Review: Discover Airlines A330-300 Business Class Windhoek-Frankfurt
Intro
The next and final segment of my aviation experience in Africa (not the whole trip) would be heading out of Africa. Originally, flying on Discover Airlines was never the plan, as I had a return ticket from Lagos to New York in Polaris (you can read the outbound review here) already booked. However, after being guaranteed by the person in Nigeria that I would not need a visa again to transit, he mentioned 2 days prior that I would need one, and the cost would be 450 USD. Um, no. It all worked out in the end, as I got a future flight credit, and I was able to use that in one of my upcoming series, “The Ukrainian Adventure.” Additionally, I was worried about being bitten by a dog and wanted to get back to the US to get my rabies shots going.
So, how was Discover Airlines on their A330-300 in Business Class? It’s certainly not up there with the likes of Cathay or Qatar, but then again, this isn’t their business model. All in all, it was a decent flight for a decent price, but it isn’t an airline I would seek out to fly again. Let’s get into it!
Route- Windhoek-Frankfurt
Seat- 5D
Flight Number- 4Y133
Aircraft- Airbus A330-300
Date- June 24th 2024
Flight Time- 10 Hours 19 Minutes
Price Paid- 88K United Miles (3 legs)+ 96 USD
How I Booked
As I sat down the night before at Gecko Ridge enjoying my steak, I was browsing the potential ways to get home on mileage space from Windhoek to New York. With the Ethiopian Airlines flight being sold out, my main option on the table was to book the Discover Airlines from Windhoek to Frankfurt, Polaris from Frankfurt to Chicago (no direct space), and United Economy from Chicago to Newark. United Airlines' best mileage sweet spot is from the US to Africa and vice versa, as this ticket came out to 88K OW in Business. Had I been Platinum or above at the time, the cost would have been 80K
In addition, I recently just booked a flight from Washington to the Seychelles for 80K Miles in business. What a deal!
Check-In
Following a long (seriously) drive from Swakopmund and being injected with my first dosage of Rabivax, the driver pulled up to the airport around 4 pm. Getting out of the vehicle, I caught the first glimpse of the A330-300 taking us 5000 miles North today. Interestingly, with the Frankfurt and Munich flights, these planes will fly redeyes in both directions (much like the European flights in JNB).
Windhoek airport is extremely small, to the point where there are no more than 20 check-in counters for all of the airline operating flights. I inquired if they had any window seats available, but unfortunately, all of them had been taken for today's flight 😒. Within minutes, the agent had checked me in and ticketed me all the way through to LaGuardia!
Windhoek Airport
Windhoek airport is efficient, especially when there are realistically no more than 2 flights at a time. 8 minutes after receiving my boarding passes, I had cleared both immigration and security. Can’t ask for much more than that!
As I happened to be flying Business Class, I was invited to the Paragon Premium Lounge. I wrote about that lounge in a separate post, which you can read here, but it’s not too bad at all.
With a couple of hours to kill, I also explored the small Terminal 2 in Windhoek. There were a couple of shops for souvenirs, a few cafes, and one restaurant. For some odd reason, I was craving a steak, so I decided to sit down and enjoy one at the restaurant. Nowhere near as good as a place outside of the airport, but it satisfied my taste buds 😉.
Boarding
There aren’t many gates at Windhoek airport, so by the time boarding was called at 6:10 pm, it was pretty hard to miss the big crowd gathering by Gate 6. Unfortunately, boarding was an absolute mess, as they first called passengers with children, as well as those needing extra assistance, before boarding passengers in group 1. However, it seemed that everyone just tried to get their way onboard the second any announcement was made 😒.
All of the tedious annoyances soon went away, as once my boarding pass was scanned, I walked out onto the tarmac to the most beautiful boarding process ever. There are no buses to take you to the gates here; you have to walk the 300 meters or so to where this majestic A330-300 was basking in the sunset.
Talk about my last boarding process on this Africa trip, I couldn’t ask for a single better view.
The Seat/Cabin/Amenities
Stepping onboard, I was greeted with an all too familiar business class layout: the Lufthansa 2-2-2 configuration. Unfortunately, the cabin was relatively full by the time I got on board, but I was able to snap a quick picture of 5D/G, which is where I would be sitting this evening.
These seats are certainly not cutting-edge, but for a leisure airline, I understand why they would operate a 2-2-2 configuration (no excuse for Lufthansa, though). Each seat features in-seat power beneath and between the seats, while the seat controls are located on the center section armrest. My one quirk with the seat is the shared footrest. As someone who is a side sleeper, I often feel like I have to be careful not to intrude my knees into my seatmate's space.
In terms of amenities, I was pleasantly surprised to find a plush pillow and a comfortable blanket waiting on my seat. It’s not the best business-class bedding, but it did allow me to get a solid 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep on the flight (more on that later).
An amenity kit was provided, although the contents were relatively basic.
Departure
By 6:30 pm, almost all of the passengers were onboard. With no one sitting next to me in 5G, I was hopeful to get an empty seat for the flight (I already dislike it when I’m not in a window). Needless to say, the last person on board happened to be the purser's partner, and he settled into his seat a couple of minutes later (really lovely guy).
As the captain announced our flight time of 10 hours and 5 minutes, the cabin crew came around to offer a pre-departure beverage and take our meal order for the flight. I opted for a champagne, why not?
