This trip was originally built around a segment starting from Zürich back to the United States.  During my trip, though, I kicked around dropping my United-ticketed return leg in favor of an American Airlines award.  As I had some domestic (yes, domestic) award travel in three-cabin first class on AA already ticketed, it dawned on me that I could add on flights from Zürich to New York for a marginal cost of 30k miles, some taxes, and a helping of British Airways-imposed fuel surcharges.

I’ve never been thrilled by BA’s fuel surcharges, but spending $340 in lieu of an additional 32.5k isn’t a terrible deal.  While a similar analysis could be done for making use of my stopover on my United award, UA didn’t have saver award availability on my desired dates of travel (nor did it ever end up opening up).

Meanwhile, as I kicked around rebooking myself, Lufthansa opened up some first class availability to New York from Frankfurt, so I jumped from the United-operated nonstop from Zürich and abandoned my aspirations of flying BA First (for now).

When I arrived at the lounge, the attendants directed me to the Business Class side of the lounge. The Lufthansa Group family of airlines are sticklers for making passengers show their Star Alliance Gold cards to have access to the senator lounges and my experience was no different.

Once inside, I visited the buffet for a light snack.

After leaving the Park Hyatt Zürich, I wandered around the surrounding neighborhood and the northern end of the lake.

With the impending loss of American Airlines Admirals Club access for my Platinum card, I’ve been wondering what to do with it lately.  Previously, I had waived my hands and justified the $450 annual fee with its $200/yr airline fee reimbursement to get my cost of lounge access down to $250/yr, far below the discounted rate for Executive Platinum members.  (Plus, I’ve made occasional use of the card to visit US Airways Clubs and Priority Pass lounges.)  I’m still not sold on the swanky American Express Centurion Lounges, as I spend most of my time in airports with disconnected terminal buildings (JFK, LAX, and SFO) rather than those with a unified airside concourse (DFW).

Yesterday, American Express announced two new benefits for the card:

• Beginning in June, cardholders will get free worldwide Boingo access.  I currently pay $12.95/mo for domestic Boingo access, so I’d be able to drop this in favor of the card-provided benefit in a few months.  After adjusting for Boingo and the airline fee reimbursement, my effective cost of holding the card is about $95/year.  There’s still some benefit from Priority Pass and the global aspect of this Boingo offer that I’m not accounting for.
• As an alternative to the Global Entry fee reimbursement, American Express will cover the TSA Precheck enrollment fee.

In early 2013, I had signed up for the Chase Hyatt Visa card on the eve of losing Hyatt Diamond status. As a result, I had two free suite award nights for any Hyatt worldwide.  While I had managed to use one night in October at the Park Hyatt Milan, I still had a night expiring in mid-January.

To make the best of it, I decided to use it at the Park Hyatt Zürich.

Upon check-in, the clerk escorted me to my suite and showed me around.

For my flight to London, I booked an Avios award in Club Europe for 9k Avios points.  While coach would have been good enough, this decision–similar to my flight from Berlin–was driven by award availability rather than personal preference.

After clearing security, I made my way to the Galleries First lounge.  As I was checking in at the front desk, the clerk suggested I might want to visit the Galleries Club lounge on account of traveling in Club Europe rather than the Galleries First lounge via my Executive Platinum card.

“Isn’t this one supposed to be nicer?”

“Well, yes, it is.”

I’m still puzzled why this conversation happened.

I made my way into the lounge to look into the dinner options I had available.

Terminal 5 would have sweeping views of British Airways’ various aircraft, but most are unfortunately obstructed by the terminal’s architectural features.

With boarding about to commence, I made my way from the lounge to the remote terminal 5 pier.  Virgin Atlantic has taken to advertising in the middle of British Airways’ “home.”

Sadly, not my chariot to Zürich was not a 747.

Club Europe’s legroom leaves a bit to be desired.

