As a part of my summer last year, I exchanged with a good friend from Versailles, France. He came for two weeks to visit my family in June. After California, in August, I was to fly over to France to visit with his family during their vacation on Noirmoutier-en-l'Île. The plan was for me to fly from IAD to CDG to NTE (Nantes). This trip was to be the first time I'd flown by myself.
Air France Flight 0039 Information
- Flight: Washington Dulles (IAD) to Paris Charles de Gaulle (CDG)
- Flight Time: 7 Hours 30 Minutes
- Aircraft: Air France A380-800 F-HPJG
- Seat: 92L (window seat--Upper Deck)
Driving to Washington Dulles, I was really excited to take my first flight on an Airbus A380. As we were pulling into IAD, I decided to check my flightradar24 app on a whim to see where the plane was. Shockingly, it was about to fly right overhead as we were still on the highway. Here are images from my app and camera of the plane passing over our car:
It was nice to be back in IAD again. I rarely fly out of IAD, so it was nice to see some of the unusual airlines and larger aircraft. Here are a few images of our Air France A380 at the gate:
It was nice to board via the separate line for the A380's Upper Deck. The line for the main deck was much longer, with many more people. After a quick boarding, it was finally time to step onto the A380 for the first time. Everything felt clean and new onboard the Air France A380, a really nice aircraft. I was a but jealous of the people seated in business class, which looked quite nice. Below are images of business class, my seat (92L), and the rear-economy section: 
Air France A380 Business Class
The Air France A380 rear-economy section
My seat on the Air France A380: 92L (Upper Deck)Here is the video from our takeoff at IAD (from my youtube MartinsAviation1). As you can see... a bug managed to hold onto the tail camera for quite awhile: I got really lucky on the flight over, the flight was lightly filled which meant there was no one sitting in my row, in addition to many rows of 4 in the middle completely open. I chose to stay in my row and let others who had a seatmates take the open rows. It was nice being able to make a small bed for the overnight flight over.
One really cool feature of the A380 is the rear, spiral staircase. I saw people walking up and down for exercise and stretching, taking their kids over to play, etc. I liked that they left the stairs open for the majority of the flight.
The meals were good on the way over. I was really impressed by the quality of each meal and the service going along with it. Dinner was great and so was breakfast. Here is a photo of our dinner:
We arrived after a nice flight a little after 6am into Paris CDG and taxiied to gate M5. I guess you could say once again we got a bit lucky. The Upper Deck jetway was either not in operation or non-existent, which mean that we got to de-plane by walking down the forward stairwell. This allowed me to get a view of the inflight art gallery for Business and First Class passengers, as well as a view of the First Class cabin.
Here is a video from our rather hard landing into CDG. It was cool to see the runway lights in the early morning:
Here is a photo of the lounge/art gallery:
Overall, I had a great first experience flying on the Airbus A380. It was a cool thing to say that I've flown on the Upper Deck. I would recommend trying to book a seat in the rear economy section of the plane vs. downstairs... there are a lot of benefits for no extra charge.
Thanks for reading and watching!
Swayne Martin
Martins Aviation / From Private to Professional Pilot
Twitter: @MartinsAviationYoutube: MartinsAviation1
