For our journey home, we settled into United Airlines service from Dubai to Washington Dulles. This would be my longest United Airlines flight at 7,059 miles, and as luck would have it, my last long haul flight in economy class in over 8 years. Despite the long haul distance, the flight made for interesting people watching.

---

This post is one chapter in our trip to the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and the Maldives on United Airlines and Etihad Airways. This trip was booked and credited to Aeroplan and Etihad Preferred Guest. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.

---

---

Review: United Airlines B777-2, Dubai – Washington Dulles

This flight was the continuation of our flight earlier this evening from Doha – Dubai on United Airlines. After a ninety minute stopover in Dubai at the Marhaba Lounge, we continued on our journey back home.

United Airlines
Economy Class
DOH-DXB-IAD (Doha International – Dubai Internationl Airport Terminal 3 – Washington Dulles)
UA 977 – Economy Class ( W )
8:20 PM – 6:27 AM + 1
Oct 21, 2012
Booked: Boeing 777-200
Flown: Boeing 777-200

After our time at the Marhaba Lounge, Dubai, we headed back to our gate and suffered through the additional US security screening. We had a full hand search of all baggage. The women got through this quickly since, as in Middle East custom, there was strict separation of sexes. As you can see, there aren’t many solo women taking this route. 

Unfortunately, we had an equipment change from the aircraft we had come out to the Middle East on two weeks ago. Tonight, as with our earlier flight, we were on a Boeing 777 with a 2-5-2 layout and no AVOD. Instead, we had the awful looping video the older UA aircraft was known for. Instead of sitting directly next to my wife, we were across the aisle. I had next to me a very bitter Afganistan military contractor who was on his way back to the states. Most of the flight appeared to be military and several obvious USMC corps people returning home. There were very few women on board. 

The Meal: A Dinner Service

As with the flight out, there were two services of food. Unfortunately, it was nothing really to write home about. Chicken with rice.

The Second Service: A Full Breakfast

The second service consisted of breakfast featuring eggs with turkey sausage. I thought it was a strange choice of United to cater sausages as a side food considering how it’s traditionally a pork item and Muslim’s don’t eat pork. There were a few concerned questions by some of the Muslim passengers on the flight to the flight attendants about this. The flight attendant’s answers of “It’s turkey sausage” were met with some suspicion.

Arrival at Washington Dulles was pretty uneventful. We used Global Entry kiosks being Canadian Nexus Members. I’m still astounded at how few people seem to be signed up for this program. Of a full Boeing 777 aircraft, we were the only two passengers that were using the GE lines.

United Airlines Overall:

This flight marked the last and longest United Airlines flight that I’ve ever taken. At seven thousand and sixty nine miles, it was one of the few ultra long haul routes that United Airlines used to serve the Middle East market, partially in support of the United States’ military efforts in the Middle East and Afghanistan. It would also happen to be my last long haul flight in economy class for the foreseeable future as we got better in redeeming rewards for business class and first class flights. While the service was pretty straight forward, the people watching on the flight made the flight most interesting.

---