Tagging Miles

Priority Pass is changing the game for airport lounges

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Gary Leff asks the question, is Priority Pass killing airport lounges? Its a reasonable post that highlights over lounge overcrowding, varying levels of quality and amenities. However, what Gary really highlights is that Priority Pass is changing the game for airport lounges
 
A week ago, I had the chance to visit Portland. It’s a great city that I’ll write about later, but flying out of Portland’s Airport was a pleasure, primarily because of the Priority Pass Benefit courtesy of my Chase Sapphire Reserve (but you can get the Priority Pass Select from other cards too!).
 
This is not just a unique aspect of Portland. I had a similar experience in Sydney this past January, and others have too! 

Priority Pass is Changing the Game For Airport Lounges

The article that Gary references in his post is right in one area – some Priority Pass lounges aren’t great.
 
The article sites overfilled lounges, finger foods, and less than stellar quality beverages. In truth, that first observation is accurate even for American Express Centurion Lounges. 
 
The fact is, there were never gourmet meals, lets just dispel that one right now. The best you can get are First Class lounges like the Lufthansa First Class Terminal, or the Qantas First Class Lounge, but you won’t get into any of those lounges with Priority Pass. In fact, you won’t get find yourself getting a dish like the phenomenal wiener schnitzel below at a Priority Pass lounge. 
 
Priority Pass is changing the game for airport lounges, Lufthansa First Class Terminal

wiener schnitzel at the Lufthansa First Class Terminal

 
But, you might get it at an airport restaurant! I would argue that Priority Pass has come to realize the changing times. This is where I would argue that Priority Pass is changing the game for airport lounges.
 
Take for example, Capers at Portland International Airport; here is a subset of my and my wife’s experience a few short weeks ago. 
 
Priority Pass is Changing the Game for Airport Lounges

Capers at Portland International Airport, a Priority Pass Restaurant.

 
We received $56 worth of credit, we had a nice breakfast, and even took a few items to go, and you know, had a few glasses of bubbly!
 
Priority Pass is changing the game for airport lounges

The Priority Pass benefit at Capers includes alcohol in addition to food and soft drinks.

And with all that here’s our bill:

Priority Pass is changing the game for airport lounges

Our bill at Capers — and look at all you can get with that $56 benefit!

Despite airport prices, we still couldn’t spend the entire Priority Pass benefit! 
 
Having experienced this though, the biggest feeling I am left with, is the fact that I couldn’t have had that caliber experience in a lounge. Effectively Priority Pass has acknowledged that many non-airline affiliate lounges just can’t compete with the quality that airport restaurants can provide. 

The Real Question

Many have hypothesized how much Priority pass pays lounges for members to enter. That isn’t terribly clear. What we do know, is that Priority Pass members get between $26-30 benefit per person at restaurants. Logically, most folks that are drawn to an airport restaurant because of a benefit, would likely spend more there, so one would surmise that Priority Pass isn’t paying that full benefit amount. But lets just assume that for a moment. It seems to me that folks get greater benefit for the restaurants, where you can get higher quality food, rather than lounges, unless of course you are there for a rather long layover and/or drinking expensive beverages.

Wrapping Up

I love the fact that Priority Pass is innovating here. It’s not clear whether this is a higher cost, or a cost savings for them, but they really are providing a greater value. I’d offer that having benefits at restaurants does fall short of my view of the value of lounges. But you still get a ton of value from eating at a restaurant with real food, rather than the limited options of a lounge.

Have you leveraged your Priority Pass membership at an Airport Restaurant? What do you think? 

 

Disney is more than just rides!

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A couple of weekends ago, my wife and I flew down to Orlando to take my parents to Epcot for the day. What we found, was something I had an inkling of from past trips, that is: Disney is more than just rides!

We ended up getting hotel rooms at the Dolphin hotel, which is on property, but is a SPG property – it ended up being an excellent choice, aside from the resort fee, which is a disturbing trend that does not seem to be slowing. One benefit however, is that if you do end up paying for parking at the hotel you can get standard parking at one of the parks. This is a huge benefit if you have a multi-day pass, because you can check out of your hotel and still enjoy a park for the day, and assuming you move your car, you can leave right from that park.

