Introduction
Singapore Airlines Silver Kris Lounge San Francisco
Singapore Airlines Suites Class San Francisco to Hong Kong
Singapore Airlines Silver Kris Lounge Hong Kong
Singapore Airlines Suites Class Hong Kong to Singapore
Conrad Singapore
Shangri-La Singapore
Skyview Lounge Singapore
Cathay Pacific Business Class Singapore to Colombo
Araliya Lounge Colombo
Cathay Pacific Business Class Colombo to Singapore
Emirates Lounge Singapore
Emirates First Class Singapore to Dubai
Park Hyatt Dubai
Emirates First Class Lounge Dubai
Emirates First Class Dubai to London Heathrow
Coworth Park London (Ascot)
British Airways Concorde Room London Heathrow
British Airways First Class London Heathrow to Seattle

We arrived back at Changi Airport terminal one around 7PM, less than 12 hours after arriving from Colombo.

Terminal exterior

We easily found the Emirates check-in counter at “aisle” two, where the crew operating our flight were just checking in and dropping off their bags.

Terminal

Emirates check-in queue

There was only one person ahead of us in the first class queue, so our check-in was processed within a few minutes, and our boarding passes were printed all the way to London.

First class check-in Read More…

Back in September Qantas and Emirates announced a huge new joint venture that would see the two airlines operating nearly 100 flights a week between Australia and Dubai. This was pretty big news given that Qantas literally kicked their alliance and joint venture partner British Airways to the curb (or as my friends on the other side of the pond would say, kerb) in favor of Emirates, which seemed to be the start of an out-of-alliance partnership trend we’re seeing right now.

Anyway, what this joint venture essentially equated to is Qantas dumping their “Kangaroo route” flights, whereby their flights from Australia to London were routed via Singapore. Instead they’re routing them through Dubai, with Emirates picking up many of Qantas’ passengers in Dubai and flying them to destinations in Europe.

Emirates first class lounge in Dubai for Qantas passengers

These flights are scheduled to start as of March 31, 2013, and it’s worth noting that they’ve now been loaded and are bookable.

The flight schedules for the Qantas flights are as follows:

QF1 Sydney to Dubai departing at 5:05PM and arriving at 12:35AM (+1 day)
QF1 Dubai to London departing at 2:05AM and arriving at 6:35AM

QF9 Melbourne to Dubai departing at 4:25PM and arriving at 11:25PM
QF9 Dubai to London departing at 1:00AM and arriving at 5:30AM

QF2 London to Dubai departing at 9:30PM and arriving at 7:20AM (+1 day)
QF2 Dubai to Sydney departing at 9:20AM and arriving at 6:10AM (+1 day)

QF10 London to Dubai departing at 10:30PM and arriving at 8:20AM (+1 day)
QF10 Dubai to Melbourne departing at 9:50AM and arriving at 6:15AM (+1 day)

Anyway, this is worth noting for a couple of reasons:

• Qantas will no longer be flying between London and Singapore, which is a big loss since their Airbus 380s are much more comfortable than British Airways’ 747s on the route, in my opinion.
• This new route will be a great way to fly between London to Dubai. Right now only British Airways operates this route, so not only does Qantas have a better product, but if you’re redeeming American AAdvantage miles there are no fuel surcharges on Qantas, while there are on British Airways.

Qantas Airbus 380 first class

So far Qantas hasn’t loaded much award availability into the calendar yet. I see maybe one or two days a month with first class award space, but then again that’s not a lot more space than I saw on the London to Australia (via Singapore) route back in the day either.

As a reminder, for those of you looking to redeem American AAdvantage miles, here are the relevant mileage costs for travel between Europe and the Middle East, travel between the Middle East and Australia, and travel between Europe and Australia:

Introduction
Singapore Airlines Silver Kris Lounge San Francisco
Singapore Airlines Suites Class San Francisco to Hong Kong
Singapore Airlines Silver Kris Lounge Hong Kong
Singapore Airlines Suites Class Hong Kong to Singapore
Conrad Singapore
Shangri-La Singapore
Skyview Lounge Singapore
Cathay Pacific Business Class Singapore to Colombo
Araliya Lounge Colombo
Cathay Pacific Business Class Colombo to Singapore
Emirates Lounge Singapore
Emirates First Class Singapore to Dubai
Park Hyatt Dubai
Emirates First Class Lounge Dubai
Emirates First Class Dubai to London Heathrow
Coworth Park London (Ascot)
British Airways Concorde Room London Heathrow
British Airways First Class London Heathrow to Seattle

