LH 459
SFO-MUC
A340-600 (New First)
December 29, 2011
9:05P-5:25P +1 (sked)
9:10P-5:05P +1 (actual)
Departed 5/8
Seats 2DG (and 2A)
OK I know the odds are less than 10% but as we turned left down the jet bridge I saw new colors in the galley and thought "No Way". 
Still in the jet bridge I peeked thru the windows of the plane and couldn't see a lick of blue. "No Effing Way".
We reached the door of the plane and were greeted by one of our FAs and ever the cool guy, my first words were "Is this the New First?"
"Yes it is" gushed the FA, seemingly equally excited.
Like a kid in a candy store, I pull out my camera as fast as I can to memorialize the new interior, lest I wake up from my dream. 
I'm one that didn't mind and indeed still liked the old First, but even without the side bed, the New First in the 346 is a WOW!
What soothing, elegant colors of cream, beige and brown. Much more visually pleasing than SQ's harsh orange and brown.
If the cabin wall look nice, there is a reason. They are covered entirely in luxurious suede.
OK I usually don't do front to rear shots when other pax are in the cabin, but I decided to bend that rule on nights like this. No close ups though.
I'm going to cut this crew some slack because it could have been their first flight on the refurbished plane, but this was far from the usual polished LH crew. Our two FAs were very pleasant but not firing on all service cylinders today. While one FA took immediately took Mrs. SFO's fur, she forgot my coat for 10 minutes until I asked. PDB Champagne (Louis de Sacy Grand Cru Brut) was poured at the front of the cabin not at the seat. But the usual PDB mac nuts were replaced by smoked almonds. No champagne top up.
At 9:10P "Boarding completed" was announced and we pushed back, and started the normal taxi near the terminal toward 26R. Heavy fog tonight at SFO was restricting arrivals and departures as well. Did a U-turn and taxied to the north end of the airport then crossed over and taxied on the east taxiway all the way to the south end, where we held for 20 minutes for flow control.
More cabin pics and you can see the foggy haze outside.
Once cleared at around 9:50P, the captain wasted no time accelerating before we were even lined up at the top of 26R. At about 300 feet, we were completely in the fog.
The lighting during take-off was very nice.
Service started pretty slowly. Lots of activity up front but T+40 and no drink service. But how about a hot towel?
No drink order yet, but here comes the amuse bouche and our lead FA takes drink orders.
Tonight was a rather strange pumpkin sour cream combo on a skewer.
Not sure why the fork, but what do I know? 
Glass of champagne, please. The bottle is open at the front of the cabin and it still takes another 5 minutes?
Now the first negative about the new First seats. The drink tray is simply too far from the seat. One cannot sit and reach your drink. You have to lean waayy forward to reach your glass. The seat divider is too narrow to hold a glass without risk of knocking it over. Only one amuse bouche can sit on this divider. The old First seats had much closer drink table and the wide armrest could easily hold the amuse bouche plate. My arm is fully extended in this pic and I'm not even close to being able to reach the drink tray.
On the other hand, one of the cool features of the New First is an elegant pocket door solid curtain cabin class divider. 
Perhaps the seating arrangement tonight confused the crew. With 1G apparently malfunctioning, the five of us were a couple in 1A and 1D, us in 2DG and a woman in 2K (with hubbie sitting in J). FA and 1A in lengthy discussion... seemed 1A was having trouble understanding the menu.
Even though Mrs. SFO (and the woman in 2K) were on the right aisle, our FA stayed in the left aisle and asked me first for my dinner order (the works, caviar, starters, salad and Lamb) and then she asked Mrs. SFO who chimed in with "I'll have the same thing." Champagne refills and then the dinner set up.
The tray table in the suite is one of the best designs in the sky. At the push of a button, a huge tray table pops up at the front of the suite. Then you simply manually slide it to any position you want including all the back to your stomach. And this is no flimsy tray. This sucker is sturdy and solid.
LH has one of the most elegant setups in the sky.
And the LH rose is a timeless touch.
Another glass of champagne and a few minutes later, we enter the twilight zone as our FA walks down the right aisle carrying two salads. She places the first one on Mrs. SFO's tray then tries to hand me the other plate. 
OK, first of all I am sure LH First protocol is to never hand a plate to a pax, never over another pax, and never when that other pax is sitting on the other aisle. AA or UA? No biggie. But LH? I don't think so.
In any event, since our FA has apparently forgotten both the caviar and the starters, I refused the plate and politely told her that I would prefer to start with the caviar and follow the menu: caviar, starters and then the salad. She apologized and took the salad back to the galley. Mrs. SFO kept the salad, figuring she had waited long enough for anything to eat that she'd just go with the flow, wherever our FA was taking it.
A few minutes later, the starter cart appears for the first time tonight coming down the left (my) aisle. From the left aisle, FA asks Mrs. SFO which starter she would like. She goes with the crab and the FA reaches over me and hands the plate to Mrs. SFO.
I'm going with the works tonight which to our FA means all at once including the triple stack.
A double scoop for me tonight. More champagne, but not even a hint of normally offered chilled vodka.
According to the menu, the feature chef is somebody named Josh Becker who apparently works at the DiLido Beach Club at the Ritz-Carlton in South Beach, the place where the NBA's biggest clutch-time choker Lebron James took his talents. Yeah I'm from Cleveland and I'm still pissed off. Did you know that Monday is Lebron James Day? Yeah, everyone gets to quit work 12 minutes early. Sorry about that, but I'm reading Scott Raab's hilarious and painful "Whore of Akron" and I got carried away knowing I will not live long enough to ever see a Cleveland sports team win a championship. Break a leg Lebron, maybe two.
