Wayne S

Kuala Lumpur to Seoul Business Class on Malaysia Airlines

May 30, 2017

Flight Review: Kuala Lumpur (KUL) to Seoul (ICN) in February 2017

Carrier: Malaysia Airlines , Airbus A330 in Business Class
Flight Duration: 6h 30m

On a trip to Asia in February 2017, I got the opportunity to fly Malaysia Airlines Business Class from their hub in Kuala Lumpur to Seoul, South Korea, to meet up with some of my family, since I am half Korean myself. This trip was part of a journey I started in Bangkok. I was able to grab a promo fare for the price of 550 USD return. Usually fares for a a route like that go for around 1000 USD.

I was quite excited to try out Malaysia Airlines retro-fitted A330 Business Class in their 1-2-1 / 1-2-2 configuration. Luckily I also had some time before the flight to check out their Golden Lounge at KUL.

Malaysia Airlines Golden Lounge KUL seating area

The lounge itself was divided into a Business Class and First Class section. These pictures show the Business Class section of the lounge. When entering the lounge you immediately notice a wide and open space with a lot of seating possibilities. Unfortunately it was night already so the open view from the lounge right onto the tarmac was not as interesting as I thought it would be.

Malaysia Airlines Golden Lounge KUL snacks

Malaysia Airlines Golden Lounge KUL Food from Buffet

Basically lounge access to me is only important because of the food, drinks and sometimes the refreshing showers! And of course I do really enjoy the atmosphere in most of the airport lounges, which are even nicer when they offer a view onto the tarmac since I would consider myself being an aviation enthusiast.

The Golden Lounge at KUL has a huge buffet which offers a wide range of cold and hot food and also quite a lot of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages to choose from. The decor makes a very nice, almost luxurious impression and there are plenty of seating opportunities to eat, work or just relax. It also offers showers and a in addition to that private sleeping rooms and an a-la-carte dining area in the First Class section of the lounge. Overall a nice and comfortable lounge I would enjoy staying again.

After spending 2 hours in the lounge eating and relaxing I made my way to the gate my flight was departing from. It took me just around 5 minutes to get there.

Malaysia Airlines retro-fitted A330 offers a Business Class product where almost every seat seems to be different. So carefully choose your seat when booking BC on this aircraft. There are basically seats which offer more room to one side of you or both sides of you (throne seats). I assigned myself to seat 1K which was a so called “throne seat”, offered a decent amount of privacy and some extra legroom because it’s a seat in the first row of the airplane. Couples should go for the middle seats or preferably 2H,2K or 5H,5K.

MH A330 Business Class seat map

The seat was great and felt really huge because of the fact that I had space to put my stuff on both sides. As you can see it also offered some kind of personal storage box right next to you.

MH A330 Business Class seat 1K

MH A330 Business Class seat personal storage Box

MH A330 Business Class seat 1K legroom

Legroom was fantastic. Even in lie-flat position there was plenty of space to move around with my toes. I’ve noticed though that some seats behind mine were a bit narrow in that area, so if possible I would always aim for the first row.

MH A330 Business Class seat 1K legroom in lie-flat position

Service on board was very pleasant aswell. Right after take-off meal service began and I was spoiled with some nuts, water, white wine and as a starter a choice of chicken and beef satay, which MH is well known for. It was delicious!

MH A330 Business Class food service / starters

Soon after I finished the snacks I slept for around 3 hours when a flight attendant gently woke me up to let me know that my pre-ordered meal had been prepared for me now. You heard right, MH offers a “book-the-cook” options on many of their long distance flights. Up to 24h before your flight you can choose from a variety of meals that will be prepared for you inflight. I went for a lamb dish but unfortunately I was so dizzy after I woke up, I just didn’t snap a pic of it. It was incredibly tasty though.

And also I enjoyed their “Dine Anytime” option with a verity of snacks which could be ordered anytime during the flight.

