Drum roll: Did I manage to get an aisle seat on my first ever transpac flight?

Before I begin this post, I'd like to say that it was a very successful shopping trip, as I got pretty much everything else I need, minus a final trip to the pharmacy on Saturday. I was even able to exchange money at a bank in Berkeley for a nice low fee of $1.50. This way, I've got $80 in baht to last me until we go to Bangkok Bank, which offers much much better rates. A rousing success!

Anyway, onto the real point of this post!

So back in September, I bought these flights

SFO-->HKG
HKG-->BKK
________________

MNL-->HKG (12 hour layover)
HKG-->SFO

(Airport codes: SFO = San Francisco; HKG = Hong Kong; BKK = Bangkok; MNL = Manila)

on one intinerary. Kayak had been quoting me prices of $1,111, and that price seemed outdated, as the best I could find was on Cathay's website for about $1,140. I had almost given up and resigned myself to that price, when I decided to check Travelocity. I found a quote of $1,026! The first time it didn't go through, but the second time, I was successful. As a result though, I was in Cathay's lowest fare class, in which you do not get to pick your seat until 48 hours before the flight. In order to move up a fare class, I would've had to pay about $1,200 for those flights. So I decided to gambit and hope that I could sneak into an aisle seat. I figure worst case scenario, I save about $150 by not being able to pick my seat, and I end up stuck in a middle seat for 14.5 hours. $1,026 seemed like kind of a bargain, to be honest, not that I claim to be any expert on such matters. Would I be successful in this gambit?

So there I was, refreshing the check-in button constantly, and sure enough, I ended up with seat 35G! Near the front of the plane, and more importantly, an AISLE SEAT!!!! Keep in mind, this is a 747-400 plane, so the seating is 3/4/3. Seatguru suggests that the only downside to this seat is that there is no row 35 window. So needless to say, I am just thrilled. I check in for the HKG-->BKK leg at 5:10 PM tomorrow. Since it is "only" a 3 hour-ish flight, I'm thinking about maybe getting a window seat. If not, I'll do that on MNL-->HKG leg on the way back.

The next obstacle is the bag checking situation. I'll probably update that from the airport.

48 hours from now, I'll be out over the Pacific Ocean.