I stayed at the Radisson Blu Style Hotel in Vienna on a trip to central Europe last year. I booked this hotel with points when Club Carlson was still offering a one award night free for every award booking and when the highest category of hotel was only 50k points (instead of 70k points). In…
Cathay Pacific renovated their lounge at BKK recently, and I have to say that this new lounge is a MASSIVE improvement over their old lounge. Their old lounge was tiny and crowded and had bad food options, and this renovated lounge is just so much better. It’s very similar in decor and feeling to their…
I accessed the Oman Air lounge at Bangkok airport (BKK) via Priority Pass. This lounge is located in the E concourse, so it’s convenient for oneworld flights (which all depart from the E, F, or G gates). Upon entering, I was immediately impressed by the decor of lounge. A lot of Priority Pass-accessible lounges can…
This was my second flight on Japan Airlines first class. You can read a review of my first flight in JAL first here. I was welcomed warmly on board. I’ve heard other people criticize JAL for having flight attendants who don’t have a great command of English, but English proficiency was high across the board…
It took me about an hour to get to the airport from the Grand Hyatt by taxi. I was flying JAL out of CGK, and at check-in, I was told that JAL uses the Pura Indah lounge. There were a lot of different lounges at the airport, including a Citibank lounge. I didn’t realize that…
For my relatively brief stay in Jakarta, I decided to redeem points for the Grand Hyatt Jakarta. Since it was a category 3 Hyatt property, it cost 12,000 points per night. Chain hotels in Jakarta are ridiculously pricey given how inexpensive other things in Jakarta are, as rates were over $300 USD per night, so I felt…
To get from Singapore to Jakarta, I flew Lion Air, which is an Indonesian low-cost carrier. Traveling around Southeast Asia can be super affordable thanks to all of these low-cost carriers (e.g. AirAsia, Jetstar), although you often have to be cognizant of fees. It’s a little misleading for me to title the post “Lion Air…
Some practical advice and tips around money when traveling abroad: Tip #1: Wait until you get to the country before getting any local currency. You generally shouldn’t exchange money at home before you leave for your trip because your home bank will almost certainly offer a worse exchange rate than what you’d get if you had waited…
On my second Emirates first class flight on this trip from Dubai to Singapore, I was the only passenger in first class. This flight departed at around 3am, and we were delayed a bit due to congestion. Funny how 3am is a congested time at DXB! Only in the Middle East. Based on the first interaction,…
On this trip, I also decided to check out the business class lounge at Dubai. The quick summary is that the business class lounge is like a slightly-less nice version of the first class lounge. It offers nearly identical amenities, but just a little less nice. The layout of the business class lounge is very…
