Review: Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport Terminal 2 International

Booking the Trip: Annual India Visit with Emirates and Air India
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Review: Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport Terminal 2 International
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YOUTUBE: Emirates: Los Angeles to Dubai
YOUTUBE: Emirates: Dubai to Mumbai
YOUTUBE: Air India: Pune to Hyderabad
YOUTUBE: Air India: Hyderabad to Pune
YOUTUBE: Emirates: Mumbai to Dubai
YOUTUBE: Emirates: Dubai to Los Angeles


 

Hello everyone,  and thanks for the long wait in the continuation of the final portion of this trip. Sorry for the delay in posting, I had dengue fever for a week and was unable to do anything, but now to continue with a review of Mumbai’s gorgeous international terminal. I have been to Mumbai Airport several times in the past few years and even wrote about my British Airways flight out of Mumbai but I never formally reviewed the terminal here, so here’s one for the books.

Mumbai Airport’s T2 has a wide check-in area for the many airlines it serves internationally. But it has a single common area for the security checkpoint. Before security and immigration, here is some bookshop.

 

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bookshop

The entire terminal after security is the very very gorgeous part that I love stepping into every time. In fact, it’s my second favorite terminal in the world. But let’s talk about the features.

So security has segregated lines for men and women, which is the norm at Indian airports and it allows for more thorough “gender customized” security checks. After that, there are separate immigration lines for hajj travelers, India passport holders, dual citizenship (that’s me for US and India), and foreign passport holders, Visa, etc.

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duty free

Once passing security, you are surrounded by the duty-free shops with all what you would find in any duty-free shop around the world at any airport: alcohol, chocolates, local snacks, perfumes, etc.

 

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Duty Free

Once past duty-free, there are a lot of shops, but there is a cool model of the international terminal T2 in a glass panel for display.

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Mumbai airport model

Anyways, to the left there is a Mont Blanc storeas well as a tie kiosk right in front. One thing you’ll notice is how beautifully the terminal is designed. The lighting to the peacock feather theme to the Indian art. Everything was just so well executed by GVK.

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shops

To the right is a Swarovski shop, a Micael Kors, sunglasses, some apparel stores, a TUMI store, and another shop.

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Shops

Here are some other shops you’ll walk by.

 

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Kimaya
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Forest Essentials
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Indian Gourmet
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Restaurant

Alright so unlike most other airports where airlines have their own lounges, Mumbai has the GVK lounge where all first and business class passengers traveling on any airline in those classes are able to access the lounge. There is a separate First class section inside the lounge once you enter. While I’ve been here once on a first class ticket on Singapore Suites, I’ve used it many other times with my Star Alliance gold status, who also gets access to the lounge. I didn’t visit this time because I had no time and I wanted to cover the rest of the terminal.

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GVK business class lounge

Now from the main section of airside, the terminal branches off into 2 different sections. There are other shops in the middle section, but I’ll cover them in a bit. First, I went down the left branch to see what all there was over there. Here is a Starbucks before entering the left branch.

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Starbucks

There was also a Cafe Coffee Day shop, which is basically the starbucks of India, and there was a Haagen Dazs store.

 

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Haagen Dazs

This part of the terminal is where all of the narrowbody aircraft leave from so its a relatively quiet part of the terminal. But as you can see, its still very aesthetic.

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terminal views

The end of the left branch was still finishing construction which is why this part is blocked off.

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plants\

I was very surprised to see a Saudia A330 at the end of the terminal but I guess there are a few heavy body gates on the left branch.

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Saudia A330

Now from where we were, it was quite a walk to where our gate would be because we would have to walk all the way back to the central part of the terminal, then to the right branch, where all the heavy aircraft leave from.

Now arriving back to the central part of the terminal there was a bookstore.

 

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bookstore

Here is a look at the other shops and features that were available in the center.

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terminal views

There is also a food court in the central area with a bar, KFC, pizza hut, and some other Indian places as well to eat.

 

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food court

 

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Indian restaurant

Behind the food court, there were also good views of the tarmac on this rainy monsoon evening.

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Air India 777-300ER
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United 777-200

I decided to get some sparkling water from the bar.

 

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sparkling water

Now we are heading towards the right branch which was the busy part of the terminal. There is a Crossword store which is the India equivalent of Barnes and Nobles in the US.

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Crossword

There is also an electronics shop right next to that.

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Electronics

I’m not quite sure what the below shops are but they were there across the walk way as well.

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More shops

Here is another clothing store.

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clothes store
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Restaurant

 

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GVK Lounge/ First class lounge

Alright so this side is the GVK west lounge and also I believe this entrance was closer to the first class side of the lounge just for reference.

 

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duty free

Alright so now we are walking down the right branch of the terminal towards our gate.

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kebab grill

There are some tablets around the airport probably for browsing the internet or exploring airport amenities.

 

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computers

There are some other clothes shops and bag shops in the right branch.

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more shops

After a while of walking, an escalator takes you down to the lower level of the departure area where all the heavy body planes leave from generally. As you can see its also more crowded.

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departures

At the end of the terminal, there were some very aesthetic shops with local goods.

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more shops
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more shops

Basically at the end of the terminal, there’s a cluster of duty free and food shops surrounded by many gates.

 

 

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shops
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coffee kiosk
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Kebab grill

And finally my plane to Dubai.

 

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Emirates Boeing 777-300

Overall, I think the reason is very clear why this terminal is my 2nd favorite in the world. There is no bias because I am a Maharashtran myself. But I think the beauty of the terminal, design, availability, and variety of shops, a variety of food places, exceptional lounges, and overall wide amount of amenities can speak for themselves. Now if only flights would consistently leave on time that would make everything perfect. But overall, a great terminal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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