After graduating high school, I went to Hanoi to visit my family. The flight tickets were provided, so we decided to fly with Korean Air, about twice the price of others, and even about 1.5x the price of Vietnam Airlines.
The Korean Air app is probably some of the best I've used, in terms of the overall experience and the user interface design stood out the most for me.
As the flight was booked pretty late, passengers had already designated their seats so there weren't many window seats available. I was able to get 31J, which was right over the wing. However it wouldn't really make a difference as the whole flight was during the night. Also, 31J was part of the front section, available for a fee, but I managed to assign them as my ticket was a higher booking class, M.
View from the bus as I headed to ICN. Going over the Incheon bridge always makes you giddy for the flight, almost like the body reacts to location.
I always take the same purple bus. The most colorful cars on the road in Korea seem to be public transport.
It was my first time travelling through T2 at ICN as I had always been an avid Star Alliance flyer. But now with the merger happening and Asiana being set to use T2 as early as January 2026, I would have to get used to this. The whole terminal seems a bit barren with only Korean Air, Jin Air, and some Skyteam carriers using this terminal.
Airside of T2, it is filled with duty free shops. The security check took quite a bit, about 40 minutes, as it was peak hours at ICN with trans-pacific departures and regional departures to Southeast Asia all bunched up in the same timeframe.
Terminal 2 really feels new and fresh compared to the old terminal 1. However, with it being way bigger than T1, which is already pretty big, the walking distances are through the roof. if your flight was assigned to one of the gates at the far end of the legs of the terminal, you could be faced with up to 20, 30 minutes of walking.
As always, I did a bit of airside plane spotting. As the sun set, the indoor lighting made it very hard to get a good picture. Some people use silicone hoods for anti-reflection, but as I only have my phone camera I can only try to maximize the result with things like aperture or shutter speed.
I prefer departing out of T1 just because T1 isn't filled with only Korean Air like here. You can see a lot of different aircraft types within the Korean Air fleet, but I'd much rather see different airlines. With Asiana moving to T2, T1 will be empty but there is speculation that T1 will go through a renovation while the terminal is used less.
My plane today, HL8209, arrived from FCO at about 1730L. As our departure time was 1840L, I was expecting a delay. Sure enough, we ended up taking off around 50 minutes late.
Originally, my flight was scheduled on the newer version of the 77W, the 277-seater, but was a victim to the Korean Air classic of the equipment change. It was changed to the 291-seater with the old business class seats. Although as an economy class passenger it didn't affect me as much as business class passengers who are the biggest losers out of this change, it did mean the seats were the old hardware. Be aware, as the screens on the old economy is as insensitive as 70 year old white male southerners from America.
If you wanted to know what you were getting, other than checking the app, if the registration starts with 77- or 82-, it means it's the 291-seater and if it starts with 80-, 83-, 72-, it is the 277-seater. But as the old aircraft are going through a retrofit, this simplification is set to be altered. The only retrofitted aircraft as of the time of writing is HL8216.
Boarded through gate 247 today.
The view as I got seated. Took a picture of the safety card, which had a change in design in sync with the rebranding of Korean Air since this flight.
The view from 32J. Very hard to get a good picture, but you can see the registration HL8209 written on the wing.
We had two options for dinner. The top is the Korean dish, bibimbap, which is a must have for a flight meal. The general rule of thumb is to pick the option that is from the airline's nation. If you're flying Asiana or Korean Air, don't be afraid to choose the Korean option.
Our progress as the meal service was well underway. We were separately given a Cledor ice cream as desert which definitely hit the spot for me. Small details like that really does go a long way in terms of overall satisfaction.
This was the cabin during meal service. The bulkhead seat had a baby in a bassinet and the baby did cry quite a bit during the flight, though it was clear the parents were trying their best.
The lights were dimmed after the trays were collected and meal service concluded.
Thanks to the dark cabin I was able to get a better picture. This was during a right turn somewhere over Guangzhou.
The IFE software on Korean Air doesn't have a good reputation and you can really see why. The software itself is very outdated, and the number of foreign movies and shows leaves a lot to be desired. However, I wasn't bored on my 4 hour flight and I could probably survive a round trip of 10 hour flights.
We were served a before landing drink and a little light show just before top of descent.
We arrived in Hanoi about 20 minutes behind schedule.
Just over the wing you can see a Vietjet A321 and an Emirates 77W.
We were parked next to a Turkish A350.
As someone who lived in Hanoi nearly 10 years ago, it is very impressive to see just how much air traffic in Hanoi has grown. From having only Aeroflot service to DME, Emirates service to DXB via YGN, and Qatar service to DOH via BKK as connections to the west, it now has Turkish, Qatar, Emirates, Etihad non-stop to their respective hubs and Vietnam Airlines non-stop to the US.
Final blurry shot of my ride to Hanoi.
Hanoi Airport's immigration has the tendency to take quite a while with the long lines and inefficient process. My bag came pretty quick thanks to the priority tag.