Once in flight, I got to discover the joys of children in premium cabins.  A family seated next to and in front of me had brought two children with them.  As to ensure I had a pleasant flight, they took turns screaming, crying, climbing over the seats, and throwing toys throughout the cabin.

We arrived at a remote stand in Zürich.  My luxury car rides to planes aside, it was one of the more pleasant remote stand experiences I’ve had, thanks to stereotypical Swiss efficiency.

For my two nights in London, I booked a category 6 award with Club Carlson for The May Fair Hotel for 50k points per night.  As part of the 2014 Club Carlson devaluation, this hotel is now 70k points per night.

As a Club Carlson Visa cardholder (a refrain heard often on this trip), my last night was free, so my stay only cost 50k points for two nights.  At the time of my stay, room rates started at around 350 GBP/nt.  Since I wouldn’t actually be willing to pay that much, even for a hotel in Central London, I can’t claim to have truly received 2.3 cents per point of “value” from this redemption.

At check-in, I was assigned a standard room with a king bed.  Unfortunately, the windows overlooked an small airshaft rather than anything remotely scenic.

As a Club Carlson Gold member (thanks to my credit card), I found a small box of chocolates and a handwritten note of thanks in my room when I arrived.

For my flight to London, I booked a ticket in Club Europe with 9k Avios points.  This choice wound up being driven by award availability (or the lack thereof in coach), rather than any particular desire to fly intra-European business class.

Between possessing oneworld Emerald status and being ticketed in business class, I was able to fortunately avoid the lengthy check-in line.

As I was checking in, I asked where the British Airways lounge was located and found myself directed back from where I came.  The lounge isn’t very prominently signed nor is it particularly close to the British Airways gate, which is a bit of a challenge by the standards of how small Tegel is.

I also got the feeling that I might have been here before.

As my exposure to oneworld has mostly come from American Airlines, I’m still learning the ropes of what exactly I should expect from British Airways’ “terraces” tier of lounge.  Observations so far?  Juice and wine of unknown quality seem to be on-hand.

After settling into the lounge for 30 minutes, they announced it was time for boarding.

I’m pretty sure I didn’t get my 4.5k extra Avios worth of legroom out of this flight.

For my two nights in Berlin, I booked two nights at the Park Inn Berlin Alexanderplatz.  As this is a category 4 hotel, awards cost 38k points per night.  Coupled with my Club Carlson Visa which saw a lot of use this trip, my cost was effectively only 19k points per night.

While this was not the absolute “best” value for Club Carlson points (my stay at the May Fair in London later on in the trip was far better), I’ve been keen to taper my Club Carlson balance to a more reasonable level.

As a bit of a history lesson, this hotel opened as the Hotel Stadt Berlin in 1970.  Fortunately, the hotel was renovated in 2012.

As a Club Carlson Gold member via my credit card, I found a fruit and wine amenity waiting for me when I checked in to my room.

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For those readers just tuning in, I actually wandered around Berlin on my trip to Europe this past winter.

Unter den Linden sees the same costumed crowd wanting money in exchange for photos as Times Square.

The nearby US Embassy has a Statue of Liberty in bear form.

Club Carlson is finally devaluing, after running their points printing presses for the last few years.  Most significantly, 9 category 6 hotels are being moved into a newly created category 7 tier, priced at 70k rather than 50k points per night.  As a refresher, the category 7 hotels are going to include:

• Radisson Royal Hotel, Dubai
• Radisson Blu Le Dokhan’s Hotel, Paris Trocadero
• Radisson Blu 1835 Hotel & Thalasso, Cannes
• Radisson Blu Le Metropolitan Hotel, Paris Eiffel
• Radisson Blu Hotel Champs Elysees, Paris
• The May Fair
• Plaza on the River, London
• art’otel, Amsterdam
• Radisson Royal Hotel, Moscow

I wrote about these changes in greater detail when they were originally announced.

For my flight to Berlin, I booked an Avios award with 4.5k points.  For the short hop, an hour in coach was far better than spending ten hours on a train.