MH Business Class Menu on my KUL-ICN flight

Bottom line:
I really enjoyed the whole experience of flying with Malaysia Airlines Business Class in one of their retro-fitted Airbus A330’s. Their lounge in Kuala Lumpur, their soft and hard product in Biz were overall a very pleasant experience, especially considering the price paid. Basically a taste of luxury for the price of flying coach! If you want to experience it the same way I do it check out my Guide on “How to travel the smarter Way!”, which will be out soon. I the meantime why don’t you take a look at how to plan and book a journey? Happy Travels!

From Europe to Hawaii for just a week?

April 30, 2017

Trip Report: Hawaii in November 2016

As I mentioned in another post I recently added -how to plan and book a journey-
I was lucky enough to grab an amazing deal on flights from Amsterdam to Honolulu and back last year for just around 370 USD. Usually similar flights will set you back around 1.000 USD or even a bit more. So this was clearly an error fare which I happily took advantage of since Hawaii has been on my bucket list for a long time anyway.
As this was an Error Fare I discovered on a travel website, I had to act fast because you never know how long those kind of fares are available for booking. So I ended up booking an unintended 7-day holiday in Hawaii alongside my sister.

When the day came, me and my sister met at the International Airport in Amsterdam to spend the next 24 hours on three different flights. Our trip led us via London and Los Angeles to Honolulu and honestly speaking wasn’t as bad as I would have expected it because of the fact that we had a couple of hours each, in London and Los Angeles to switch planes and walk around in the airport terminals. Due to the good weather conditions during the whole journey I was able to take some great photos out of the airplane windows aswell. One of many reasons I prefer window seats are the amazing views you get to see. It doesn’t matter how often you fly, sunsets at altitude never get old. If you’re interested in reading more about flight experiences, feel free to check out my flight reviews on this website.

The stopover at LHR was quite relaxed, as we had three hours until our upcoming leg to LAX. Unfortunately we were not eligible for any loungeaccess on this trip, which would have made our trip even more relaxing. But really, we were definitely not in the position to complain about anything. After all we paid under 400 USD each, for a trip basically to the other side of the world and back.

Stunning London city view before landing in LHR

The ten hour ride from LHR to LAX was one of the smoothest I have ever experienced. We were lucky to fly in one of their Boeing 777’s, basically American Airlines’ flagship within their fleet. On top of that we experienced an amazing sunset view right before landing in Los Angeles.

Los Angeles sunset view before landing at LAX

After another 6h flight from Los Angeles we finally arrived in Honolulu the next morning and made our way to Waikiki which takes about an hour by bus or roughly 30 minutes if you grab a cab or an Uber. If you’re on a budget try to avoid taking a cab, as it will cost you a lot more than taking a bus or an Uber.

Honolulu International Airport HNL

weather forecast for the week we stayed in Honolulu (in °C)

One thing we noticed after booking our flight to Hawaii was that average hotelprices were around 200+ USD a night! That’s when we decided to stay at a hostel right in the center of Waikiki which was the best decision we have made so far!

I love staying at hotels in general. But I really don’t mind staying at a hostel every now and then. You will most likely meet amazing travellers from all around the world, all with different stories to tell, you will never feel alone even though you might be travelling by yourself and most importantly you might make new friends and overall have an amazing time together. And for all of that you will pay a fraction of what you would’ve paid for an expensive hotel room. So if you don’t necessarily need the luxury of a private room all the time, this is the way to go!

Seaside Hostel shared 6-bed dorm Downtown Waikiki

Our hostel was located in Downtown Waikiki, only a couple of hundred meters from Waikiki Beach and we paid around 25 USD/night and per person. Due to our rather short stay, we decided to stay on the main island of Hawaii, Oahu, which has a lot to offer. As I mentioned before, Hawaii in general is not a place for cheapskates, but I found it surprisingly simple not to spend tons of money during this trip.

Waikiki Beach view / view of Diamond Head

Oahu is not as big as I thought it was in the first place. You can basically drive around the whole island within 2-3 hours depending on traffic.

