Minnesota Fun Fact
Minnesota is one of the few states with an official state grain (it’s wild rice)
Departure Airport: Istanbul Airport (IST/LTFM)
Arrival Airport: Julius Nyerere International Airport (DAR/HTDA)
Aircraft: Boeing 737 MAX 8
Airline: Turkish Airlines
Flight Time: 6:36
Server: Expert
My Turkish 777-300ER flight from Chicago arrived into the gorgeous Istanbul International Airport at 7:00 AM, after a 9.5 hour overnight flight in Premium Economy. Istanbul is one of the busiest connecting airports in the world - 66% of its passenger traffic is passing through. As a result, the process for transferring is extremely smooth.
I disembarked and headed through a brief security checkpoint which is not immigration. My bags were taken care of - I had no need to recheck. Just a few minutes later, I was back in the terminal. IST is gigantic, and walking to my next flight took almost half an hour, as it was on the opposite side of the terminal. When I finally reached the departure gate for Turkish Airlines Flight 603 to Dar es Salaam, my aircraft was being prepared by the ground crew. I was initially a little nervous about the length of my connection - 95 minutes - but thanks to Turkish’s very efficient operation here, it was no problem.
Boarding began on time. I was in Group C, so somewhere in the middle of the process. My seat today was in Economy class for this 6.5 hour flight, right on the leading edge of the wing. I had looked to upgrade to First a few weeks before my trip, but it was all sold out.
Turkish has TSI Epianka slimline seats on their narrowbody fleet. It offers 31 inches of pitch and width of 18 inches. There’s a slight recline built in, with the option of adding 4 inches yourself (at the expense of the passenger behind you). Everything was clearly quite newly retrofitted, and while it wasn’t the most comfortable, it was not the worst. The headrests are adjustable, and the padding is OK, but Turkish runs some 8 hour segments on these planes which could get quite… interesting.
We pushed back at 9:55 AM after a briefing from the cockpit, which was first made in Turkish then English.
“Günaydın and welcome aboard Turkish Airlines flight number 603 with direct service to Dar es Salaam. We are pleased to have you with us. We’ll be departing to the north, then making a bank to the south. Our planned route takes us across Türkiye, over the Mediterranean, then crossing Egypt, Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Kenya for a flying time of 6 hours and 40 minutes. Based on current conditions, it looks like it should be a mostly turbulence-free ride. The current conditions on the ground in Dar es Salaam are 31°C with clear skies and a light wind out of the west, with similar weather expected for our arrival.”
After waiting in line for fifteen minutes, we were cleared to take off on Runway 35R. We got some amazing howl from those two CFM International LEAP-1B high-bypass turbofan engines as we had a long roll down the airstrip. It was a slow climb as we were heavy, which gave us great views
Despite what the captain had said, it was actually pretty bumpy for the first hour of flying. I used the time to connect to the WiFi, which did cost me $9 for 250 MB of browsing. This seems a little steep to me, since that only covers about 2 hours of light work (like email). For unlimited internet, it costs $25 which I didn’t do since I planned to spend a lot of my time with the IFE screen. The WiFi worked well in terms of speed and getting online wasn’t difficult at all.
Near Cairo, the ride smoothed out enough for the flight attendants to come through with a lunch service. There was an option between pasta and grilled chicken - I went with the pasta as I had chicken for dinner on my flight the night before. It was spaghetti with some sort of red sauce, served with a bread roll, small salad, a mint, and my choice of beverage. It was kinda bland, but did the trick. And it was free, so can’t complain there.
All the food onboard is Halal, as Türkiye is a majority-Muslim country (though it is officially secular from a governmental standpoint). Because of this, Turkish (which is partially state-owned) is not a dry airline unlike nearby Saudia, Kuwait Airways, and Iran Air.
The scenery outside the window got quite interesting as we tracked south. Near the northern border of Ethiopia, we flew over Lake Tana.
Despite its massive size (1,400 square miles, or about equal to Rhode Island), the deepest part of Lake Tana is only 49 feet. This makes the water quite warm, although you wouldn’t want to swim in it unless you like getting mauled by hippos and crocodiles or getting severe organ damage from parasites. If that doesn’t bother you, the underwater flora and fauna is incredible to see (70% of the fish species in Lake Tana live nowhere else in the world). But if you’re not a fan of the aforementioned perils, maybe strike snorkeling in Lake Tana from your Ethiopia bucket list. Sorry for the tangent, I did a project in fifth grade on Lake Tana and find it very interesting. Back to your regularly scheduled programing:
After taking in the views, I turned my attention to the IFE screen in front of me. It’s big and modern and is delightfully responsive (a laggy IFE screen is almost worse than none, in my opinion). There’s a huge array of options in multiple languages, with most of the content being in English and subsequently dubbed to a variety of other dialects. There’s also an interactive moving map, which has an extremely minute amount of detail, much appreciate by the geography enthusiast in me.
As we passed Mombasa, the pilots began our initial approach into Dar es Salaam. In the cabin, the flight attendants simultaneously collected garbage and passed out the all-important Tanzanian immigration forms.
Our arrival took us parallel to the Kenyan coast, over the island of Pemba, and across Zanzibar. We set up for a long straight-in approach over the aforementioned island’s southern tip, falling in line behind an Emirates 777 coming in from Dubai.
After crossing the Zanzibar Channel, we came in on short final past Downtown Dar es Salaam, flaps set to 30 degrees for our imminent landing.
It was a perfect landing in Tanzania’s capital city to cap off what turned out to be a very enjoyable flight. I’m a little sad not to be taking Turkish back home - my trip ends in Zanzibar, and my itinerary has me returning to Minneapolis via Frankfurt on Discover.
We made it into gate F14 ahead of schedule. The arrival time of 4:00 PM put us right in the middle of the crush of international flights, meaning customs was going to be a bit of a mess.
Final Rating:
Seat: 7/10
IFE: 9/10
WiFi: 7/10
Crew: 8/10
Food: 6/10
Gound Experience: 9/10
Landing: 9/10
Average: 7.9/10 (B-)