Niki also seems to have a confusingly expensive set of food options to purchase on board.  I’m not sure why I would ever spend 39 Euros to have a cake in flight rather than simply buy one on the ground.

For my stay in Vienna, I booked two award nights at the Radisson Blu Palais hotel.  As a Club Carlson Visa cardholder, my second night was free, so this award only cost 44k points.

As I was researching this stay, I noticed that all of the room rates advertised a complimentary minibar.

After arriving off of my flight from Los Angeles, I made my way to the Lufthansa First Class lounge prior to my flight to Vienna.

I checked in with the front desk attendant, who then directed me to the window across from her.  Rather than have First Class passengers enter Schengen elsewhere in the airport, Lufthansa has arranged for a member of the German Border Police to be available.

As I my flight to Vienna was going to be departing from a remote stand, I was told to come back when it was time for my flight to get a ride to my plane.

I then went to the back of the lounge to take a shower following my redeye flight.  Lately, Lufthansa has been issuing collectible blue rubber ducks, but this location was apparently “out.”

There were only a few other passengers in the lounge on a Monday afternoon.

I then went out in search of lunch at the buffet.

All of the outlets were European style.

When I entered the lounge, the attendant at the front desk had instructed me to return to the front at 3PM for my ride to the remote stand for my flight to Vienna.  As I didn’t want to hold up an entire plane with my tardiness, I returned at 3 sharp and went downstairs to the limousine desk.  Boarding had not commenced, so the agent advised me to take a seat.

She investigated and found out that the flight was still waiting on one last crewmember.  As there was going to be a brief delay, she suggested I leave my bags downstairs and return to the lounge to relax.  A few minutes later, the front desk clerk stopped by to apologize for the delay and let me know that I my flight (and car) were ready.

As we approached the plane, my driver asked whether I wanted to board the plane first.  Rather than hold up a bus full of people, I said I didn’t mind waiting or boarding simultaneously.  After we pulled up to the plane, he verified that the crew was ready for boarding, let me out of the car, and then carried my bag to the plane.

Meanwhile, a bus full of people were waiting, despite my best intentions.

My gate was a quick walk from the lounge, so I took a moment to admire the planes preparing to depart to Europe that evening.

The flight was already starting to board economy, so whatever line there might have been for the premium lane had already cleared out.

Lufthansa 453
Los Angeles (LAX) – Munich (MUC)
Sunday, December 22nd, 2013
Depart:  5:16PM
Arrive: 1:04PM
Duration:  10 hours, 48 minutes
Aircraft: Airbus A340-642 (D-AIHP)
Seat: 2K (First Class)

As I settled in, a flight attendant came by with an amenity kit, pajamas, and a menu for dinner.  After introducing himself (in English), he asked whether I preferred English or Deutsch.  I answered “either,” leading the flight attendants to interpret that as “English” for the rest of the flight.  Answering this in German might lead to better results.

The flight attendants then came by offering water and champagne as predeparture drinks.  My macadamia nuts and rose were somehow overlooked, however.  The purser eventually stopped by with a rose after takeoff.

The menu read as follows:

Obviously, it’s not possible to realize that you’re flying in Lufthansa’s First Class without it being prominently written at the front of the cabin.

The dinner service began with bread and olive oil.

Lufthansa provides small salt and pepper grinders for its meal service.

I had ordered a vegetarian meal in advance, so in lieu of caviar, I was served a small vegetable plate.

The vegetable plate seemed a bit redundant with the salad appetizer.

I had ravioli for my entree.

A bit after dinner, I asked for a turndown.  Lufthansa’s in-flight entertainment left a bit to be desired, so I decided that getting a full night’s rest, even if at an awkwardly time in the evening, was a better choice.

Several hours later, I woke up to a well-lit cabin and one of the flight attendants asking me for my breakfast selection.  When I mentioned that I had ordered a vegetarian meal, she quickly recalled that and returned with breakfast.  Two dishes of fruit, rather than the one on-menu dish of fruit, is an important part of any vegetarian breakfast.