The reason we had chosen the Dolphin, other than the SPG sync up–which netted us a few free drinks and rooms ready when we arrived first thing in the morning–was because it is part of the group of hotels between Hollywood Studios–yet I’ll always know it as MGM Studios–and Epcot. It’s less than a 12 minute walk, if you are so bold. And if you aren’t, there’s a boat–and who doesn’t love a boat ride? We even got lucky on our evening ride back to the park to see a rocket launch out of Cape Canaveral.

The infrastructure that Disney has put in place, and continues to put in place makes a huge difference for staying on property. That might sound like a no brainer, but, it really changes the day.

A day at Disney Epcot

We had chosen Epcot for a number of reasons; mostly because we were there to celebrate my mom’s birthday and she wanted to go to Epcot. It was an excellent choice, given that the Flower and Garden festival is currently running (I think through early May). My friend Ed wrote a post last week that got me really looking forward to this visit–and it had nothing to do with the rides! You see, in addition to amazing flower arrangements and designs, they have a variety of special authentic cuisine on offer.

Don’t get me wrong, there were definitely some cool flowers, plants, and characters!

Figment perhaps had the best location with Spaceship Earth as a backdrop.

In fact, even Captain Hook and Peter Pan made appearances!

But the food, wine, and beer options were wonderful. There were great options, like fried cauliflower and kabobs in Morocco:

Beef tenderloin tips in Canada: 

Each “booth” had a different menu, like this at the United Kingdom’s Cider House:

Or a wonderful taste of Marrakesh (the Fried Cauliflower was a great choice!)

You can find the full menu of all the Epcot Flower and Garden Festival here.

The Rides:

Full disclosure – this is the first time that my wife and I had been to Epcot since grad school. Back then we had an annual, Florida resident pass – we’d literally drive down I-4 for a ride or two and dinner, or sometimes just to ride Mission Space (or Aerosmith, or a brief Star Tour….). 

We rode 3 awesome rides. Not only that, but all 3 rides were different than we remembered them from over a decade ago. My mother’s #1 ride was Frozen – so much so that she made a beeline for it. I have to say – having remembered the old maelstrom, I thought the ride was rather well done in adaptation to the movie.

Our second ride was the Test Track. It was completely on a whim, considering we had remembered the old version with the heat test and the Belgium blocks (not the greatest for a bad back). I’m glad to report that it has been updated, with more speed, some curves, and thankfully, no Belgium blocks!

Like many, we sought air conditioning in the heat of the afternoon… Our final ride came at night. After dinner, my father, wife and I ventured back to the park and made our way to Soarin’. That was also new for us, and rather special. We’ve been awfully blessed with so many travel opportunities. Here we are on this ride, Soarin’ by the Eiffel Tower, through Sydney Harbour, Taj Mahal, and so many other places, more often than not I was thinking “wow, this looks great from above” then “but I remember this from the ground” or from this vantage point or another. If anything, Soarin’, which was really well done, reminded me of how truly blessed my family and I are, in that many of the places we “flew” over, we had seen with our own eyes as well!

Wrapping up: Disney is more than just rides!

While the rides were quite enjoyable, the real value for us on our one day visit to Epcot was spending time with family, and enjoying the flower and garden festival. The Flower and Garden festival brought so many interesting foods, beers, wines, and flowers into the art of the possible for a significantly larger population. The care and quality that Disney takes in everything they do, is very clear and present in the Flower and Garden festival. The food, wine, and beer are definitely worth a visit and give a view into the cultures from which they came. Bottom line: Disney is more than just rides!

Have you been to Disney’s Epcot Flower and Garden Festival?  

Onboard Qatar Airways QSuites

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Boarding the Qatar Airways QSuites 777-300ER, you’re immediately met with classy touches that show this aircraft is special.

Making that right turn, to my seat, 1A, it was clear this was QSuites, and the excitement was rather apparent. The general atmosphere of the cabin was not the glitzi-ness of Emriates A380 F. It was more subdued, dark, fairly gentle tones. Lots of maroon aligning with Qatar’s livery. The layout reminded me a lot of Etihad’s 787-9. Some seats facing backwards, some forwards, the aisles meandered, giving some seats just a tad more space than others.

The seat itself is rather impressive.

Qatar Airways QSuites

It was perhaps the most functional airline seat I’ve ever had. There was plenty of storage, plenty of space to work or place things.

