wysiwyg

Thanks for the comments Laplap. I tend to arrive at the airport early, but since this is an Air France flight in a foreign country, I'm dependent on the opening of the checkin counters, which is usually around 3 hrs before scheduled departure.

I'm hoping to catch a light meal at the lounge (or in a restaurant at the airport) before the flight since I want to just try to go to sleep as soon as I can and skip the meal service.

Giblets

Managed to access this lounge as a result
of my PE ticket with was appreciated. Seats were OK, though would have appreciated a couple more TVs with flight info on.
there were a few meal options (their beef curry, bento box and some western options), beer dispenser, wine dispensers and some free pour sparkling wines, and saki.
would have been nice to have some comfy sofa’s. Only had an hour transfer myself so no real issues

jakezim

Not quite on topic for this thread, but close enough that it didn’t seem worth starting a new one:

Family of 3 (two adults and one 8-year old kid) flying HND-ORD in J. One adult is OWE, nobody else has status.

Can spouse + kid enter F lounge as guests of the status member? Or is it Sakura lounge only for us?

And following on the comments above, if it’s Sakura only, would folks suggest visiting the CX lounge instead?

lsquare

I think it's only one guest allowed.

JALPak

https://www.jal.co.jp/jp/en/jalmile/flyon/lounge.html

CPH-Flyer

Indeed one guest only, both for F and J lounge. That would go for both Sakura and CX J lounges. Some programs allow to bring children in to the home lounges. JAL only allows jmb members to use lounge coupons for extra guests, so no free guests. I am not sure which OWE you have, and whether there is a family rule for that program, but it would only apply for the lounges of the associated airline, not alliance wide.
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lsquare

18-year-olds count as children? Where does JAL draw the line?

Unimatrix One

Here's a new report on the lounge (Japanese only).

https://www.dangan-lucky.com/entry/h...ge-review-2023

Unfortunately it says the lounge was very crowded. I was hoping for less crowding...

CPH-Flyer

Apparently not as crowded as the ANA Suite Lounge

LapLap

Worth noting that this report was made in the morning (“early” is mentioned a few times but it’s not specific about when)

5khours

What a dump. Crowded. Noisy. Designed like a maze. Not a comfortable chair in the place. Seats outside the lounge near the gates are better.

Greenpen

Until fairly recently Japan has 20 as the age you become an adult. Now 18.

JALPak

I bet you are going to "love" the new NH HND lounge at T2, especially the way they pack 1300 seats there LOL

mhy

Just flew HND-JFK yesterday and used Sakura Lounge. I had F lounge access until early this year so first time in the J lounge in a few years (pre-COVID). Seems they've moved the lounges around a bit since I last visited.

A word of advice: if you are using the Sakura Lounge, skip the 4th floor lounge and go to the 5th floor one ("SKY VIEW" lounge). The 4th floor section was extremely overcrowded with almost no seating available. The line for food was long. The 5th floor lounge was considerably less crowded and more serene. I miss the F lounge!

Unimatrix One

I just used this lounge the other day from about 4:30pm to 5:45pm. It's basically the only Oneworld J lounge open at this time. (The Cathay lounge closes at 5pm and the Sakura Skyview lounge doesn't open until 6pm.) It was quite crowded, although there were enough open seats that I didn't have to walk around a long time to find one. The alcohol selection was very good. The food selection was meh. Most selections are not offered via the buffet but are prepared to order, and it looks like you can only order large items that are almost a meal in themselves. I only wanted a small snack, but the only things on offer at the buffet were junky carbs (bread and sweets). No cheese or cold cuts or vegetables or anything.

The other weird thing is that every seat has a QR code you can scan which supposedly lets you place an order for food, but when I scanned the code at my seat and tried to look at the menu, it told me that only certain areas of the lounge are allowed to order online, and my area wasn't one of them. (Then why have a QR code at my seat?)

So overall the lounge wasn't very good but it wasn't horrible either. Better than the overcrowded ANA lounge in the same terminal, but as CPH-Flyer said upthread, that's a very low bar.