Another way of unbundling has reached my attention. Using the services of Optiontown, I got an upgrade last week, with Air Asia at nominal cost. The way it worked was this: I completed my online booking with Air Asia I then navigated to Optiontown and retrieved my airline booking Chose the upgrade option I wanted Paid a small non refundable fee to apply for the upgrade. Fees can be paid by Credit Card or Paypal Paid a second fee equivalent to 50% of the usual upgrade price. This fee is refunded five days after the flight if upgrade does…
Trip Reports
Category Archives for Trip Reports.
My 500th Route!
My 977th flight today from Penang to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia was my 500th route. Since my first flight 45 years ago, I have spent 131 days instead aeroplanes. If I count check in and waiting times, I have probably spent a year of my life in air travel! Eleven of my Top 20 routes have been in Australia with sixty nine trips being between Sydney and Melbourne’s main airport Tullamarine. Not surprisingly Melbourne, Australia my home port which I have travelled into or out of 320 times features in eleven of my top routes. Los…
Trip report: Malaysia “five star”
Of the 5000+ air carriers on the world, There are only six five star airlines: ANA All Nippon Airways Asiana Airlines Cathay Pacific Malaysia Airlines Qatar Airways Singapore Airlines What makes a five star airline? According to Skytrax: The 5-Star Airline rating recognizes airlines at the forefront of product innovation, that set quality benchmarks and trends that are often followed by other carriers. The Airline Rating systems assess the standard of an airline’s Product and Service Delivery Quality, using more than 800 assessment categories, applied across both the Onboard and Airport environments. My experiences with…
Trip Report: Thai to Bangkok
Sat 8th June, 2013 08:05 Kuala Lumpur (KUL) M 09:15 Suvarnabhumi, Bangkok (BKK) Thai Airways TG 420 Non-stop: 2 hours 10 Airbus A330-300 (333) Booking: 8/10 I found the best fare for this flight on Skycanner. Ironically the cheapest fare on this Thai Airways flight was sold via Malaysian Airlines. So while booked on a Malaysian airlines flight number, I was flying on a Thai Airways plane. The logic of airline fares and rules, I have long given up on. The disadvantage of booking on the Malaysian flight was that I was unable to manage…
Qantas to Bangkok-Trip review
This was no ordinary flight for me. According to my flightmemory, it was my 950th flight ever. In addition, it was my 275th flight with Qantas and my 24th on an Airbus A330. Booking: 9 out of 10 Qantas’ booking engine is very streamlined. Six steps take you from enquiry to payment. If you are logged in as a Qantas Frequent Flyer, then the amount of information required to be typed in is minimal. Thanks to Skyscanner, I found the same fare on another website for $249 less. This saved me almost a third of the fare. It has annoyed me…
Virgin America Storm Chaos (Trip Report)
Today, Virgin America a normally good airline gave a disappointing performance. Virgin America (along with JetBlue) occupy top billing for me amongst all of the US carriers. On previous flight, I have given Virgin perfect scores with no exceptions. This most recent Virgin America flight was very disappointing! Virgin America (VX) launched in August, 2007 from their San Francisco base (now in SFO’s magnificent Terminal 2). They fly to sixteen destinations in the United States and three in Mexico. They began a Toronto, Canada service but it was not financially sustainable. This is an issue for the loss making airline which…
Aer Lingus: Budapest to Dublin (updated)
Background Aer Lingus is the flag carrier and second biggest airline in Ireland. Operating since 1936, its name an Anglicisation of the Gaelic Aer Loingeas means “air fleet” . A lot has changed for Aer Lingus in the last six years not the least being the Irish economic situation. The government reduced its 85 per cent stake to 25 percent through a listing on the Stock Exchange in 2006. Ryanair, arch rival and biggest Irish airline has now picked up close to 30 percent and attempted three takeover bids in five years.Abu Dhabi-based and owned Etihad…
Delta First Class Delight
For many years, I refused to fly Delta. My re discovery of them has been a great experience and this recent almost perfect flight was confirmation that Delta have a lot to offer these days. Booking 10 out of 10 The Delta.com web site is very straightforward and gave fare options for both First Class and Coach. The booking engine flows well, is logical and a pleasure to use. When making my seat selection, I chose 1C being the only seat left in the front row of First Class. Check in: 10 out of 10 Delta has a great…
Trip Report: Air France to London City
My 920th flight was also my first flight into London City. As a result of this flight, I have now flown into and/or out of every one of London’s five airports. The other are: Heathrow, Gatwick, Stanstead and Luton. London City Airport was opened in 1987 after six years of planning and construction. The airport is located within the newly developed Docklands precinct of London (11 km: 6.9 miles) from the City of London. In 2011, the Airport served nearly 3 million passengers. Booking: 9 out of 10 This flight was operated as an Air France service by its subsidiary CityJet.…
Double Turkish Delight
Apologies for publishing both the final version and an initial draft almost simultaneously of my Report on my Turkish Airlines experience from Washington to Budapest via Istanbul. The draft was clearly not meant to be published. Ironically, I was on a plane when they went live. As one reader noted, I must have inserted the wrong disc in my amenity pack! I recommend the correct version. It is much more tasty! Thank you to those who noted the mistake.
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