As the breakfast service was wrapping up, our captain came on to announce our imminent arrival to Munich airport.

After reaching our gate, I disembarked and began walking to the center of the main terminal, in search of the Lufthansa First Class Lounge prior to my flight to Vienna.

With my flight to Munich departing at 5:15PM, I dropped off my rental car just before 3PM and made my way to LAX’s Tom Bradley International Terminal.  The Lufthansa First Class check-in line actually had two other passengers waiting when I arrived.

During check-in, the agent asked me if I needed to be escorted to the lounge or the plane.

Me: “What exactly does that entail?”

Agent: “Well, we’ll walk you through security and drop you off in the lounge.  In the case of the plane, we’ll pick you up from the lounge when the flight is ready to board.”

As TBIT is serviced by non-US flagged carriers, TSA Precheck hasn’t been setup yet, so I decided that being walked past security could save a bit of time.  It worked out well in that I was able to enter the north checkpoint after they had stopped accepting new passengers for screening.  It worked out poorly, as the agent didn’t want to steer us to a checkpoint with just a metal detector, so I ended up having to opt-out and enjoy a Freedom Grope.

Star Alliance runs a shared lounge at TBIT with a separate first class section.

When I arrived, the first class section was empty.

Shortly after I arrived, an attendant stopped by with a dining menu.  As I was going to eat on my flight, I turned it down and began to look around.

The first class section has a small dedicated selection of food and drinks of its own and passengers can head over to the main Star Alliance Gold lounge next door.

Since Hong Kong, I’ve become fascinated by the power outlets available near the seating areas of lounges.

While the first class is somewhat secluded (and has views of absolutely nothing), the main lounge overlooks the main airside hall.

The lounge has an outside terrace that looks northeast towards the east part of runways 24L/24R and the terminal buildings.  The weather of Los Angeles in December was too much for lounge goers, even with several fireplaces and heaters setup.  For the hour (near sunset), it was a bit disappointing that the terrace didn’t face west.

The main lounge had its own selection of food, along with a few hot dishes.

As part of the decorations for the lounge, there were a number of quotes prominently displayed on the walls.  I kept feeling like they were telling me something about Los Angeles…

Soon though, it was time for my flight to Munich and headed to my gate.

For Christmas and New Years, I decided I would try booking earlier than last year (the Friday before Christmas weekend).  This didn’t actually prove to be particularly useful:  My final outbound flight wasn’t booked until the night before.  To give a glimpse of my trip construction, with an outbound on 12/22 and a return commencing 12/30:

• 12/11: ZRH-EWR (UA J)
• 12/15: LAX-SFO-FRA (UA F) / ZRH-EWR (UA J)
• 12/21: LAX-MUC (LH F) / ZRH-EWR (UA J)
• 12/22: LAX-MUC-VIE (LH F, J) / ZRH-EWR (UA J)
• 12/27: LAX-MUC-VIE (LH F, J) / ZRH-FRA-JFK (LX J, LH F)

It looks messy, but on a map, the final flights are close to the “I better book something, just so I can get there” flights I chose:

With the then-impending United devaluation in February, I was thrilled to pick up two seats in Lufthansa First.

As I wanted to move between several European cities during my trip, I booked three flights with Avios, eventually finishing the itinerary with:

In early December, I visited Boston and stayed at the Sheraton Commander Cambridge.

As a business class passenger, I had access to the United Arrivals lounge.  As only United’s International First Class lounge has showers airside, I would have otherwise not had access to one before catching my connecting flight.  While Continental brought showers to the merger, it’s worth noting that there are only a handful available at the premerger President’s Clubs in EWR and IAH.

The United Arrivals lounge is located on the arrivals level of Terminal 3, which is some distance away from the International Terminal where most of passengers with access will be clearing customs.