I thought the NFC was interesting, allowing, I assume, for easier transactions. There were 2 USBs, an HDMI port, a 110 Volt power port, and plenty of seat controls.

 

I particularly appreciated the area above the controls and plugs – a nice, convenient area to store phones or tablets.

The flight attendants were just as excited about QSuites as we were, despite having trained and flown on them for at least a few weeks.

I had the obligatory pre-departure champagne, and perused the menus, all the while still trying to control my giddiness.

 

The drink menu was fairly exhaustive:

 

While the dining menu on this sub 5 hour flight wasn’t as exhaustive.

I started out with warm nuts and a glass of Royal Tokajis’s 2013 Puttonyos. I enjoy the sweet wines more than any other type, so I figured it’d be nice to try the Hungarian dessert wine. It was worth it. 

 

Classic Arabic Mezze

 

Tomato and Basil Soup

 

Chicken and sweet pepper kebab

Chicken and sweet pepper kebab

 

Slow cooked lamb leg with herb lamb jus

Slow cooked lamb leg with herb lamb jus

 

Mediterranean vegetable cannelloni

Mediterranean vegetable cannelloni

 

Red velvet cake with nougat

Red velvet cake with nougat

While it was only a 5 hour flight, I figured I should test out the bed. I found it to be roomy in all the right places for a side sleeper, something that I’d say the Reverse Herringbone seat fails to deliver.

Wrapping Up – Qatar QSuites

After having flown the Qatar QSuites, I have to say that unequivocally, this is the best business class in the sky right now. It rises above the other best business class seats. But, more than that, some of the softer touches. All the touches on the seat, the blanket, they were all spot on and quality, right down to the plastic safety card highlighting the QSuites–think the kind’ve plastic thats good plastic (not laminated) playing cards are made from. And the pride of the crew. It’s hard to put a value crew that takes pride in their product.

What enhanced security will you go through flying from Qatar?

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Last week I had the chance to fly back to the US via Doha, Qatar on Qatar Airways. I found it interesting to find out what enhanced security there was flying from Qatar. You see, airlines from a number of countries in the Middle East experienced a laptop ban mid-2017. While I originally thought it was a win for the US big three airlines–American, United, and Delta–(US3), that controversy seems to have faded from the national discussion. 

We had connected in Doha following our surprising QSuite flight. with a bit of a layover that I’ll cover in a separate post. Ultimately however we were flying from Doha, Qatar to Philadelphia on a Qatar Airways A350. Our experience traversing security was one that is ingrained in my memory, at least for another few weeks.

Entering Hamad International Airport from our long layover was welcoming as usual:

flying from Qatar

Further immigration and security was simple. We found ourselves in the lounge in no time–so much so that we skipped photos, since its been well covered.

But, when it was time to travel, we made our way to the gate and found a rather complicated process to ultimately board our flight. That process started with standing in a line to have our electronics swabbed and bagged in duty free bags.

flying from Qatar

Once our electronics were in the duty free bags, we went through another 2 individuals who had to inspect our boarding passes and passports.

flying from Qatar

Resulting electronics bag

Then it was security, which was typical–remove your belts, electronics and liquids. Following that we had no fewer than 5 additional Qatar Airways staff members who inspected our boarding passes and passports. That isn’t even including the flight attendant at the door that verified our boarding passes and pointed us to our seats.

Wrapping Up – Flying from Qatar

I have to say, our experience flying through Doha was less than stellar. Hamad International Airport is a phenomenal airport. But the enhanced security for flights to the United States was excessive and, while I try to avoid passing judgement, I fail to see the value added. The security, so far as I could tell, was just as exhaustive as US Preclearance out of Abu Dhabi, but without the benefit of exiting the aircraft Stateside without having to go through immigration. 

Qatar Airways QSuite flying not just to LHR, CDG, and JFK!

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Ever since Qatar Airways QSuite was announced I’ve been trying to roll it into a trip so I could try out what is touted as the most luxurious business class product in the sky. 

In a rather spectacular surprise, I got to fly QSuites (review forthcoming) on a flight I never expected it on. My wife and I were set to fly from Colombo, Sri Lanka to Doha, Qatar, as we continued our journey home. At check-in, I asked nicely if we might be able to get window seats, knowing that the 777-300ER seatmap was 2-2-2.