In late December I first shared my plans for this trip on the blog. There were a couple of things that motivated this trip:

• Singapore Airlines started opening up saver award space in Suites Class on the Airbus 380, which is probably the most coveted product in the sky, so I was desperate to try it.
• I flew Emirates first class from London to Dubai a couple of weeks prior due to a rebooking from British Airways, and was just blown away by the shower… and the amount of faux-gold in the cabin… and the room service phone. I had to do it again.

There are some cheap premium cabin fares out of Colombo, Sri Lanka that allow you to travel on Emirates (or a number of other airlines), so I decided I could combine an outbound in Singapore Suites with a return on Emirates and British Airways in first class. This would not only allow me to experience Singapore Suites for the first time, but also experience the ground services offered by Emirates in Dubai and British Airways in London, both of which I’ve yet to experience (along with more firsthand experiences of their in-flight products).

In addition to the flight from Seattle to San Francisco (which I booked using 7,500 British Airways Avios and won’t cover with this report given that flying with Alaska is little more than a “nice” bus ride), I booked the trip in three parts:

Part 1:

01/15 Singapore 1 San Francisco to Hong Kong departing at 10:50PM and arriving at 5:50AM (+2 days) [Suites Class]
01/17 Singapore 1 Hong Kong to Singapore departing at 8:00AM and arriving at 12:00PM [Suites Class]

Cost: 91,375 Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer miles + $ 325.50 taxes/fees/fuel surcharges

Part 2:

01/18 Cathay Pacific 711 Singapore to Colombo departing at 9:00PM and arriving at 10:15PM [Business Class]

Cost: 20,000 British Airways Avios + $53.63 taxes/fees/fuel surcharges

Part 3:

01/19 Cathay Pacific 710 Colombo to Singapore departing at 12:45AM and arriving at 7:00AM [Business Class]
01/19 Emirates 355 Singapore to Dubai departing at 9:35PM and arriving at 1:00AM (+1 day) [First Class]
01/20 Emirates 5 Dubai to London departing at 4:30PM and arriving at 8:15PM [First Class]
01/21 British Airways 49 London to Seattle departing at 2:30PM and arriving at 4:05PM [First Class]

Cost: Premium cabin fares between Colombo and most destinations in North America are very reasonable, so I’d suggest doing some Googling or reading comments section of this post for details. I wish I could spell it out though I’d get a) yelled at by a bunch of people and b) sometimes it’s better not to make things too obvious.

Here’s the itinerary on a map:

Picking the actual flights was very much a process. Originally I had wanted to take SQ11 from Los Angeles to Singapore via Tokyo instead of SQ1 from San Francisco to Singapore via Hong Kong, given that the former has a far superior meal service and I like the fact that it’s two longhaul flights vs. one ultra-longhaul and one shorthaul flight. That being said I far prefer the 12PM arrival time in Singapore of SQ1 compared to the 3AM arrival time of SQ11. Though most importantly a friend of mine was working the Hong Kong to Singapore portion of SQ1, so it would be a great opportunity to catch up with her.

As far as the Emirates flights go, initially I had planned on routing through Hong Kong and flying Hong Kong to Bangkok to Dubai to London on Emirates, though after reading some reviews online it occurred to me that the Hong Kong to Bangkok flight had a pretty crappy meal service, while the Bangkok to Dubai flight only served breakfast, which is something I try to avoid on planes whenever possible. Instead I decided to book Singapore to Dubai to London, as both flights were dinner flights with a “proper” meal service (and I care about that simply because I’d rather report back on a decent in-flight meal than eggs and cereal).

I’ll cover my hotel decision making process in the each individual post, but that’s roughly the “shell” of the trip.

As it turned out the trip had some ups, downs, and dizziness due to excessive drinking. As a matter of fact I think I’m still getting over the hangover from my Singapore to Dubai flight…

And as much as I’d like to call that the worst flight ever due to how much I drank, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to repeat it, especially if I had the same crew.

Anyway, sit back, relax, and enjoy the report, and if you have any questions please let me know. I’ll try to post an installment a day (+/- one per day).

