Just to let everyone know, LufthansaFlyer has found a new home with www.First2Board.com. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Randy and the rest of the fantastic Boarding Area family for the support and help in making LufthansaFlyer a great success. I’m super excited about the new opportunity!

You can continue to find my site at www.LufthansaFlyer.com and you can continue to follow me twitter @lufthansaflyer.

I hope to see you there!

I wanted to take this opportunity to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and joyful Holiday Season!

It’s been a great year for me with LufthansaFlyer completing its first full year. Thanks to everyone for their support and interest!

Personally, it’s been a record travel year for me with over 150,000 miles flown and the “odometer” for next year looks to exceed this years efforts, so I’m genuinely excited about 2013!

I also want to take this opportunity to thank everyone within the Lufthansa Group (you know who you are!) who has helped LufthansaFlyer become so successful. Your willingness to help and your support have been invaluable!

On that note, here is the 2012 version of the LufthansaFlyer Christmas Tree. Many ducks have been added thanks to such a great and blessed year of travel and now cover the entire tree. Unfortunately there was not enough room for all of them. Looks like I’ll need to upgrade to a bigger tree for the 2013 version!

Many new ducks have joined the family this year.......

Today marks the last day of the Fundraiser being held by Passports With Purpose to help benefit Water.org and their goal of bringing fresh drinking water to those in Haiti who need it most.

I’ve relisted my original post introducing the fundraiser, so if you missed it the first time that I wrote about, here is another opportunity for you to become familiar with it.

Remember, for only a $10 donation, you can enter to win one of dozens of prizes, including travel gear, hotel loyalty points, vacation packages, travel vouchers, etc., etc.!!

If you would like to donate to this effort, please follow the link that you’ll find at the bottom of this post. the Fundraiser draws to a close tonight (December 11) at midnight (EST).

MY ORIGINAL POST:

This year, I’ve joined Passports With Purpose to help raise funds for Water.org as they seek to expand the availability of fresh drinking water in Haiti. The objective for Water.org is to build two new wells for two communities in Haiti. If you’ve followed the news over recent years Haiti has been decimated by natural disasters and her citizens continue to struggle with their recovery efforts.

Normally I don’t come to you for your help, but in this case I thought the plight of the Haitian people deserves all of our attention. Passports With Purpose is hoping to raise $100,000.00 to help make these Fresh Water Wells a reality.

They’ve developed a great fund raiser for this cause that not only will raise the money needed for the project, but will give YOU an opportunity to win a fantastic gift as a small token of thanks for your contribution.

The way the fundraiser works is as follows:

The Fundraiser starts on November 28 and ends on December 11 at Midnight (EST)

Each blogger who is participating in this fundraiser has arranged for a prize to be donated to the prize pool that has been built by participating blogs.

With each $10 donation, you are able to choose which gift you would like to be entered to win from among all the donated prizes from all the participating blogs. If you want to enter to win this bag, please make sure to find LufthansaFlyer on the list of participating blogs.

Prize Winners will be contacted on December 18.

Everyone is eligible to enter, just make sure that the prize you choose offers shipping to your country.

I approached American luggage legend Tom Bihn to help with my efforts for this fundraiser and they have been superbly helpful and have donated a Forest Green Western Flyer which is one of their most popular business/overnight travel cases. In addition, the case comes with their optional “Absolute Strap”. The value of the contribution is $240.00 and I am grateful for their contribution!!

The Tom Bihn Western Flyer:

I’ve been a loyal fan of Tom Bihn’s products ever since I purchased a “Super Ego” bag from them. It has traveled over 100,000 miles this year and has been absolutely the perfect bag that compliments my carry-on trolley.

I hope that during this Holiday Season that you can take a moment and for the cost of a pack of cigarettes or a movie ticket can help someone get access to fresh drinking water.

Please use this link to go to PassportsWithPurpose.org and submit your donation.

After your donation is made, you will then be asked to choose which gift you would like to win.

Thank You in advance for your support and I ask that you share/tweet/post this to your social networks. If you can be so kind, please leave a comment on this thread if you had made a donation. I’d like to see how many people participated.

This year, I’ve joined Passports With Purpose to help raise funds for Water.org as they seek to expand the availability of fresh drinking water in Haiti. The objective for Water.org is to build two new wells for two communities in Haiti. If you’ve followed the news over recent years Haiti has been decimated by natural disasters and her citizens continue to struggle with their recovery efforts.

