After a lot of looking on line during the planning stage of the trip we decided not to book the regular Dazhong Airport hotel as google maps was showing that two new hotels have been built in front of it impacting the view and instead we booked the Ramada Pudong Airport. We arrived at the hotel at 11:30AM and were able to check without difficulty even though the check in time was 15:00, we were also able to negotiate a late checkout four hours after the normal check out time and we very much got the impression that the hotel was fairly empty. We had booked an executive floor room and were given room 711 which has a double bed but they delivered a rollaway for a small fee,
A few notes - the Executive lounge was closed for refurbishment although no refurbishment looked to be going on, The hotel has 9 floors with the executive floor being located on the 7th Floor. any room facing the airport between 706 and 717 would do, 711 being in the middle is the perfect option. If they are landing on the 34/35’s then aircraft can be seen on short finals flying towards you subject to visibility, if they are landing on the 16/17’s then inbounds can be seen on finals At night landers on the 34’s will be bulbs however landers on the 35’s will rollout full length so will still be seen. The smog/fog will make or break your trip, we were relatively lucky that it cleared by 09:00 on both days we were there and did not reappear until the early hours of the following morning.
As a side note. The COMAC factory is located some distance from the airport and connected by a long taxiway and remote runway, don’t expect to see anything unless you are on the Right Hand side and landing on the 34’s even then only on finals. between 11:30 and 14:00 I made 104 new frames,
One final note on Pudong, the airport is HUGE and busy with movements, I can’t see how you would be able to effectively spot there except from a hotel room with electronics. FR24 works in China but there is no ground coverage and aircraft drop off FR24 at about 1500FT and don’t appear until a couple of minutes after departure. We made it work by one of us managing the arrivals and other one departures and both of us ensuring we saw everything. As well as tactical use of FR24 and the SBS.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/d7xvM8F97ymrM6iz5 NOTE: locations in China are frequently inaccurate