As always, all comments/questions are welcome!

I’ve been incredibly fortunate to have visited some of the best airline lounges in the world. I’d say presently the two best first class ground experiences in the world are offered by Lufthansa and Thai.

Lufthansa has the First Class Terminal in Frankfurt, which refines the airport experience for first class passengers. You don’t even have to visit the terminal anymore, and are instead driven to your plane on the tarmac in a Porsche or Mercedes. It’s awesome.

Thai Airways also has an amazing ground experience in Bangkok. While they don’t have a separate first class terminal like Lufthansa, they do escort you through the airport from the moment you arrive. As a first class passenger you get a semi-private living room in the lounge and an hour long full body massage in their spa.

While those are hands down the two best first class ground experiences, there are some other airlines that aren’t that far behind. I’ve visited the Qantas First Class Lounge in Melbourne, which was awesome as well, with a really modern design, plenty of seating, a nice restaurant area, and a spa. I was also pretty impressed by Qatar’s Premium Terminal in Doha. After those experiences I’d say that the next best ground experience I’ve had is Virgin Atlantic’s Clubhouse, which is surprising given that it’s only a business class lounge.

Anyway, Emirates just opened a new Airbus 380 pier in Dubai a couple of weeks ago, and along with that opened a new first class lounge. I’ve gotta be honest — I didn’t have very high expectations. I tend to think the Middle Eastern airlines are high on style and low on substance, so I was expecting much of the same, like gold plated toilet paper and ramen noodles.

After checking in and navigating the airport we made it to the A pier, where the first class lounge is located.

The entrance was impressive and agent friendly. She directed us to pass the desk to enter the lounge.

Entrance

After passing the desk I was confused. We must have made a wrong turn, since we found ourselves in a terminal with duty free shops and gates. What the…?

Walkway to duty free shops

Duty free shops

As it turns out this is probably the most unique lounge in the world. It’s essentially a floor dedicated to first class passengers that takes up the entirety of the terminal. You can board each of the Airbus 380 gates directly through the lounge. Business class gets all of level five to themselves, while first class gets all of level four to themselves.

At first I was a bit put off and confused by the whole concept. I mean, isn’t this the point at which a lounge simply turns into a really nice gate area? The lounge was massive. Massive. I mean it literally spanned the entire terminal.

Between each gate was seating with a fully stocked bar and buffet.

Lounge seating

Buffet in each gate area

And the lounge clearly knows the way to my heart. They have “first class nuts” and a choice of water.

First class nuts

VOSS or Evian? How am I supposed to decide?!

Then the lounge has a bunch of specialty areas, including a fine dining area, general dining area, quiet room, entertainment center, cigar bar, and more.

Dining area

Lounge seating

Fine dining area

The fine dining area has both a buffet as well as a menu. I was immediately in love with the service because as soon as I pulled out my camera they opened each serving tray.

Buffet

Buffet

Buffet

And while I don’t smoke my dad would love this place, and they do eventually plan on having complimentary cigars there.

Smoking lounge

Then there was a quiet area with over a dozen comfy seats with pillows and blankets.

Quiet area

And before I knew it we could board… directly through the lounge!

Departure gate

Departure gate

I’ll have a lot more pictures and details with the trip report this week. Kudos to Emirates on an extremely innovative lounge. What I loved most is that I suspect this lounge will never be crowded. There are at most 14 first class passengers per flight, and this lounge probably has seating for a thousand. The service was uncharacteristically good for the UAE as well.

I’d say this ranks among my top three lounges in the world after the Lufthansa and Thai facilities. If the first class ground service was a bit more personalized I might even say this lounge has them beat. It would be nice if they walked you from check-in to the lounge (since it is quite a haul) and I think it would be a nice touch if they picked you up in the lounge when it was time to fly. The lounge will also eventually have a spa, though it’s not open yet.

Like I said, more details coming later!

In the meantime I’m in a lounge which makes me dream of an Admirals Club. More on that shortly…

I just flew on Emirates from Singapore to Dubai, and decided to run a little giveaway for those of you that wanted to “play along.” While the flight ended up being an utter failure on my part, I was sober enough to record the answers to the questions, surprisingly. As a reminder, I’m giving 10,000 Membership Rewards points to whoever first correctly guessed the sum of the correct answers to the below questions.