Normally I don’t come to you for your help, but in this case I thought the plight of the Haitian people deserves all of our attention. Passports With Purpose is hoping to raise $100,000.00 to help make these Fresh Water Wells a reality.

They’ve developed a great fund raiser for this cause that not only will raise the money needed for the project, but will give YOU an opportunity to win a fantastic gift as a small token of thanks for your contribution.

The way the fundraiser works is as follows:

The Fundraiser starts on November 28 and ends on December 11 at Midnight (EST)

Each blogger who is participating in this fundraiser has arranged for a prize to be donated to the prize pool that has been built by participating blogs.

With each $10 donation, you are able to choose which gift you would like to be entered to win from among all the donated prizes from all the participating blogs. If you want to enter to win this bag, please make sure to find LufthansaFlyer on the list of participating blogs.

Prize Winners will be contacted on December 18.

Everyone is eligible to enter, just make sure that the prize you choose offers shipping to your country.

I approached American luggage legend Tom Bihn to help with my efforts for this fundraiser and they have been superbly helpful and have donated a Forest Green Western Flyer which is one of their most popular business/overnight travel cases. In addition, the case comes with their optional “Absolute Strap”. The value of the contribution is $240.00 and I am grateful for their contribution!!

The Tom Bihn Western Flyer:

I’ve been a loyal fan of Tom Bihn’s products ever since I purchased a “Super Ego” bag from them. It has traveled over 100,000 miles this year and has been absolutely the perfect bag that compliments my carry-on trolley.

I hope that during this Holiday Season that you can take a moment and for the cost of a pack of cigarettes or a movie ticket can help someone get access to fresh drinking water.

Please use this link to go to PassportsWithPurpose.org and submit your donation.

After your donation is made, you will then be asked to choose which gift you would like to win.

Thank You in advance for your support and I ask that you share/tweet/post this to your social networks. If you can be so kind, please leave a comment on this thread if you had made a donation. I’d like to see how many people participated.

ATTENTION: THIS IS A RE-POST OF WHAT I WROTE YESTERDAY. I’M RE-POSTING DUE TO THE OUTAGE THAT BOARDINGAREA.COM (MY BLOG’S WEB HOST) SUFFERED FOR MOST OF YESTERDAY. IF YOU SUBMITTED A COMMENT AS AN ENTRY, DON’T WORRY, IT WILL STILL COUNT AND YOU DO NOT NEED TO RESUBMIT ONE!

This is the second chance via LufthansaFlyer for you to enter VERY GOOD POINTS’ (VGP) fantastic contest celebrating her site’s FIRST anniversary. By sharing your experience and answering the following question, you’ll have a chance to advance to VGP’s Grand Prize round for a chance to win one of her great Grand Prize options.

The question:

What has been you MOST favorite flight experience EVER?

Too many times we read about all the negative experiences that people have when flying. Seldom do we hear about great flights which can include great cabin crew, a funny pilot, great food, a fantastic aircraft, etc.

It usually appears that it’s easier to complain than to pay a compliment. So this time I want to draw out compliments and positive experiences.

I’ll pick a winner based on the impact the answer makes on me (remember, it’s the JOURNEY not the DESTINATION!) and advance them over to VGP for a chance to win one of the Grand Prizes:

Grand Prize #1 –

300k Delta Sky Miles

200k Hilton Honors Points

Grand Prize #2 –

240k US Airways Dividend Miles

100k Marriott Rewards Points

50k Hyatt Gold Passport Points

Please note, only ONE ENTRY per person! I’ll accept entries through midnight (US Eastern Time) on October 26.

There is one more week left in her contest during which she has been awarding weekly winners as well. For this final week, she is awarding 20,000 Starwood Preferred Guest Starpoints. To enter this week’s give away on Very Good Points, please visit her Contest Entry Post.

Share your experiences and GOOD LUCK!

This is the second chance via LufthansaFlyer for you to enter VERY GOOD POINTS’ (VGP) fantastic contest celebrating her site’s FIRST anniversary. By sharing your experience and answering the following question, you’ll have a chance to advance to VGP’s Grand Prize round for a chance to win one of her great Grand Prize options.

The question:

What has been you MOST favorite flight experience EVER?

Too many times we read about all the negative experiences that people have when flying. Seldom do we hear about great flights which can include great cabin crew, a funny pilot, great food, a fantastic aircraft, etc.