After showing my boarding pass to the attendant, she began printing out another boarding pass.  Thinking this was my boarding pass for my connection, I asked her for it, only to discover that it was a duplicate of my HKG-SFO leg, used by the lounge to keep records of its visitors.  Using a computerized system would be too much to expect.

I made my way to the back to use one of the showers.

Afterwards, I grabbed a coffee and prepared to head out.

While I had booked a K fare for my journey across the middle of the Pacific to Hong Kong, I splurged on a W fare for my return, choosing to play systemwide roulette with United.

When I booked this trip, confirmable upgrade space was plentiful on United’s two NRT-SFO flights for the days I wanted to travel.  As UA78/UA79 service between Tokyo and Hong Kong was dropped in late October, I was left trying to book a flight with ANA unsuccessfully.  Thanks to some quirks in United system’s, it proved impossible to book that segment while staying in a low fare bucket (rather than say full fare coach or business class for HKG-NRT).

Fortunately, my upgrade cleared a few minutes before online check-in opened and I was assigned the last available business class seat on the plane.

I left the lounge when boarding was announced, but nevertheless, group 1 had already become a sea of humanity.

Boarding flights (to the United States, at least) at Hong Kong is somewhat complicated by the thorough bag inspection conducted for every passenger.  Making past the final security check, I settled down in my seat.

United 862
Hong Kong (HKG) – San Francisco (SFO)
Monday, December 2nd, 2013
Depart:  12:30PM
Arrive: 8:25AM
Duration:  11 hours, 55 minutes
Aircraft: Boeing 747-222 (N121UA)
Seat: 6B (Business Class, Lower Deck)

After finally passing an entire 747 of passengers through the bag search gantlet, we pushed back, taxied, out, and took off to the South.

The menu read as follows:

Service began with drinks and warm, mixed nuts.

I had ordered a vegetarian meal; and thanks to my upgrade clearing before the 24 hour mark, I managed to actually receive it.

Somehow, American manages to rather consistently offer small glass bottles of olive oil and vinegar as a dressing choice.  United, rather consistently, offers prepackaged dressings in far less elegant plastic containers.

At United, “Asian vegetarian” secretly means “Indian” for reasons that have never been made clear to me.

After finishing lunch, we still had about nine hours of flying time left before our scheduled arrival to San Francisco.  The majority of flights from (and to) Asia are poorly timed for any reasonable sleep schedule:  3PM is not a great time to go to sleep.

I caught what rest I could before waking up to the beginnings of the breakfast service about an hour before arrival.

Once again, I had a vegetarian meal for breakfast.

While I wanted to catch some good pictures of the San Francisco area from the air during our approach, the fog of the Bay Area was diligently uncooperative.

Seated in 6B, just behind door 1L, I was able to get off the plane quickly and make my way to the United Arrivals lounge.

I had some time between clearing passport control and my flight to San Francisco so I stopped by the United Club.  Like the Narita United Club (and Global First lounge), the Hong Kong lounge is a bit different from those normally found in the United States.

First, the lounge sits on an open air platform above the terminal concourse.  Off in the distance is N121UA, our Boeing 747 in United’s Star Alliance livery.

More importantly, the food is vastly different than the normal United fare.

A make your own taco station?  That’s a far cry from Milano cookies and yogurt covered raisins.

Beverages were intermixed with the various food sections.

My only (slight) annoyance was that the power outlets were limited to the British style.  While I do carry a power strip to maximize my usage of a single outlet adapter, I had to go fish it out of my carry-on suitcase.

For my three nights in Hong Kong, I stayed at the Hyatt Regency Tsim Sha Tsui.  The hotel occupies part of a mixed-use building in Kowloon, shared with a mall on the ground floor and residences on the higher floors.

Room rates were hovering a bit north of 250USD/nt, so I decided to redeem 15k points/nt for my stay.  This was done as very practical booking, rather than an aspirational one.  Further, category 4 standard rooms were untouched in the great Hyatt devaluation.

The graylish slab to the right of the bed is a sliding door that exposes a window to the bathroom sink.