Here are the correct answers:

• The number of times I’m addressed by name on the flight / Answer: 1 (by the purser when being presented my menu)
• The number of hot towels I’m served throughout the flight/ Answer: 2 (once during boarding and once before landing)
• The number of languages spoken by the crew (which is usually announced at the beginning of the flight) / Answer: 12
• The number of times I’m served drinks or they’re topped off / Answer: 17

So if my math is correct, that makes the correct answer 32.

That was first guessed by Matt S in the fifth comment. Congrats, Matt, and I’ll be in touch shortly regarding the points!

Good morning from Dubai, where it’s approaching 4AM after two redeyes in a row!

I’ve had an absolutely stupendous week, and was quite looking forward to my Emirates flight tonight from Singapore. As I always say I very rarely drink. At home I never drink, and if I’m flying I may have a glass or two of champagne, but that’s the extent of it.

I took a slightly different approach last night, as I decided it would be fun to drink a bit too much. I figure there aren’t many experiences in life not worth having at least once, and being tipsy on a plane is one of them. I had my flight all figured out. I was going to board, have dinner, watch a movie, shower, and then maybe nap for an hour or two, and at that point hopefully be in Dubai.

The reality was a bit different. I was doing the return portion of this trip with a friend, and apparently he’s a bad influence, because I was talked into doing shots in the lounge. Three shots of tequila with salt and lemon to be exact. I’m a lightweight when it comes to alcohol, so aside from the utter trashiness of licking your fingers and putting salt on them, it sure got my evening off to a giggly start.

Once aboard the fun continued, as the crew was quite liberal with refills, and in the first hour of the flight I had a few more glasses of Dom. I was feeling great. How out of it was I? I forgot to photograph the pre-departure Dom, which I think says a lot.

Then I had water with dinner to get back into a more normal state. After dinner I decided to head to the aft business class bar, where the flight attendants sure were liberal with refills. I had three shots of Patron XO Cafe, and then two shots of Hennessy Paradis. In the meantime the purser made an appearance and asked whether I wanted turndown service. Sure, why not?

So I headed back to my suite figuring I’d lay down for a few minutes, given that there were several hours left in the flight in which I could shower. Next thing I know I hear the “cabin crew, prepare for landing” announcement.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! I failed myself and I failed you guys. I’m. So. Sorry.

I feel as guilty as this dog:

And this dog:

…combined!

Then again I learned my lesson. Never drink again on a plane. Ever. Or you may miss a shower.

Tomorrow I’m headed to London and will be sure to spend double as long in the shower spa to make up for my failures today.

I’ll be announcing the winner of the giveaway first thing in the morning.

Hello from first class on Emirates 355, an Airbus 380 somewhere over the Indian Ocean between Singapore and Dubai.

Anyway, as I hinted at yesterday, I’m giving away 10,000 Membership Rewards points to whoever is the first to correctly guess the sum of the following while I’m still in the air (about another five hours from the time this post is published) in the comments section of this post:

• The number of times I’m addressed by name on the flight
• The number of hot towels I’m served throughout the flight
• The number of languages spoken by the crew (which is usually announced at the beginning of the flight)
• The number of times I’m served drinks or they’re topped off

One guess per person, please, and I’ll announce the winner once I land. The 10,000 points can be transfered to any loyalty program account that partners with the US Membership Rewards program.

If you’d like to follow along with every aspect of the flight, be sure you’re following me on Instagram and Twitter!

As frequent readers of the blog know, back in December I flew Emirates first class from London to Dubai with only a couple of hours advance notice, and it was probably my ultimate travel “high.”

And while the shower was quite possibly the coolest thing ever, that’s not what I enjoyed most about the experience. What I liked most was the wifi, so I could share the experience with you guys live. That was a blast. I had made the following posts during my travels:

Is British Airways first class the world’s best business class product?
The story behind how I ended up in Emirates Airbus 380 first class…
The most, gaudy, obnoxious, and awesome f*&^$&# flight of my life!

Anyway, in about 12 hours I’ll be flying Emirates first class on the Airbus 380 again, and I’m really looking forward to doing it all again, from the shower to using the wifi to share my experiences.

