Any long haul flight takes it out of you - and in fairness Finnair were not bad, although the seats on all newer planes seem to be getting smaller and smaller (or maybe my bottom is getting wider.)

First we had the London - Helsinki leg (about 3 hours) where we both got a row of seats and a nice lie down!  Then a 45 minute change over in Helsinki and a 9 hour 45 minute flight to Hong Kong.  Sadly no rows to lie down in, but we did get a nice little quiet corner thanks to seatguru - which I used to look up which seats to avoid when I checked us in online the day before.  The flight out went like clockwork, no problems at all.  The food was fine, and as it was a night flight they did a good job of feeding us, and tucking us in for the night, and I got a good long sleep. 

But what I don’t understand and what I experienced on the way back is why, when it’s a long haul day flight, they don’t try and calm things down in the same way.  Instead there seemed to be an awful lot of sales announcements - annoying when they interrupt your movie, even more annoying when you’re trying to get a little snooze in.

The flight back was another 8 and a half hours from Beijing to Helsinki, a 3 and a half hour wait, and then another 3 hour flight back to lovely London.  Please remember that flying back through Helsinki means another security check as you arrive at the airport, so you will need to have all of your liquids in one bag, and you will not be allowed to bring in anything over 100ml - so don’t buy any duty free booze in Beijing airport!

The British Airways operated flight from Helsinki to London (although booked as a Finnair flight) was also fine, although delayed - as the plane was a bit older it had much bigger seats, and I did get a very nice nap on this one despite the screaming kids thanks to the Via Spa.

Actually that is the one thing that lifts this Finnair flight completely out of this world - visit the spa to make your economy flight feel like first class and beat the jet lag.  If they could only get the spa on the actual plane!

In terms of cost we could have got a flight to either Hong Kong or to Beijing for about £100 less when we booked in February, but as this would have meant an additional internal flight (for about £100) it didn’t make economical sense for us. 

For more information on domestic flights see regional sections, especially Yangshuo Spa Princess/The Flight.