Let’s face it. On this trip we visited YVR, New LAX, ICN, SIN, and then IST. There’s going to be a letdown at some point and this was it. We weren’t even talking YYZ or WAW here. Not even YXE (new, half-finished YXE, not old) Sorry, IST, it’s not going to work at face value. If you want to compete as a hub you’re going to need something extra special to overcome the really average, almost-overcrowded terminal you seem to have inherited from the STN school of ceiling design.
IST
Oh wait, it’s IST. And that something special is right over there. It’s the TK Lounge.
Lounge: Turkish Airlines Lounge Istanbul
So forget any of my criticisms of IST as an airport, because while the terminal itself isn’t anything special it houses one of the best *A lounges around. I would rate it favourably to the T3 SKL that we just left in every aspect but one: hot food. I can’t really compare it to the LAX *A F lounge but the two are just polar opposites of what you’re going for in a lounge, I think.
First off, the lounge is huge. Gigantic, even. When you’re exploring it and you think you’ve seen it all, make sure you notice the piano, because that means there’s only one more normal-lounge-sized area left. Or there was, because I hear they expanded it yet again with a bottom level. No, this is easily the biggest lounge I’ve ever encountered, most easily measured in multiples of whatever lounge you have the most experience with. So despite the fact that it was fairly busy by any other standard, we could have easily walked for a few minutes and found a near-deserted corner to sit. Don't let the pictures fool you, there were people in the lounge. It just wasn't full by any means.
Look at all that space
Second, the decor. Someone here was on the bit, managing to create a compartmentalized yet open area that used the open space of the IST terminal while successfully taking your attention away from the awful ceiling. The furniture and fittings are nice without being gaudy or tacky.
And then the birds. I don’t know how they got there, I don’t know if this was intentional, and if it was I don’t know who decided it was going to be a good idea, but there are birds flying around up there. I found them near the piano. They are not in a cage. They’re just up there, hanging out, doing bird stuff, making bird sounds, and it’s sort of relaxing to have them there. Not expecting that one. There’s also plenty of greenery on the unique arches that adds a nice touch, and probably adds a nice place for birds to sit. You know, now that you have birds. Like the boarding signs for OZ F, I’m now going to rate lounges on their birds because now I know that’s a thing.
Third, the food. This was the only real letdown of the lounge for two reasons: first, there seemed to be only one kitchen and when I was there the lines were long at the one open stand. The second area, supposedly serving Pide (or so said the sign) was just unstaffed. Nothing. When I finally managed to track someone down about it they said "all gone" as if it was too late in the day. At 8am. Disappointing to say the least. That was the second letdown. Now as far as coffee goes, the coffee areas were all staffed and made a great product. The cold food was also great, loads of different delicious baklava and olives and tapas-y stuff. Drinks were plentiful at good intervals through the huge space. But if I didn’t want an omelette then I was out of luck.
Just…. sitting there. Taunting me. And then I blinked and they disappeared.
Power was… interesting. Outlets were plentiful, but very oddly located in the arches and in fact not really accessible by all plugs. MrsBarn’s Moto G charger, where the USB plugs into the side, wouldn’t fit at all. My Nexus 7 charger, though, worked since the USB cable plugs into the end. But there were enough plugs if we had the right chargers, so that’s a plus in a way. Definitely not like some other lounges (cough cough *A LHR) where you can’t find a plug even in an electrical emergency.
As we arrived early in the morning, the shower facilities were a factor and they were decent, but not overwhelming. Water temperature topped out far too early, but pressure was good. It’s not an arrivals lounge so I didn’t expect lots of units but there were more than a couple rooms so I didn’t need to wait long. Amenities were minimal, but no big deal. Overall perfectly adequate.
Utilization of the lounge, though, was spectacular. This was a lounge that seemed to be in the middle of a rush but there was no difficulty at all in finding a seat and at least for drinks and coffee there was always a station nearby. We didn’t even wait long to get in, and while we didn’t use the lockers provided there seemed to be space left despite the high use. I can only imagine how it is now with the expansion, although sadly I’m not planning to be back in the near future. With *G this lounge makes IST a factor as a transit lounge for me.
So anyway, as to our time there we mostly caught up on a few emails, copied some files off MrsBarn’s camera card, talked with other guests, and had a long breakfast graze. By 11 it was sadly looking like we should be heading back into the terminal to find our flight, the last shot at anything resembling J for a while.
Finally leaving the lounge, we discovered that our bus gate would be way down the pier, necessitating another long walk. This time we’d be leaving behind the Stansted-y ceilings in favour of low LHR-esque ceilings and endless travelators. Eventually, after passing the Skyteam lounge we went down one more level and found our bus gate with a huge queue heading back. Oh well, end of the queue we go.
We moved quickly enough through the queue, scanned our boarding passes, green light flashed, and then we headed out to the tarmac to find no bus. Nothing. So we just sort of stood around for a minute until something completely out of the ordinary: we were approached by a staff member asking us to come back into checkin.
Excuse me?
At this moment, I’m having flashbacks to more than one FT thread where TK royally screws up an Aeroplan reward and everything goes wrong. I’m also having flash-forwards to something I may not have mentioned yet: my Polish residence visa was due to expire…. two days earlier. This is not something I discovered at the last minute, but it was something I discovered later than I should. On the (wrong) advice of the staff at the Ministry for Foreigners (or something like that) I was told it wouldn’t be such a huge deal (it was, just not at immigration), but when you get flagged on the flight back into the EU for no good reason, the platitudes of bureaucrats aren’t very effective. It turns out, though, that it would be more of the former reason: TK had no ticket numbers attached to our reservation.
Because, you know, apparently it’s common practise to issue boarding cards without ticket numbers.
Anyhow, this could have gone many ways, but thankfully I had overplanned this one and had all our ticket numbers in TripIt. Maybe. I don’t quite remember which iteration of the ticket numbers it was, but I’m fairly sure it was the right one. At least TK accepted it. But they were the ones who let us through without ticket numbers in the first place, so I’m still not totally convinced.
Back outside, though, we still had no bus but a very sunny midday standing on the tarmac at an airport. I was one happy camper (once you get past the not being sure if I’d get deported on landing) with some unique photo opportunities. Soon the bus hauled us off to our waiting flight….
Tarmac Views at IST