Anyway, back to the show. The Chilled Crab with Jicama Salad and Avocado was sensational.
The Smoked Duck with Marinated Cabbage looked weird and tasted worse.
The Asparagus Potato Torta and marinated Manchego was bland and forgettable, with way too much Torta and too little asparagus and manchego.
Next up was the Seasonal Salad with dried yellow tomatoes and Green Bell Peppers with a Balsamic Dressing. Fifteen minutes after the first delivery attempt, I'm wondering is this the same salad, or a new one? In any event, the salad was tasty.
By now, you might be wondering how Mrs. SFO was enjoying her meal? She had her salad before my caviar arrived and then only had the crab starter while I continued to stuff my face. Although I might have asked for our preference, our FA apparently decided that we would eat our main at the same time.
For our main, we both went for the Dreamer's Delight hot specialty, the Braised Lamb Cazuela, Almond Pesto, Lamb Sausage and Apricots. This tasted even better than it sounds. Wow, it was one delicious taste treat. Even better paired with '04 Château Belgrave Cru Classé Haut-Medoc. The service no-nos continued, as our FA handed the warm plate to me over Mrs. SFO from the opposite (right) aisle. 
Next up: Course six I think. I picked at the cheese plate and downed a glass of the '06 Callabriga Douro, Sogrape, Vila Nova de Gaia.
But devoured the OMG fabulous Apple Cinnamon Cobbler Tart with Vanilla Ice Cream, and a glass of the '08 Huxelreben und Ortega Beerenauslese, Weingut Bischel.
Now I may have missed it but I rather doubt that... No after dinner drink offerings either from the cart or the galley. Just a box of chocolates which apparently signified end of the dinner service. Just as well, as I was totally stuffed and had the beginnings of an unhealthy buzz.
Mrs. SFO decides to pack it in a little after midnight. While she heads to the lav to change into her LH PJ's, one of our FAs converts her seat into a bed complete with mattress and lovely duvet.
While I head over to "my office" to download and edit the nights pics before I fade.
But first a pit stop.
How many folks are going to leave the evidence in the ashtray vs. flushing it away?
About an hour later, I changed into my PJs as our FA had converted 2D to my bed just before Mrs. SFO turned in for the night.
I sleep poorly for the better part of three and a half hours, as a lingering hangover and consistently warm cabin temps conspired against me. Got up, took more Tylenol and went back my pics. As dawn broke and window shades were opened, I took a few more seat pics so I can go into more detail about the suites.
The suite has a lot more privacy should one wish. Here is the basic seat.
And at the touch of a button, a privacy wall rises to block views from the aisle or other seats. There is also a full privacy wall that can be raised between the two middle seats.
One side of the seat contains the IFE controls. IFE is much better than before but limited selection of movies still annoys, as does the poor quality of the video. By comparison, both CX and SQ offer 100s of movies with far superior video quality.
Controls in the other arm are for seat functions including recline, raise, bed/sleep, etc...
Other seat controls on the seat arms themselves provide an almost overwhelming choice of controls which leave the newbie a little confused and hoping the electronics can handle all the seat controls.
Another really nice feature about the suite is the ottoman, which is the major storage container for the suite. It moves forward and back at the touch of a button to adjust for leg length.
Although the ottoman storage space is great, it is not particularly convenient when your feet are on it and/or your tray is in use. For convenient arm's length storage space, the Old First is superior to the New First. Old First's super-wide arm rest provided ample storage space right at your seat. Unfortunately, the New First seats have two much smaller and potential useless bins. They are simply too small for storing larger personal items. Some with large hands will find it near impossible to retrieve items from the bottom of the bin. And Mrs. SFO's kept popping open seemingly every time you looked at them. And in a glaring oversight, gone is the shallow storage compartment for smaller items like glasses or iphones/pods.
Nevertheless, in spite of these minor annoyances and deficiencies, IMO the New First seat/suites are indeed a major step up.
About 90 minutes out, our crew starts preparing breakfast and I change out of my PJs. I stayed in 2A so as not to disturb Mrs. SFO, who decided to sleep all the way until about 20 minutes to landing. Hot towel, followed by menu and drink order.
The breakfast setup. Since the new table is bigger than the old one, not all linen place-mats have been replaced.
Seam could have been placed face down. 
I opted for the fruit plate, and the scrambled eggs.
Service follies continued at breakfast as our FA delivered the scrambled eggs before I had finished the fruit plate and before removing the fruit plate. The new table is certainly big enough to accommodate both plates, but I doubt that this is in the service manual.
The scrambled eggs and bacon were delicious as always.
With the window shades up, my first day-time look at the cabin interior.
We touched down in wet snow flurries some 20 minutes early, just after 5PM. Apparently only one GA was working tonight and he/she decided that 2L was the only door were would be using... so we all made the U-turn back thru J while the Y pax were held for F and J.
Our bags were among the first few on the carousel and we exited baggage claim at about 5:15P. Thanks to oliver2002, we found a reliable yet inexpensive limo company and great driver who navigated the snow and country roads south of Munich, avoiding a big back-up on the main MUC-SZG highway, and got us to our Salzburg hotel at 8:15P, as promised when we left MUC.
UA doesn't normally open JFK-SFO F seats until a few weeks before departure so I figured I'd wait it out and/or hope for MUC-SFO to open up. Meanwhile the good old Aeroplan is history. The old 100K miles for a First award was now 125K when I booked, although they had a December sale that dropped it to 90K for a few weeks. And now they've added fuel surcharges for new LH bookings (and any changes). This added nearly $1,000 in fees when I booked our JFK-SFO UA flight. I considered just flying AA home from JFK, but in the end the J price with the upgrade for Mrs. SFO would have been the same.
