Flight Report

UO 688 Hong Kong - Osaka Kansai
2 April 2024

With the Easter long weekend coupled with another traditional Chinese festival that is also a public holiday, it's a popular time of year to fly to Japan to see the cherry blossoms. I had planned my first trip to Japan since the pandemic to include Osaka, Tokyo, and other cities further north, hoping to use a combination of miles and cash fares to make it more affordable.

Luckily, Hong Kong Express came to the rescue with a HKD $470 one-way fare to Osaka Kansai plus taxes for a weekday afternoon departure. It's a fairly decent price since I decided to fly after the Easter long-weekend to avoid the rush.

Having flown a few flights with them in recent months, although with earlier departures, I was a bit worried the check-in line would be gigantic. But with only hand baggage that was slightly overweight, I went for online check-in and hoped for the best to try to print a boarding pass at their kiosk. I had encountered errors with these kiosks previously as it doesn't work for some destinations such as Beijing. There were no issues today, thankfully.

Hong Kong Express is a low-cost carrier and most of their destinations are in Japan, even flying to some secondary cities such as Takamatsu and Kagoshima. They've recovered well after the borders re-opened as Hong Kongers are avid Japan fans and a revenge tourism boom ensued. My last trip to Japan was during the first few weeks of a mystery illness circulating around in early 2020. That was a last-minute short weekend trip to Shizuoka and the Fuji Five Lakes.

The security line was long but I had enough time to comfortably get to the 200-gates satellite terminal.

The main terminal looked quite busy but there weren't many plane spotters like me roaming around the windows.

There weren't many passengers on the train heading to the satellite terminal either.

I've got some time to go and being a cheapskate flying low-cost, I went to Starbucks with my credit card that had a departure special - $1 for a drink and a pastry. Bon appetit. This location even had beer on tap.

My gate was at one end of the pier with a Taipei-bound flight on the same airline next door boarding just slightly earlier.

Boarding was timely and finished minutes before our scheduled departure time of 2:55pm. It was a full flight but we pushed back 3 minutes early, heading to the eastern end of the airport for take-off. I invested HKD $60 for a window seat during online check-in so I could be entertained en route. We would land just after sunset.

Less than an hour later, I spotted Taiwan's central mountains. They were having a good weather day as well.

We would then be out at sea until our descent into Kansai. The weather was good and the flight was uneventful. There is no in-flight entertainment so I kept busy on my phone, looking out the window, and resting. I've got 12 days of sightseeing in Japan ahead and it would be quite hectic, and enjoyable with the yen being so cheap!

It's only a 3 hour flight to Osaka but with a 1-hour time difference, the sun started setting as we neared Kansai. The view on the left would have been wonderful as we flew just off Kobe's coast and turned right for landing.

We landed at 7:15pm local time and parked at the gate 12 minutes later and 18 minutes ahead of schedule. I had earlier filled in the landing forms and customs declaration online and got a QR code, hoping the next processing steps would be easier. Reading about insane crowds and long lines at immigration before, I hoped for the best and rushed out as quickly as I could, catching the train for the short ride to the exit.

It looks like another international flight had arrived ahead of us and many of those passengers were not as efficient in getting the paperwork done ahead of time or even lining up in front of the counters. Some just sat on the floor in the immigration hall for some reason, seemingly waiting for sunrise.

I headed to a relatively small line at the end of the hall where the crowds seem to have forgotten and was processed relatively quickly. I only had to wait a few people for my turn and the QR code seemed to have made things easier. I also had to check into a kiosk for customs further on, but was not flagged for another screening.

I was out the door within half hour of getting off the plane and even made the 8pm train to the city. It's superb timing for a large airport considering I got off the plane only half hour earlier.

Depending on which part of the city you are going, you have a choice of taking either the Nankai or JR trains into the city. My hotel is near Tennoji so I headed to the JR train, which takes less than an hour.

An uneventful flight on a low-cost carrier meets all my expectations. Affordable, reliable, and punctual are my key success factors, and Hong Kong Express delivered once again today.