I’ll be blogging, Tweeting, Instagramming, and Facebooking, so if you’d like to follow along be sure we’re “connected” in all places:

• You can add me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bschlappig
• You can follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/onemileatatime
• You can follow me on Instagram: http://instagram.com/onemileatatime

But I figured I’d take it one stop further and run a little giveaway for 10,000 Membership Rewards points, though I’m still open to ideas on how to do this (I try to run the blog as more of a democracy than anything else).

My general idea was this — once I take off I’ll post a link to my Flightaware, and whoever first guesses the sum of the following correctly while I’m still in the air wins 10,000 Membership Rewards points:

• The number of times I’m addressed by name on the flight
• The number of hot towels I’m served throughout the flight
• The number of languages spoken by the crew (which is usually announced at the beginning of the flight)
• The number of times I’m served drinks or they’re topped off

Anyway, would love some feedback on possible other “metrics” I can add to the above for fun.

Am totally open to ideas over the next 12 hours, and will post the official entry thread once I’m airborne.

Thanks, and safe/enjoyable travels!

On Wednesday Alaska Mileage Plan published their award chart for travel on Emirates, which was pretty much as I expected. It’s kind of funny that Alaska charges fewer miles for travel on Emirates than Emirates’ own Skywards program does, but then again it’s not really that unusual, since US frequent flyer programs are pretty consistently more generous than foreign programs.

Anyway, it looks like Emirates Skywards has also just published their award chart for travel on Alaska, which looks as follows:

The award chart is more or less what I expected. Certainly no redemptions that make me want to go out of my way to earn Skywards miles. In my opinion you’re still better off accruing miles through Alaska’s Mileage Plan for travel on Emirates, regardless of whether you want to redeem for travel on Alaska or Emirates.

That being said, for those with Skywards miles this is a nice new option for travel within North America.

Last January Emirates was added as an Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan partner, though only on the accrual side, with plans to allow redemptions starting late in 2012. In mid-December they announced a delay in that option. Then just a couple of weeks ago I broke the news that they’d begin allowing redemptions starting January 16, 2013.

Well, Alaska Airlines has just published their award redemption chart for travel on Emirates (for redemptions starting January 16, 2013, as predicted). Alaska publishes their award charts by region, so here’s the Emirates award chart for travel to India, the Middle East, and Africa:

And here’s the chart for travel to Asia:

These are the only regions for which they publish an award chart, though aside from restricting this for travel to North America this makes sense since in other cases it’s not logical to fly Emirates. The award chart is exactly what I had expected, being a realistic optimist.

My fear was that they wouldn’t allow redemptions in first class, though that’s not the case. My other fear was that they’d only allow redemptions out of certain markets, like Seattle, though that’s not the case either. And my last fear was that they’d price each segment individually (for example, publish a chart between North America and the Middle East, and then one between the Middle East and Asia, charging the cumulative cost of the two awards).

So I’d say this looks pretty good. It’s worth noting that they’re only publishing awards between North America and other destinations, and not between other regions (like just between the Middle East and Asia, for example).

They’re basically charging 180,000 miles for first class to the Middle East/India, and 200,000 miles for first class awards to Asia/Africa.

So if you have Alaska miles this is a great use of them, in my opinion. Alaska also partners with Starwood Preferred Guest, though if you have those points you’re typically going to be better off transferring them to Japan Airlines and booking Emirates from there, as they have a pretty lucrative distance based award chart. Roundtrip first class travel on Emirates between New York and Dubai costs just 135,000 miles, while it’s 155,000 miles for up to 20,000 miles of roundtrip travel.

As a reminder, you can search Emirates award space on ExpertFlyer.com. For first class award space you’ll want to look for the “Z” fare bucket, while for business class award space you’ll want to look for “D” fare bucket.

Award space is generally quite good, and with a bit of planning it shouldn’t be tough to find several first or business class award seats, even on the Airbus 380.

And while I doubt I need to remind y’all, Emirates first class on the Airbus 380 is the only place to shower on a commercial airplane.

For those of you that haven’t read it, here’s my report of Emirates first class from London to Dubai.

So, what do you guys think of the award chart? Better or worse than you expected?

PS: I was in my garage on the way to the supermarket when a friend texted me to say the chart has been published. I ran back to my apartment as fast as I could and literally tripped over myself and fell in my kitchen. My leg is bleeding a bit, but decided to write the blog post while on the floor before seeking medical attention. Do I get an A+ for being a dedicated blogger or what?