As part of the mistake fare from the Seychelles to Dublin I flew Etihad for the first time, on the AHU to Dublin segment. In truth the flight left around 2am and so I slept much of the way, so you won’t get much of a report this time I am afraid.

We boarded on-time, right at the end of the terminal. The plane seems full and certainly business class was packed.
The seats are 1-2-1 with alternation of seats in a way that seats have a table either to left or right. The config of this aircraft was not shown on any of the seatplan sites and so I relied on the web site. This turned out to be accurate, with my window seat (6A)  having the table on the right, reducing chance of being awoken by traffic.

The seat converts in to a nice long bed, and were provided with a pillow and duvet, which were on the footstand when I arrived.

The amenity kit was a little basic, but had the eyeshades and earplugs I needed:

I declined dinner, but the options were:

• Roast Pumpkin Soup
• Steak Sandwich
• Selection of international cheeses
• Seasonal fresh fruit with fruit coulis
• Selection of ice cream flavours
• Potato crisps – selection of flavours
• Baked cookies and madeleines
• Swedish crisp breads
• Arabic baklava

There was a more comprehensive breakfast offering about an hour before landing:

• Cranberry brioche
• Smoothie drink
• Yoghurt with granola
• Cereals with full-cream or low-fat milk
• Fresh fruit with grape coulis
• Beef pastrami on wholemeal bagel
• Oven-baked eggs with hollandaise sauce with rosti, chunky tomato and fried onions
• Egga in Arabic pancake with balalit
• Farmhouse breakfast – scrambled eggs and beef sausage, beans and potatoes
• Waffles with warm chocolate sauce with dried plum compote

This was a spectacular selection, but I wanted to sleep so passed.

The bed was wonderfully comfortable and I have to say that, if I can get this sort of seat again, I would be happy to fly much further with this airline. The service was great – friendly staff who made you feel that nothing was too much trouble and tolerated passengers wanting meals as we were landing and passengers in loos about 10 minutes before landing.

The gate was very close to the terminal and only a short walk was needed. Unfortunately the link corridor to Terminal 1 was not open and so connecting passengers had to go outside in order to get to our connections.