My Travels

Headed out on a mix of Star Alliance carriers to Vietnam. I'm out for a short trip on personal business and was able to buy a last minute fare to Hanoi on United and Vietnam Airlines . Interestingly, I did not realize that United would sell non-partner flights on their website. I guess Vietnam Airlines (like Hawaiian Airlines) is some kind of secondary code share partner and so will pop up on the United site. My layover in Haneda Interational Aiport was a few hours. Unfortunately, ANA Lounge did not accept my ticket on Vietnam Airlines despite being a codeshare flight and I wondered around the terminal. I was disappointed to be denied of karaage and curry. Yet again, I am unable to get ANA karaage! On the bright side, I was able to upgrade on the United segments to business so I can't complain too much. Despite the fanfare of Polaris in United literature, I did not get the "full" Polaris experience. The seats were not yet installed but the bedding and amenity k...

Went out to Las Vegas on United Airlines for a timeshare promotion. As a HGVC owner, they are fairly consistent with wanting me to come out to Vegas. For this particular trip, I am staying at Trump International . I usually prefer Elara but the Trump location is beginning to win  me over. In booking, the HGVC folks were giving a complimentary upgrade to two bedroom suite if you booked a one bedroom suite. For $99, I was not going to quibble and I was also getting a $100 dining credit at Buca di Beppo. Clearly, the political climate has not made the hotel very popular if these are the things they are throwing out to get people to come. Similar to Park City, the configuration is a two room lock out. The two bedroom configuration is made of one studio and one one bedroom suite that shares the same foyer. In some ways, it is nicer to have this type of configuration but it also is a little dividing if you had a large group that wanted to stay hangout in the living room. One interest...

Off to a work trip to the island of Cyprus. I've never been to the Mediterranean area and looking forward to seeing what the fuss is all about. I'm back on Swiss Airlines  and in business class for most of the way. There was no real easy way to get to Cyprus at a reasonable cost so I booked my Swiss itinerary to Athens and then on to Cyprus on Aegean Airlines . On  the way to Athens, I did a brief layover in Zurich and visited the Swiss Lounge again. This time I tried the Whiskey Lounge and had some hot items such as meatballs and macaroni cheese. I have to say the American versions are better but it was good to have on hand for the time being. Since my layover was long, I was able to get a shower. There are significant differences between the International Terminal location (Terminal D) and the EU (shengen) side (Terminal A). The lounge was mostly empty. Once I was ready to leave, I had to leave the international terminal and go through passport control to get to term...

Flew on United Airlines out to Maui on this trip. I received a promotional timeshare presentation to visit the Westin Ka'anapali Resort . The promotion included a rental from Avis too. The uneventful flight arrived to some rainy weather at Kahului Airport . The airport is not really built for the flow of passengers that arrive. The rental shuttle busses pick up at various locations on the curb and there was an intense wait at the rental agency. Luckily not many are Preferred and I jumped into that line to get out within an hour. The poor souls in the regular line likely took twice as long. On the bright side, United automatically emailed me a voucher for the delayed arrival into Maui! Works out since I'll use it to my Las Vegas trip in a few months!! More details to come on that trip. The resort was about an hour away so a short Costco trip was done. Costco is also located right outside of the airport so it was an easy stopover. After grabbing food, headed over to the reso...