The next morning me and my sister decided to walk around Waikiki and the beach area for a bit to see whats going on. Soon I realized that it seemed to be quite difficult to get around Oahu by foot or even public transportation. There is a way of taking busses all around the island, but a rental car seemed to be the better option. As my sister is more of the laid back kind of person who enjoys hanging out at the beaches, I decided to rent a scooter by myself to explore the island more adventurously. After walking around in the Waikiki area for about an hour, I found a place that rents out scooters and motorcycles. Staff was friendly and provided all the information I wanted without pushing me to rent one of their bikes immediately, so I ended up renting a 125cc scooter for 3 days at that place for around 120 USD in total which was not cheap, especially compared to asian countries like Thailand or Vietnam, where you can get a scooter for just a few bucks a day. But then again, this was Hawaii, the most expensive state in the US and I really wanted to ride around the island with a bike or at least a scooter.

125cc scooter I rented in Waikiki

Day 1: I decided to just ride around Honolulu and the Waikiki area to get familiar with the roads and the traffic. So far I have driven motorcycles, cars and scooters all around the world and one thing I learned is that you need some time to adapt to each country and their driving culture. Compared to asian countries, driving in Hawaii was extremely laid back and only within the first hour I really started to enjoy riding around the island.

First stop was the famous Diamond Head which was easy to reach by scooter. It takes about 10-20 minutes to get there from Waikiki and another 20 minutes by foot to reach the top and it’s really worth it!

view from Diamond Head monument

Day 2: The next day I decided to head to Pearl Harbour, which is roughly 20km outside of Honolulu and was a 30 minute ride with the scooter. Pearl Harbour is known for its II.WW Memorial site and the famous USS Arizona, which sank after a surprise attack from the Japanese in 1941. The memorial is basically a platform on top of the sunken USS Arizona. I was surprised that there was no entry fee to the memorial site itself and also the 5 minute boat ride to reach the platform over the USS Arizona was free of charge. There are a lot of other things to see like old submarines and tankers which you have to pay for though. Overall the Pearl Harbour Memorial was definitely worth exploring and I would recommend it to anybody who is even slightly interested in history.

scenic boat ride to USS Arizona Memorial

USS Arizona Memorial above the sunken USS Arizona

recovered USS Arizona anchor

I decided to head back to Waikiki and on the way back I noticed a nice park with an amazing beach front view. Since the sun was about to set I pulled over to rest and take some pictures. A funny thing I noticed was that there were about a dozen asian couples – I think mostly Japanese – taking wedding pictures while sun was setting as you can see in the picture below. Some were even standing in line side by side in their wedding attire to get the best sunset shots.

sunset view Waikiki area

Day 3: Someone I met at our hostel recommended to check out nearby Manoa Waterfalls, which I did. The ride to the falls north of Honolulu was about 40 minutes by scooter and on the way I noticed a couple of tourists heading the same direction.

When reaching the main entrance of the walking trail I parked the scooter and continued by foot.

Manoa Falls walking trail entrance

The trail was about 3 km long, so nicely walkable. If you like the feeling of being stuck in the middle of the jungle, you might enjoy walking the trail. I did find it interesting at first, but after a while it felt slightly boring walking towards the falls. After reaching the top you get rewarded with a waterfall you can even hang out and swim in though.

After all I enjoyed the trip to the falls, but wouldn’t necessarily do it again.

to be continued…

Madrid to Frankfurt Business Class on Latam

April 16, 2017

Flight Review: Madrid (MAD) – Frankfurt (FRA) in mid 2016

Carrier: Latam, Boeing 787 (Dreamliner) Business Class
Flight Duration: 2h 30m

In september 2016 a friend and I decided to go on a weekend-trip to Madrid. We chose to fly Latam (former Lan) , which is by the way the only airline serving this route with one of their fairly new Boeing 787 Dreamliners. Latam offers incredibly competitive Business Class fares for especially this exact routing -we paid roughly 200 Euros each for a roundtrip- and is also the only airline to do so by using a longhaul aircraft, a fairly new Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Those offers seem to be available because Latam continues flying out from Madrid to Santiago de Chile just an hour after coming in from Frankfurt. So the airline maximizes capacity on their daily FRA-MAD and MAD-FRA flights by offering very cheap Economy Class and Business Class roundtrips, which we took advantage of.