QR 77W 2-2-2 Seatmap

QR 77W 2-2-2 Seatmap

Except that he was saying things that didn’t make sense – saying we could sit on opposite sides of the aisle from each other – 1A and 1E. I asked a clarifying question and he kindly shared his screen.

Qatar Airways Qsuites

I dug a little deeper on this one once we got into the lounge, and found that we were flying on tail number A7-BEN, by popping the flight number into Flightradar24. 

QR665 over the past few days courtesy of Flightradar24.com

QR665 over the past few days courtesy of Flightradar24.com

I could then see that on 4 January, A7-BEN was operating our flight. Logically, I wanted to know where else this plane has been:

Flights operated by A7-BEN courtesy of Flightradar24

Flights operated by A7-BEN courtesy of Flightradar24

QR7 was–I think–the first flight announced to be operated by Qatar Airways QSuites, so that was a pretty big corroborating factor. Ultimately it was in fact a QSuites configured 777-300ER.

Qatar Airways Qsuites

Other Qatar Airways QSuites Aircraft

I don’t know for a fact how many other Qatar Airways aircraft are configured with QSuites at the moment, but I would make reasonable guesses that the following flights are operated by QSuites. Interestingly enough, some of these aircraft have visited a bunch of other cities recently, including Kuwait City, Mumbai, even Karachi!

(Note, each aircraft tail number has a hyperlink to Flightradar24 so you can see where its operating now).

Conclusion – Qatar Airways QSuite flying not just to LHR, CDG, and JFK!

Ultimately, it was more an academic activity since I couldn’t really change anything, however, I think the above steps are helpful if you’re trying to chase a particular product or aircraft. This same strategy could also be used to chase Emirates’ new First Class on the 777-300ER.

Qatar Airways Qsuites

Would you sell your body to be consumed by others?

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Update: It appears this may be one of those pervasive Fake News stories, and admittedly, it just seemed so exciting that I wrote about it. Sorry about that, but I’d offer it is still an interesting thing to consider.

In perhaps the weirdest story I’ve seen in weeks, there is now a Japanese restaurant in Tokyo nicknamed “The Resoto ototo no shoku ryohin” translated to “Edible Brother.” But they can’t really serve anything unless you choose to sell your body, or at least others choose to sell their bodies.

sell your body

You see, Japan passed a law in 2014 that permitted the consumption of human flesh. Now, we’ve all seen how this can go badly in movies, but, lets put that aside for a moment and consider the economics.

According to Steemit (perhaps apply titled given the topic), if you want to be part of the main course, you must decide before dying, to sell your body to a restaurant. You can earn roughly $36,000 dollars, however, only folks that die young can sign such a contract. I’m not sure why its limited to the young. Once upon a time, I had a most amazing steak in India at the Oberoi Amanvillas in Agra (where the Taj Mahal is), and I have to guess that the cow must’ve been nearly as old as I was. 

Would you sell your body to be consumed by others?

I realize that the title of this post is pretty clickbait, but, when I read the linked article, that was the first thing I was thinking. If you ask me, I certainly wouldn’t. But, would you?

 

Munich Airport’s L Gates – Not ready for prime time!

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This past week my wife and I had the opportunity to travel to Munich, Germany for Oktoberfest. I’ll have posts on that soon(ish), but I really wanted to get this brief post out soonest, since I know Lufthansa is putting a bigger focus on their Munich hub by launching A380 Flights. I will just say – Munich Airport’s L Gates are not ready for prime time, and that’s where I think most of the growth will be.

30 minutes Check-in to train

For starters, if you are flying to the US from Munich via Lufthansa, you go to Terminal 2. Checking in for me at least took a little longer, but I expected this with Oktoberfest still going strong. What I didn’t expect, was that even in the Business Class security screening line–and yes there is one that specifically calls out business class passengers– it took us roughly 25 minutes to get through. Part of it is that the millimeter wave technology they are using seem to be slower, and take up a ton more space, so you get less throughput. The other side was I made a bad choice in that we had a new security screener. 

Arriving at Munich Airport’s L Gates

Once you get through normal security, you still have to take a train to get to the L Gates. There you go through immigrations officially exiting Germany. Needless to say, you need to pack some extra patience.

