When readers shared their own travel tips and several really stood out as worth highlighting. Kerry said, One of my travel rules is “always go into town the first night.” If you’ve been traveling all day, it is very tempting to just hang out at the hotel and go to bed early, but I made that rule after I found out the next morning that I had missed the annual summer fest at a little town on the coast of France. I have scored standing room at La Scala, the Munich Opera (Aida!) and a box seat at the Folk Opera in Madrid, by pushing on and checking out what was going on in town that first night. I see this as a jetlag tip more than anything else. My first international travel as a…
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What’s in My Laptop Bag?
When readers shared their own travel tips and several really stood out as worth highlighting. Erndog said, Invest in a ‘power brick’, something to keep your phone and/or tablet charged,while traveling. For an iPad, be sure it has at least 2 amp output Fortunately most of the planes I’m on have seat power, and even standard outlet plugs — my Empower adapter died after many years and it’s an outdated enough technology I didn’t want to replace it. Flying American’s older planes without power isn’t the only time I need extra juice. I do get a solid four hours of battery even watching movies and while online with inflight internet. There will be plenty of MacBook Air fans in the comments probably singing that machine’s praises for battery life, but it’s not a viable solution…
Travel Tip: Why Paper Still Matters in an Electronic Age
When readers shared their own travel tips and several really stood out as worth highlighting. Harlan V. said, When traveling abroad, always PRINT OUT your ticket information. I got stuck in a place where I didn’t speak the local language and needed proof of an onward journey. While I couldn’t TELL them, I definitely could whip out my travel info and SHOW them that I would be leaving the airport soon. This has saved me a few times! There are many times it helps to have a printed e-ticket itinerary, and even a printed boarding pass. An itinerary can be helpful: Getting into the airport Many airports in Asia — such as Male and Manila — will have security checking for itineraries on the way into the terminal. Showing your onward travel plans at immigration.…
Bits ‘n Pieces for October 26, 2013
News and Notes from Around the Interweb: How to get more luxury out of your vacation without spending a lot: Part 6 of 6 Really good post about customer service China Southern’s newly-announced route between New York JFK and Guangzhou, China will be a useful options for redeeming Delta Skymiles in business class to Asia. Hopefully award availability will be as good as it is on their Los Angeles flight (which isn’t as good as it used to be, and the New York route will be operated by a smaller aircraft, but this is still a welcome addition). Air Canada Aeroplan’s online shopping portal isn’t usually the most rewarding, but through October 28 they’re offering 5 points per dollar. You can join the 30,000+ people who see these deals and analysis every day — sign…
Saudia Business Class Trip Report: Saudia’s Jeddah Lounge and Jeddah-Lahore
Pakistani Correspondent continues her guest post describing the experience flying Saudia business class, which she redeemed using American Express Membership Rewards points transferred to Delta. Here’s her previous installment: New York JFK – Jeddah And now P.C. continues with the Saudia lounge in Jeddah and arriving in Lahore, Pakistan. Welcome to King AbdulAziz International Airport, Jeddah. The airport is fairly small but the signs for the Saudia lounge were misleading. Also, as an unacompanied female, I was not allowed to remain in transit for more than 18 hours but this wouldn’t be a problem because my onward flight was supposed to leave long before that. Eventually, I found the lounge on my own because no one wanted to talk to me and kept redirecting me to talk to someone else, or asked if I was…
Using Elite Security Lines When You Aren’t Entitled to Do So
When readers shared their own travel tips and several really stood out as worth highlighting. This one simply amused me, I’ll explain why in a minute. Jacob said, If you don’t have status flash expired airline status cards at security to go through elite lane It brought back memories of perhaps the most controversial travel-related blog post I’ve ever seen, when Million Mile Secrets wrote about how to fake an entitlement to priority security lines. In the US, I’ve been able to go through the airport elite status line just by showing a card – sometimes a regular frequent flyer card which I got for free just by signing up for a program – to the agent manning the shorter elite lines!… Sometimes it is just a regular frequent flyer card for an obscure foreign…
Saudia Business Class Trip Report: Award Availability (Delta Miles!) is Amazing, But Should You Fly It?
I’ve written about how easy it is to find award availability on Saudia using Delta miles. I’ve even walked through making a booking on Saudia live, in front of hundreds of people. There’s a reasonable question that comes up, objection even, Saudia? What is that like to fly? A co-worker flew Saudia on miles — the fruits of her signup bonus for an American Express Platinum card and a small amount of additional spending — and I asked her to share her experience. The trip was to Lahore, Pakistan to visit her family — departing from New York, and returning to Washington DC. She prefers to remain anonymous, but she provided a great trip report that I think is a fascinating window into an airline that isn’t frequently written about. We’ll call her my Pakistani…
American Launching Dallas-Hong Kong and Shanghai, Nixing JFK-Tokyo, and Updating Old Planes with New Seats
American has come out with a bunch of announcements today, exciting news under the rubric of new routes and a timeline for new seats. I had the chance to talk to American’s Vice Presdent of Network Planning Chuck Schubert about the moves. American is launching two new routes from Dallas to Asia: Hong Kong and Shanghai. They’re applying for authority for daily flights to each, and flight times may ultimately change. Dallas – Shanghai, operated by a Boeing 777-200 10:55am Depart Dallas Fort Worth – Arrive Shanghai 2:55pm +1 4:55pm Depart Shanghai – Arrive Dallas Fort Worth 6:15pm Dallas – Hong Kong, operated by a Boeing 777-300ER 12:40pm Depart Dallas Fort Worth – -Arrive Hong Kong 6:00pm +1 1:30pm Depart Hong Kong – Arrive Dallas Fort Worth 4:30pm The launch date for both services is…
Bits ‘n Pieces for October 15, 2013
News and notes from around the interweb: Which Hotel Loyalty Program is Best and Why? My piece over at Conde’ Nast Traveler. Younger business travelers are more likely to splurge with their company’s money than they would with their own. Older workers are much less likely to do so. (HT: uggboy on Milepoint) Several months ago I put together a primer on American Express financial reviews. Dan’s Deals what sorts of activities he sees as flags for banks generally to cause them to take a closer look at your accounts. Wandering Aramean says that United is now allowing only three connections (four flights) on one-way awards between the US and Australia/New Zealand and no longer just between the US and Asia via Europe. A United website glitch was letting people book award tickets without miles…
JetBlue Introduces Family Pooling of Miles – A Great Option, But They’re Not First
Some frequent flyer programs allow ‘ppoling’ of points within a family, everyone flies and then a family member uses everyone’s points for a reward. Others offer family accounts on the theory that the points belong to the head of household. Family pooling is not uncommon with Middle East programs. Still others want to reward the decision-maker in travel, Southwest Airlines was one of the first ones with this idea with their ‘Secretaries Program’ in the 1970s where administrative assistants could earn free travel by steering their bosses to fly Southwest. (Another tactic in the 70s was rebating take-home alcohol to passengers buying pricier tickets, when the Civil Aeronautics Board began ‘experimenting’ with price competition and national carriers were permitted to undercut Southwest fares.) JetBlue has taken a step that’s a first for any North American…