The flight from Madrid to Frankfurt usually departs at around 2pm, so we went to the airport 2 hours before departure to grab some lunch in the lounge. Latam Business Class passengers and Oneworld Sapphire members are given access to the Iberia Lounge in the Sattelite Terminal (T4S) of Barajas Airport, which is the non-Schengen Area of T4. Although we haven’t had any trouble checking in, we noticed that we should have come a little earlier to fully enjoy and relax at the lounge. The Sattelite Terminal can only be reached by a skytrain and there is quite a distance to walk to reach your departure gate if you’re unlucky. So in the end we had a not very relaxing 20-minutes stay at the Iberia Lounge to grab some food and beverages before we left for our flight back to Frankfurt.

Passengers flying from Frankfurt to Madrid are given acces to the Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge.

Iberia Lounge T4S seating area Madrid Barajas Airport

Although the lounge was filled with many transiting passengers, there was still plenty of sitting space left for us. The buffet offered a variety of cold and hot dishes, right next to the buffet was an open fridge with many non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages (mostly beers). Unfortunately we weren’t able to fully enjoy our lounge visit and left after having a small lunch. Well, at least we took an ice cream dessert to-go each, right before leaving for our gate, which was something!

Complimentary Ice Cream at Iberia Lounge T4S

After rushing to our departure gate – while eating our Ice Cream, we must have looked way too funny – we found ourselves being the last passengers to board the aircraft.

Business Class on Latam’s 787 Dreamliner features a 2-2-2 lieflat seat configuration, which are great when flying with a friend or partner. Due to the fact that all windowseats do not have direct aisle acces and therefore limited privacy, they may not be the favorable option for passengers traveling by themselves. We chose to sit in 2A and 2C, which are a window- and an aisleseat right next to each other.

Latam Business Class seats on 787 Dreamliner

Latam Business Class lieflat seat on 787 Dreamliner

The seats are spacious and convert into a fully lieflat bed with the option of getting bedding and a nice blanket from your flightattendant, which we obviously didn’t need to use on our roughly 2,5h flight to Frankfurt. But I can imagine it being a very comfortable spot to sleep on a 10 hour redeye-flight from Madrid to Santiago de Chile.

We definitely enjoyed the view through the much larger 787 windows during our flight though, which by the way don’t have classical windowshades anymore but some built-in hightech glasses which darken by pressing a button under the windows.

Windows on 787 Dreamliner

Sunset view while aircraft is tilted to the right (FRA-MAD flight)

An inflight meal, declared as “snack”, was served about an hour after take off. As you can see, the meal included european bread with butter, beef carpaccio served cold on a plate with salad, olive oil, some sort of salsa sauce and a chocolate cake for dessert. It was a delicious gourmet snack we both really enjoyed.

Latam Business Class inflight meal MAD-FRA

Bottom Line:
Overall, flying Business Class on Latam’s 787 Dreamliner was a unique experience that doesn’t break the bank. I definitely recommend it, especially on this route which is usually flown on shorthaul aircrafts like the 737 or A320 by other airlines. In Addition to this fact comes that those Latam Economy and Business Class fares are incredibly competitive.

So why fly intra-european Business Class on an A320, which we all know are basically Economy Class seats in the front of the plane combined with Business Class service, when you can have the “real” Business Class experience for the same price or sometimes even less money?

Sydney to Melbourne Business Class on Qantas

April 16, 2017

Flight Review: Sydney (SYD) – Melbourne (MEL) in early 2016

Carrier: Qantas , Airbus A330 Business Class
Flight Duration: 1h
Price Paid: 60 EUR + 5.000 Avios (miles)

While being on a 5-week backpacking-vacation inbetween my studies I got the opportunity to fly from Sydney to Melbourne in one of their (at that time) newly remodelled A330´s. To book this flight I used my Avios (Miles) from my British Airways Executive Club account. So in the end a oneway-trip in Business Class cost me around 5000 Avios plus an additional 60 Euros in fees and taxes. The cost for this ticket without using miles would have been a whopping 900 AUD. So the use of my Avios wasn’t bad at all.

