the cost was 2400 USD for Business Class round trip! I had friends flying economy for 1800 on Delta. I love Hainan Airlines now. Great service the entire way and for the layover in Beijing they had a limo meet us and take us to VIP lounge and through customs. Truly great bargains can be found on Internet if you search for them.

Interesting. Of course fares are always much lower when your trip starts in in BKK, The amazing thing is that I checked a couple of search engines I usually use and Hainan never comes up. Which site did you find them on.? I went to their site and found similar fares .

 

All things being equal I prefer staggered seats .  Glad you made it but I never fly into Chicago during winter time.  Disaster always waits with weather cancellations.

As Michael mentions, use Flights.google to compare airfares.  It will also send notifications about airfares for a date or date range and price changes.  And agree with Firecat69 that Chicago's airports are on the "avoid in winter" list.

Wow that is expensive compared to travel from Europe to BKK. I'm flying in economy to BKK for 660 EUR.

you missed it was Business Class and twice the distance.

Europe - Thailand on one of the ME3 you can get as low as € 1400 (US$ 1460) business class when they have special offers. Thai or Lufthansa would want double or more.  If you don't want to go into Chicago, Hainan goes directly to Boston or Seattle too.

ME3 also have good prices (in economy) out of Canada and service is supposed to be good but is it good idea for a gay male to go through Dubai or Doha?

prices are only one part of equation, connection time counts too.

 

When I look at options I always consider how long it takes from first start to final landing. 

Guys,

Have you considered Singapore Airlines?

I believe you can have a stopover before going to Thailand... why not spend a little time here (with me and all the other cute young men)?

Unfortunately they are a great airline and they charge like it.  Also Singapore is one of the most expensive Asian cities. I can spend 3 weeks in Bangkok for what 1 week costs in Singapore.  Wonderful modern city but just too expensive.

is it good idea for a gay male to go through Dubai or Doha?

Is it a good idea for ANYONE to fly via the middle east ? I don't want to be on a plane used for some terrorist activity. Whilst these 3 airlines have been OK so far, look at what goes on in the region.

Is it a good idea for ANYONE to fly via the middle east ? I don't want to be on a plane used for some terrorist activity. Whilst these 3 airlines have been OK so far, look at what goes on in the region.

Well, literally millions of people do each year...and how many have come to grief? Get real!

ME3 also have good prices (in economy) out of Canada and service is supposed to be good but is it good idea for a gay male to go through Dubai or Doha?

Nothing to be concerned about being gay and transiting through Dubai or Dohar.

In the last 6 years i have not only transited through on numerous occasions but have spent many days and nights there,and the amount of available hot middle eastern men looking to hook up with other men via  the gay apps,especially if you are a westerner is very surprising and at no charge.

That has been my experience anyway.

I'm doing Qatar from Miami-Doha-Bkk the end of Jan. My first trip on the ME3. It's 5 hours faster than going west thru Hong Kong, so thought I would give it a try.

Ive thought about Hainan Airlines a few times and am impressed that Skytrax has given it a 5-star ranking for at least the last couple of years. The price is always great. The problem for me is it uses Beijing as its international hub rather than Hainan. Whenever Ive checked this has meant a 5 hour overnight flight from BKK to Beijing in a 737 with no biz class and only 8 F class old fashioned recliner seats, a very long transit time and then the 787 on to various US cities. Does a biz class tkt out of BKK guarantee F class to and from Beijing? Even then, after the flat bed seat from Chicago or wherever, Im not sure Id be so happy spending 5+ hours at the end of the trip either in cramped economy or in an F seat with just a small recline. So Ive stuck to other airlines for now.

SeatGuru  shows a 50 inch pitch which still should be a very comfortable recline, even if not flat.

The Bangkok to Beijing flight is not lay flat. But, it was a nice wide seat and lots of leg room for me.  I was very comfortable.  It was not a full sleep kind of flight but much better than USA domestic business class seats IMHO. I had no issue with it at all. If you book business the entire way, you will be in Business on that flight and for 5 hours, it was such an easy flight for me and I'm really picky about seats when I fly long distance.

Thanks for the info. Thats great to hear. Seatguru shows there is no biz class on the 737s flying the BKK to Beijing legs. So I just wonder if you are on a transpacific biz ticket, do you get an automatic upgrade to F out of BKK? I know seatguru is sometimes out of date so is there now a dedicated biz class cabin on the aircraft?

 

My only concern would be booking transpacific and then discovering there were too many biz passengers transferring to transpacific or other long haul with the result some might then have to be downgraded to economy inter Asia. That Id hate. If its guaranteed F class to and from Beijing Ill have no hesitation in using the airline in future.

Although I have never flown them, I don't remember ever booking a ticket where the class for each leg was not spelled out prior to purchase.  But easy enough to call their reservation number to confirm.  Pretty sure the vast majority of their passengers are Beijing to USA so 8 seats is probably enough.

 

As they increase their BKK business then they will have to reconfigure because passengers would not stand for paying for Business and getting Economy.   They also have to compete with a myriad of other Chinese airlines with even cheaper fares for Business.

Bored so I checked  a few of their flights and they are specific on their site that the booking is on a B737-800 all of which they own are configured with First Class seats .   They also have certain dates where the price skyrockets and I would guess that is because they have to partner with another airline for the Bejing-BKK segment because of lack of suitable Business seats.  Just guessing however!

 

But of course you may always be bumped out of your seat on any airline and the compensation for a partial downgrade is never sufficient.

Following on firecat69s checking, I checked a notional biz class return booking BKK to Chicago in March. All sectors are ticketed as I, the lowest of the discounted biz class ticket codes. But without a biz class that doesn't make sense. Ive done some round the world biz tickets where internal US flights are in first class if there is no biz class. But the code for those sectors is usually the lowest discount first fare A. Ill check with Hainan Airlines direct in BKK to try and clarify.

Well Michael reported that he was seated in First Class on his very cheap Business Class Ticket.

Spoke to the local Hainan Airlines office. Although the website states the BKK to Beijing service only has first and economy, in fact it should be biz and economy. They don't have an F class. Confusing for those not aware of it, but great for those wanting a cheap biz fare to the US on what is clearly an excellent airline. So far it seems they have non stops to Chicago, Boston, Toronto, San Jose and Seattle with feeder arrangements from a few other cities.

I used Google Flights to find the tickets and booked directly on Hainan. I chose the tickets in advance and they said they were Business Seats the entire way.  I also checked SeatGuru and they had the same.  I'll try to take some pics on the way back but they didn't like cameras on the flight I was on.

Well, literally millions of people do each year...and how many have come to grief? Get real!

Looking at the broader middle East, with Egypt alone, there have been 2 crashes in recent years.

Whilst the gulf states have a good record, I am not going to count on it staying that way.