It usually appears that it’s easier to complain than to pay a compliment. So this time I want to draw out compliments and positive experiences.

I’ll pick a winner based on the impact the answer makes on me (remember, it’s the JOURNEY not the DESTINATION!) and advance them over to VGP for a chance to win one of the Grand Prizes:

Grand Prize #1 –

300k Delta Sky Miles

200k Hilton Honors Points

Grand Prize #2 –

240k US Airways Dividend Miles

100k Marriott Rewards Points

50k Hyatt Gold Passport Points

Please note, only ONE ENTRY per person! I’ll accept entries through midnight (US Eastern Time) on October 26.

There is one more week left in her contest during which she has been awarding weekly winners as well. For this final week, she is awarding 20,000 Starwood Preferred Guest Starpoints. To enter this week’s give away on Very Good Points, please visit her Contest Entry Post.

Share your experiences and GOOD LUCK!

Like myself, a fellow blogger is also celebrating her 1st year with “Boarding Area” and has launched a fantastic contest that has weekly winners throughout October, as well as 2 Grand Prize Winners that will be chosen at contest’s end!

Stacey of “VERY GOOD POINTS” has put together one of the best contests that I have seen from a blog and she was kind enough to invite readers of “LufthansaFlyer” to participate in the festivities. For the month of October, she is holding a weekly contest that gives away Hyatt or Starwood points based on entries she selects as winners based on her criteria each week. Please visit her site to take advantage of the weekly contests.

Here’s an overview of the weekly prizes:

Week 1 – Oct 1st – Oct 7th – blog post will be dated Oct 1st and deadline will be October 7th 2012, 8pm EST

Weekly prize – 20k Starwood Preferred Guest Starpoints

Week 2 – Oct 8th – Oct 14th blog post will be dated Oct 8th and deadline will be October 14th 2012, 8pm EST

Weekly prize – 50k Hyatt Gold Passport Points

Week 3 – Oct 15th – Oct 21st blog post will be dated Oct 15th and deadline will be October 21st 2012, 8pm EST

Weekly prize – 20k Starwood Preferred Guest Starpoints

Week 4 – Oct 22nd – Oct 28th blog post will be dated Oct 22nd and deadline will be October 28th 2012, 8pm EST

Weekly prize – 20k Starwood Preferred Guest Starpoints

And the Grand Prizes:

Two Grand Prizes will be given away based upon all entries submitted during the 4 week contest period (starting Oct 1 2012 through Oct 28th 2012 at 8pm EST). There will be one bonus entry announced during the contest period and that will count as 1 additional entry. Any participant who enters more than 3 times per week is be disqualified.

Grand Prize #1 –

300k Delta Sky Miles

200k Hilton Honors Points

Grand Prize #2 –

240k US Airways Dividend Miles

100k Marriott Rewards Points

50k Hyatt Gold Passport Points

This is where LufthansaFlyer comes in:

TWO LufthansaFlyer readers will be chosen for the Grand Prize Entry pool at the end of the month. If you read both Very Good Points and LufthansaFlyer you’ll have one more entry that will increase your odds.

To enter for your chance to win the LufthansaFlyer portion of the contest and advance to the Grand Prize pool, all you have to do is leave a comment to this thread telling me about your most memorable travel experience that you can recall. It doesn’t have to be the “perfect” trip where angels sang along the way. It can be funny anecdotes, bad travel experiences or embarassing ones. It doesn’t matter as long as its something that you have experienced during your travels.

I will publish 2 contest entry posts during October (this one being the first), so you’ll have the opportunity to share 2 travel memories. From all the memories that are shared, I will at my discretion pick 2 unique winners (one winner per contest entry post) and send them over to “Very Good Points” for the Grand Prize opportunity. My criteria will include travel location, creativeness and the impact that it makes on me.

So without further ado, please share your travel memories and good luck!

Thanks again for making the contest celebrating LufthansaFlyer.com’s first year such a success. After compiling several hundred entries from the four rounds of the contest, we have a “confirmed” winner!

Congratulations “BRANDON”!

Your entry (#420) was selected by Random.org’s Random Number Generator. Enjoy the miles and your upcoming travel with Lufthansa!!

Stayed tuned for an announcement later this week involving a fantastic contest being held by a fellow blogger…..Trust me, you’ll want to enter.

I have to give credit to my wife for finding this “off-topic” gem.