To get more information on how to earn and use miles just check out my beginners tutorial on how to plan and book your journey here!

So when I arrived at the airport in Sydney I checked in my backpack at the empty Business Class counter and proceeded through security. One of the amazing perks of flying Business Class are the lounges you are allowed to access before departure. And that’s exactly what I did. (I must admit, I did even skip having lunch in Sydney to come to the airport 2-3 h before departure to have it in the Qantas lounge).

Qantas Business Class Lounge

The lounge is spacious and there was quite a good choice of hot and cold food at their selfservice buffet. Complimentary alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks were available at the bar right next to the buffet. There is also the opportunity to have a quick shower in one of the lounge’s private shower rooms, which I didn’t take advantage of though.

For aviationgeeks this lounge features a fairly nice view onto the tarmac with a lot of qantas planes waiting to be boarded right next to the windows of the lounge.

Qantas Lounge food and view

After having a nice lunch -it was more like a brunch- I headed to the gates to board my rather short flight in Qantas’ new A330 Business Class.
I assigned myself seat 4A which is a window seat on the left side of the plane, obviously. Business Class is configured in a 1-2-1 layout with direct aisle acces for every seat. I really liked the level of privacy given on a window seat.

Qantas Business Class seat A330

For the first time in my life (yes, this was actually my first Business Class flight ever) I felt like being on a private jet. The seat certainly felt like it and also the service was amazing, especially for a short flight like this. Even though the flight-time was just under 1 hour the crew managed to serve a full meal in Business Class, which I wasn’t even expecting. The meal included a chickencornsoup, some bread (which unfortunately I ate before taking the picture), some sort of sweet cake for dessert, water and white wine. I was quite impressed by that.

Qantas Business Class food and entertainment system

So despite this being an extremly short flight to fly Business Class on, it was definitely still worth using my avios for. I had a great experience flying their new product at that time but I would certainly not spend 900 AUD for a oneway-ticket. Though again, the option of using my avios made this a very reasonable and unique experience.

Frankfurt to Dubai Economy Class on Emirates

April 9, 2017

Flight Review: Frankfurt (FRA) – Dubai (DXB) in early 2017

Carrier: Emirates, Boeing 777 Economy Class
Flight Duration: 6h

On a recent trip to Asia I was able to experience and review Emirates Economy Class.

First of all there seems to be a small difference in level of comfort within their whole fleet. I was lucky enough to get all the different views of Emirates Economy Class by flying on their older 777’s, their fairly new 777 and also on the way back to Europe on one of their state of the art A380’s.

This review covers my Frankfurt to Dubai leg in one of their older 777’s.

On longhaul Economy Class flights I usually prefer to sit in a windowseat for two simple reasons:

There won’t be any passengers waking me up by trying to climb over me to use the lavatories and also I tend to lean my pillow against the wall to have a decent position to rest and sleep in.

Unfortunately Emirates wants non-status members to pay a fee of 25USD per flight to choose their seat more than 24h before departure, so I decided to wait until a few hours before departure to assign my seat for free online. Long story short, I ended up not getting my window seat but assigned myself an aisle seat, 42D.

Emirates B777 Economy Class aisle seat and entertainment system

Other than that Check-In and Boarding procedures seemed to be very well organised. The seats weren’t great, but I have experienced worse. Seat width and leg space seemed to be quite decent on their 3-4-3 Economy Class layout, at least for this 6 hour flight. Even though this particular Boeing 777 plane seemed outdated, I noticed USB outlets for your electronic devices and was happy to use them to charge my phone. I also appreciated the Emirates inflight entertainment system “ICE”, which is updated regularly. So a good choice of some of the latest TV series and movies is given at any time.

Emirates B777 Economy Class seating

Emirates Economy Class blanket, pillow and noise-cancelling headphones

One thing I really enjoyed in Emirates Economy was the paper menu which was handed over to every Economy Class passenger shortly after takeoff. I have noticed this kind of service only in Business Class before. A wide range of complimentary beverages, non-alcoholic and alcoholic, was given. There was also the option to pay for champagne, which is served for free in Business and First Class.