Unfortunately, due to not having a window seat and it being an all-nighttime flight, I have no pictures to share of takeoff and landing.
We ended up pushing back at 6:55 pm and were wheels up to Frankfurt 10 minutes later at 7:05 pm.
IFE+Wifi
Let’s just get this out of the way, as this is where Eurowings let me down. For starters, each passenger has a TV located on the seatback of the person in front. While not the highest definition, it should, in theory, still work, right? Well, throughout the first hour of the flight, the IFE screens were just broken, and no one on the plane could watch anything. There was this weird message that kept coming up, but I was not quite sure exactly what it meant.
However, after a few system resets, it eventually started working again. I was tired and just put it on the moving map, but from what I saw, Eurowings offers a similar selection to the IFE on Lufthansa (considering the Lufthansa group owns Discover).
Those looking to connect will be happy to know that Discover Airlines features Wifi. For 15 Euros, you can access the internet for 2 hours, and for 25 Euros, you can access the internet for the whole flight. I didn’t buy it since sleep was on my mind, so I am unsure about the speeds.
Meal Service
Roughly 40 minutes after departure, it was time to get ready to eat. The cabin crew came around to lay our tray tables and cover them with a pristine white tablecloth.
Another 10 minutes passed before the drinks cart came around, offering passengers their choice of beverage for the upcoming meal (nuts were also offered, but as you may well know, nuts scare me due to my allergy to certain ones). I have a tradition when flying business class where I will ask for sparkling water, a glass of champagne (to drink before the main), and a glass of red wine (to enjoy with the main).
15 minutes later, warm bread rolls were brought around. While there wasn’t a choice on the bread, they were quite delicious. Soon after that, the main course came out. There were 4 options on the menu (which, unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of due to chatting nonstop with my seatmate), and I chose a red meat dish. It was good but not memorable. Finishing up, I had a hazelnut cake for dessert (and this is how I discovered I am allergic to Hazlenuts 😂, that was fun. Nothing happened; I just felt like it was tough to breathe. I didn’t even tell the cabin crew, which, in hindsight, I should have done).
All in all, the meal was fine. However, the highlight of the meal wasn’t the food but the conversation I had with my seatmate. For almost 2 hours straight, we just talked about life. It’s weird since every time I have flown these seats, I end up having sensational conversations with my seatmate. Back in 2020, I flew to Beijing and ended up sitting next to this lovely woman, and we chatted for 6 hours straight! 6 hours!
Bed Time
Exhausted from the past 5 weeks (I had visited Guyana, Trinidad, Grenada, Barbados, New York, Nigeria, Senegal, Mauritania, Ethiopia, Somalia, Rwanda, The DRC, South Africa, Mozambique, and now Namibia), it was time to head in for the night. I didn’t plan on it, but I slept for 7 hours straight and woke up as we were an hour outside of Frankfurt.
Lavatories
As I woke up from the long night of sleep, the first stop was the bathroom. For reference, passengers seated in Business Class have access to the two lavatories located by door 1L and the two lavatories between 2L and 2R.
On one hand, no real amenities were offered inside, but the lavatory was still clean after 9 hours of flying time. I’ll take it.
Breakfast
Coming back from the lavatories, I was happy to see the breakfast had already arrived at my seat. The choices were either an egg dish or this yogurt thing. Considering I was going to eat at the Air Canada lounge in Frankfurt (Bacon yum), I just nibbled my way around. It was good, not great, but good.
Service
There are certain flights where I will touch on service and other flights where I won’t. However, I wrote down a couple of notes talking about service during the flight, and this is what I saw:
The service from most of the crew wasn’t exactly the business-class service you get on most* airlines. For example, when the crew came around to take dinner orders, they just said, “And you”?
The lead flight attendant was the outlier, and I wondered if that was whether or not I was sitting next to her partner. Maybe, or maybe not, but it doesn’t matter as she was very kind.
All in all, it was fine, but it wasn’t great.
Arrival
By 4:30 am (this is a brutal redeye, the captain announced our initial descent down into Frankfurt. In the past, I have had some horrible luck when it comes to holding patterns in Frankfurt, but luckily, we ended up touching down 7 minutes ahead of schedule onto 7R.
From there, we pulled up to a remote stand (again? The last time I got a gate was 5 flights ago, ha). The cabin crew bid us farewell at the door, and we made our way onto the bus that was waiting to take passengers to the terminal. Unfortunately, Discover does not have buses dedicated to business class 😒.
And it was off to go explore Frankfurt for 5 hours!
Final Thoughts
Flying on Discover Airlines in Business Class from Windhoek to Frankfurt was a pleasant experience as a whole. I will never be one to complain about a lie-flat seat, I managed to get 7 hours of sleep, and eat 2 meals. However, going forward, I wouldn’t seek out flying Discover unless 1. the price was right or 2. I basically had to. Hypothetically, the other option (had it been available) was Ethiopian, and I would have much rather flown with Ethiopian on their 350 to IAD/YYZ. Broken IFE systems also let me down on this flight 😒.
I would like to add one thing for readers. Discover Airlines has two different layouts on their A330-300s. Unfortunately, I got the layout, which is in a 2-2-2, but there is one that is better, which you can find here (Aerolopa).
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