In what could be one of the greatest travel short cuts of all time, she had found this gem while browsing “Pinterest” showing how anyone can program an elevator to go directly to their desired floor and eliminate the annoying stops along the way. This comes in REALLY HANDY when you are on a high floor and want to get to the lobby without being the “local” elevator stopping on every floor.

Not sure if this will work on every elevator, but it may be worth a shot!

This coding is apparently built into some elevators as a safety mechanism which allows emergency workers to access any floor without interruption.

The instructions are self-explanatory in this image:

After the first 2 weeks of my contest celebrating LufthansaFlyer’s first year, I’m thrilled at the “turn out”. Thanks to everyone for entering for a chance to win 10,000 “Miles&More” miles!

This post officially kicks off Round 3 which will run until next Friday, September 14. The final round will begin next Friday and the contest will come to a close on September 21.

All you need to do to enter is to leave a comment to this post. Since I will be posting 4 CONTEST ENTRY POSTS you will be able to enter each time, giving you 4 chances to win the miles. You can enter at any time on any of the CONTEST ENTRY POSTS during the contest period, just remember it’s 1 entry per person, per post. You can find links to the previous CONTEST ENTRY POSTS below.

Once the contest closes I will assign each entry a number and use Random.org to pick the winner. For example, if the first Contest Entry Post gets 50 entries, those will become entries #1-50, the entries for the second post will start with #51, and so on for Contest Entry Posts #3 and #4.

Once the winner has been chosen, I’ll arrange to have the 10,000 miles deposited to their Miles & More account within 2 weeks.

If you are not a ‘Miles & More’ member, you can sign up here.

Thanks again to everyone for making LufthansaFlyer’s first year a fantastic one! I’ve had an absolutely great time getting to know you and helping many of you with your Lufthansa related travel!

If you have not entered in either one of the previous CONTEST ENTRY POSTS you can use these links to go back and enter:

ROUND 1 CONTEST ENTRY POST

ROUND 2 CONTEST ENTRY POST

Important Contest Details:

The Lufthansa Group in no way is affiliated with this contest.
Contest deadline is Friday September 21, 2012 (Midnight US Eastern Time).
Winner will be selected via Random.org by Wednesday September 26, 2012.
You can enter 1 time per Contest Entry Post.
Miles will be deposited approximately 2 weeks after Winner is selected and successfully contacted.
If winner does not reply within 7 days of being selected, another entry will be selected using Random.org.
The contest is open to everyone, regardless of country of residence.

All I can say is WOW! What a great response to the contest so far! Thank You All!!

As I stated in my previous post that launched this contest, I’m doing this as a token of my appreciation to all of you who have made LufthansaFlyer’s first year such a great one!

This post marks the beginning of the 2nd round of the contest in which one lucky winner will win 10,000 Lufthansa “Miles & More” Miles for their account.

Each friday for the next 4 weeks (this is WEEK 2), I will post a Contest Entry “story” on my site. All you need to do to enter is to leave a comment to that post. Since I will be posting 4 Contest Entry “stories” you will be able to enter each time, giving you 4 chances to win the miles. You can enter at any time on any of the Contest Entry “stories” during the contest period, just remember it’s 1 entry per person, per post. IF YOU MISSED “ROUND 1″ YOU CAN VISIT THAT POST HERE AND ENTER.

Once the contest closes I will assign each entry a number and use Random.org to pick the winner. For example, if the first Contest Entry Post gets 50 entries, those will become entries #1-50, the entries for the second post will start with #51, and so on for Contest Entry Posts #3 and #4.

Once the winner has been chosen, I’ll arrange to have the 10,000 miles deposited to your Miles & More account within 2 weeks.

If you are not a ‘Miles & More’ member, you can sign up here.

Thanks again to everyone for making LufthansaFlyer’s first year a fantastic one! I’ve had an absolutely great time getting to know you and helping many of you with your Lufthansa related travel!

Important Contest Details:

The Lufthansa Group in no way is affiliated with this contest.
Contest deadline is Friday September 21, 2012 (Midnight US Eastern Time).
Winner will be selected via Random.org by Wednesday September 26, 2012.
You can enter 1 time per Contest Entry “Story”.
Miles will be deposited approximately 2 weeks after Winner is selected and successfully contacted.
If winner does not reply within 7 days of being selected, another entry will be selected using Random.org.
The contest is open to everyone, regardless of country of residence.