Emirates Economy Class food and beverages menu

So about half an hour after takeoff FA’s went through the cabin to provide beverage service. I ordered some white wine and orange juice before lunch was served.

Emirates Economy Class beverages

I was excited to try the lamb curry for lunch but unfortunately they were out of it very fast so I had to go with the chicken, which wasn’t a gourmet meal – and didn’t look like it for sure – but was still fairly tasty.

Economy Class lunch, Chicken with gnocchi, green beans and carrots

Overall flying longhaul Economy Class is not something I am very excited about, but this flight in particular went by quite fast since it was a shorter transcontinental flight and the food, IFE and overall service was still great.

I certainly wouldn’t mind flying Economy Class on Emirates again, even if it was on a longer route.

How to plan and book a journey for beginners

April 9, 2017

Multiple times in the last couple of years I was lucky enough to grab extremely cheap flights basically all around the world, but mostly between Europe and North America.

So for example I was able to book a roundtrip from Luxembourg to Sydney via London and Los Angeles for around 900 USD, or a trip from Amsterdam to Honolulu, Hawaii and back for around 370 USD, which was due to an error in an airline’s booking system.

Here are 5 basic rules for you to increase chances of getting good deals on flights:

1. Search on multiple search engines

When looking for a flight try not to dedicate yourself to only one search engine. There might be a huge variation of prices between different platforms e.g. skyscanner, kayak, momondo, google flights etc. So always compare the prices.
You will also notice that most of the search engines will redirect you to a third party company’s website offering the cheapest results. Many of those try to increase their margin by adding extra fees for certain type of credit cards, useless insurances or services you definitely don’t need. So be sure to check additional fees and possibly book with their preferred and therefore cheapest payment method.

2. Try to be flexible

If possible, try to have many different dates and times of departure and arrival in mind. Fares do vary a lot depending on date and time of travel. Chances of finding a cheaper flight for just a day before or after the intended day of travel are high.

3. Search from many different airports

Airlines tend to vary their prices from certain airports or between certain cities for various reasons like airport taxes, frequency of the route, pricing of competing airlines etc. So always search for alternative routings, even though you might lose a bit of time, have to travel further than intended or the routing does not seem to make sense in the first place.

For example I was once able to save some money on a trip to Las Vegas because I simply departed from Luxembourg instead of Frankfurt, which I originally planned to do. Although ironically ending up flying through Frankfurt (LUX-FRA-ORD-LAS), which seemed to be idiotic in the first place, a flight from Frankfurt would have cost me around 300USD more than the alternative routing I chose. A plus though would be the little extra mileage earned on this itinerary for less money, which leads us to the next important point.

4. Earn and use Miles

I will briefly be explaining how to use the perks of frequent flyer programs in a different section of my blog, since there are just too many different possibilities of doing so.

I personally love earning and using on British Airways’ frequent flyer program “BA Executive Club”. Compared to many other programs it seems to be easier to earn a decent amount of avios (miles) in a short period of time, even if you fly only a couple times a year.
For example: A roundtrip booking from Europe to North America or Asia would earn you enough miles to fly intraeuropean once (e.g. FRA-LHR) almost for free.

5. Take advantage of error fares and deals if they fit your schedule

In the past I got a couple of great deals by finding and booking so called error fares. Error fares are basically false prices, which you will be able to find on the internet sometimes if you’re lucky. Most of the times they can be found for the fact that airlines do not or forget to double-check on their prices of some of their routings, so it happens that prices are falsely calculated within their booking system. Some people even think that Airlines occasionally put them on the market on purpose, as known as “self-dump fares”.
Either way, if you’re lucky enough to find one of those “too-good-to-be-true” deals, act fast. Usually they only last for a couple of hours or even only minutes before the errors get fixed.

So basically that is it. It is really as simple as that. By following these basic and honestly quite simple “rules”, I was able to save quite some money on my travels.

Feel free to check out my other travel experiences and reviews on this website. There might be some more helpful and entertaining information for you to read. If you have any questions about me or traveling in general feel free to comment below or contact me. Happy Travels!

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Author: Wayne S