Munich Airport's L Terminal

There’s still a bunch of construction, as you can see, which limits the amount of immigration booths they can open–though in full disclosure, they had less than half open when we first arrived. Overall, the situation was less than stellar.

A final point about Munich Airport’s L Gates

A couple of week ago, American Express announced that they had worked out an arrangement with Lufthansa for American Express Platinum and Centurion card holders to gain access to their lounges in Munich. This arrangement meant that American Express Platinum holders could gain entry into the Lufthansa Senators lounges, and Centurion card holders could gain entry into the Lufthansa First Class lounges.

Lufthansa has a Business, Senators and First Class lounge in Munich Airport’s L Gates. We obviously didn’t have access to the First Class lounge, but opted to gain entry into the Senator’s lounge, really, just because we wanted to test the American Express Platinum access. Unfortunately, it took 5+ minutes for the person at the front desk to figure out how to provide us access to the lounge. It even took going to a colleague within the lounge to figure out the necessary codes to enter in the computer. I’m not even sure I understand why it took all the effort.

A final note is that there is an additional screening area, that looks like a “lite” version of the US Pre-clearance area of Dublin or Abu Dhabi airports. The gates for US bound flights are segregated with a separate security screening area. I wonder whether Munich may be trying to get on the US Pre-Clearance list.

Wrapping Up

Overall, I was rather unimpressed departing Munich Airport’s L Gates. I totally get that Oktoberfest is a rather busy time of year for them, but as the photo above demonstrates, they were rather unprepared. I suppose I would understand that, if such a busy time of the year were a surprise, but, alas, Oktoberfest is on the calendar years in advance. Overall, I’d advise against choosing Munich as your point of departure from Europe back to the United States. I realize that it may be new and exciting, as Lufthansa begins flying A380’s from Munich, but it may be a lot more pain than its worth.

Review: Packing Cubes

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 If you poll frequent travelers, I think you’ll get a mixed response on whether folks use or don’t use packing cubes. Until recently, I hadn’t even tried using a packing cube, but during the last Amazon Prime Day, there was a pretty decent deal, so I grabbed a 4-pack of two different sizes.

Packing cubes come in many different sizes, though they primarily seem to be quadrilaterals. There are also a bunch of brands as well, in addition to Amazon Essentials—Amazon’s private label brand—eBags has their own, and scores of others. Below are the two sizes that I got:

packing cubes

In general, packing cubes can be helpful for getting more into a smaller suitcase, as each cube compresses your clothes. They can also be really helpful in separating clothes if you are going to multiple destinations on your trip. For example, for a Southeast Asia trip, you could have one packing cube for Singapore and another for Bali. You can also use them to separate clean clothes from the dirty ones.

My Experience with Packing Cubes

I first tested out using the packing cubes on a 2 night trip a couple of weeks ago down to ResellingDO 5. My wife ended up using one as well, and we fit both of the smaller ones into a single Briggs & Riley carry-on—which incidentally is my favorite carry-on, period.

For 2 nights, really I could have just thrown clothes in a back-pack, but, I found for the most part, the clothes came out pretty neat. Not necessarily any more wrinkles than my normal standard rolling technique. Note: Due to the nature of packing cubes, I opted not to roll, just to fold and pack.

packing cubes

My second test of our packing cubes was on a 3 night trip to Napa Valley, California, to visit some friends. This time my wife opted for her own carry-on. You can see mine below:

packing cubes

Again, I was able to get all of my clothes into the smaller of the two sizes. Also of note, This carry-on is the Briggs and Riley Torq, and the cube fit fine with little to no wasted space wide-ways. It fit even easier into my normal Briggs and Riley international wide-body carry-on. 

Final Thoughts on Packing Cubes

While I’ve only had two trips with packing cubes thus far, I’m already sold on using them. I definitely feel like you can get more clothes in the smaller cubes. Are they appropriate for all situations and trips? Probably not, but, there are a lot of benefits. I’m still on the fence of what other sizes might make sense, but the ones that I do have, have already proven better. If anything, I’ll probably side more toward the smaller sizes.

Have you tried using packing cubes? Share your experience in the comments.

Can you save a seat on Southwest?

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This past weekend, my wife and I flew southwest down to Orlando for ResellingDO 5. On the flight home we saw a curious sight: bags were left on a couple of seats. It made me ask the question – can you save a seat on Southwest?

save a seat on southwest

Southwest’s policy

Logically, I turned to Twitter to ask Southwest. I was surprised with their response:
 
 save a seat on southwest
 
It seems like a reasonable thing for Southwest to do – that is, having no policy on the matter. I could see how enforcing such a policy could become contentious.
 
In my mind though, there shouldn’t be a need for a policy because people should have follow standard etiquette and be considerate. Taking the entire 3rd row on one side of the aircraft seems pretty inconsiderate and downright selfish to me.
 
Some folks on twitter weighed in:
 
save a seat on southwest
 
There is also the security aspect. For all intents and purposes, these bags were left unattended. A reasonable person might assume that the owners of these bags are onboard, but I have seen people deboard aircraft before. Yes, these bags were likely screened by TSA’s finest, but it still gives me pause to see unattended bags.

More details on the folks that saved the seats

It was not truly apparent upon boarding, but I will share what I think happened. When I boarded as A52, I saw row 1 ABC and DEF filled (well, DEF had 2 people but one looked like a gentleman of size, so giving him the benefit of the doubt that he purchased a second seat). I observed folks seated in row 2 ABC passing things back and forth with row 1, and there were interactions with row 3. Row 3 ABC was where bags were left. What I can surmise from this, is that ~4 members of the family pre-boarded, and saved seats for the remainder of the family. This took up 12 seats in the first 3 rows. 

I think Susan said it best:

save a seat on southwest

So, can you save a seat on Southwest?

The answer to this is simple, per Southwest, there is no policy for or against this practice. 
 
But I would offer that the question really is: Should you save a seat on Southwest? What about an entire row when not a single seat is occupied in that row? I would say no.  
 
To me, I might be more understanding if folks are trying to save seats further back in the aircraft, but seeing row 3 reserved (and I boarded as A52) seems incredibly inconsiderate. 
 
What do you think? Is saving an entire row on Southwest ok?

How I almost missed flying EVA Air’s Hello Kitty Plane

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Last week, I had the opportunity to fly EVA Air’s Hello Kitty plane, unfortunately I was very close to missing that opportunity. You see, a friend and I were booked on a 10pm United flight out of Washington-Dulles, which was scheduled to arrive just before 11pm into Chicago-O’Hare. Check-in for our Hello Kitty flight was supposed to close at 11:30, so that didn’t leave a whole lot of time. But that is what United’s award booking engine kicked out, so we figured we were well within Minimum Connect Time (MCT).

Weather Delay in Chicago left us grounded in Washington

Our United flight boarded roughly on time, and the captain announced that he was trying to get out before the FAA issued any ground stops; we hustled. Correction: most of us that understood what that meant, hustled. We even left the gate a minute early! but, unfortunately we were stuck with a ground stop at Dulles.

Eva Air Miss

I have to say, what happened next reminded me of why I used to enjoy flying United. The captain came out and started inviting kids from economy to see the cockpit. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a photo, but, I did tweet about the matter:

United, Eva

As the children were getting to visit the cockpit, I was sending a map to my cohort for this Hello Kitty flight. We already had an idea of the gate that we would arrive at (B2), so I sent him the map from the Hemisphere’s Magazine, letting him know which way we would need to run.

EVA

The above depiction shows where we arrived, an the path we had to run, catching the train roughly at the TSA PreCheck area, then sweating the entire train ride until we arrived at Terminal 5. I’m not the most athletic person, but I will tell you, I ran full bore with my favorite spinner carry-on (which was operating as a normal 2 wheel suitcase given the speed I was going). There are few times that I actually walk up or down escalators, but I was doing them 2 steps at a time. I wanted this flight.

Luckily, when we arrived at Terminal 5, while it looked like a desolate area, there were 2 EVA Air employees, and one was empowered to radio to the most empowered to see if they could check us in. The fact that we were flying business class and had no luggage definitely helped. Ultimately, the fact that EVA Air’s David had stuck around on the landside, was truly the reason we made this flight. He was truly awesome, and even after he got us checked in, he escorted us through security and right to the plain. I truly hope EVA Air knows how great a team member they have with him, because he pretty much made our trip.

 

 

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