pbarnette

Good God, how bad are connections at SYD? BNE requires leaving one terminal and taking a local train to another.

avidflyer

I was commenting on the bar.

AgentCooper

SYD requires leaving the terminal and taking a bus/taxi/train to another. I've always found it fairly painless (as long as you have plenty of time padded in for the connection) but I can see where others may disagree.

Nugget_Oz

SYD requires a bus transfer. For Americans Australian domestic transfers must seem unwordly because Australian airports still separate domestic and international terminals and at some of the major airports the terminals are on opposite sides of the airfield. It'd be like TBIT being on the Imperial Highway and all the other terminals being on Manchester.

FWIW you can also take the bus transfer in Brisbane (instead of the AirTrain) and you can also take the local train in Sydney (instead of the bus).

landgraf13

That's a tough one to swallow. I flew upstairs on the KE 380 JFK-ICN and back and have to say it was one of the better products and service in the air. I know you were talking about the bar, but I've gotta say that's a perk we don't often get on many planes. Nothing beats the ability to walk around, hang out and stretch your legs at a bar (similar to the days of old upstairs on the 747's). Yes, their drink selection at the bar wasn't the most comprehensive, but it beats the hours sitting in your seat. Then again, if it's the drink you're more concerned about, the self-serve bar they have in the lounge up front does the trick too.

mAAine_flyer

It was fairly clear to me from the thread title ("Business class delta vs.virgin Australia")

avidflyer

TOTALLY agree.

ashill

They're fundamentally similar: both airports have separate domestic and international terminals which are more than a km apart. At BNE, VA gives you a pass to ride the train, which is right outside the terminals, although the queue for the transfer desk at which you get the train pass was prohibitively long when I did it. There's also a VA-operated bus, which I think is used for domestic-international transfers. At SYD, VA operates a bus which takes quite a while, or you can pay to take the train.

Jmr007

Thank you all for your quick and helpful comments. In addition to my original question, I found out about the connection issues in Sydney + BNE.
Now I will certainly look at connection times.

I had actually considered switching to UA or quantas in Lax. Has anybody experience with baggage handling across airline alliances (delta to either of this)

Nugget_Oz

That would be Qantas. I believe both airlines interline although you may get a better deal keeping it as one ticket and do the short hop to DEN/LAX.

pbarnette

My main complaints centered around:

1) Mediocre food that shouldn't be mediocre. I laugh at a lot of airlines' attempts to be "fancy" and give you things like overcooked steaks and rubbery shellfish as a result, but Korean doesn't even have somewhat tricky ingredients as an excuse. They are serving Korean comfort food, which has a lot of potential to be pretty good in flight. At a minimum, offer more than a couple of banchan and don't serve gristly meat. That it isn't a multi-course offering is also kind of lame and the desserts were pathetic.

2) Lack of direct aisle access. This is 2015 people.

3) Weak drink selection and infrequent top-ups. The wine, especially, is clearly an afterthought. And no shoju or sake on the menu seems like a missed opportunity. As for the bars, the front bar is even weaker than the back, with vodka and a couple of mixers on my flights. It is nice enough, I guess, but it isn't make or break for me. It would help if the seating was more comfortable.

4) I found the service to be robotic and not terribly genuine.

It wasn't a terrible experience, just an underwhelming one. DL, top to bottom, offers a better product IMO.

But that is way too much of a diversion for a thread about VS and DL.

pbarnette

I've never had a problem going across alliances, but haven't done a connection between DL and those guys at LAX specifically. If you had time, you could always consider just collecting and rechecking.

Doesn't sound like enough of a difference to be much of a decision point. I should add that, while I didn't find connecting at BNE to be optimal, it wasn't the end of the world.

Nugget_Oz

This could all change at SYD, there are a few proposals (none of them with that much support) to change the terminal configuration at SYD so that T1 (the current international) becomes Virgin Australia/Star/SkyTeam and T2 (the current domestic) becomes Qantas/OneWorld/Emirates.

exwannabe

WRT the *A TBIT lounge, it really ranks well amongst international lounges (and domestic lounges are not even close).I honestly like it over the regular lounges I visit at Asian gateways.

They really are doing a good job of transforming TBIT from a 3rd world airport to what one would expect for the international hub at LA.Still have a few years to go (that bus gate facility...).

Colin

DL to UA at LAX would be my choice. The DL gates at T5/T6 are connected airside to UA gates at T7, a benefit not easily available when connecting to QF at Bradley (though there may be bus transfer airside). I'd feel comfortable with an hour connection on the outbound, about that for the return if Global Entry.

Traveling as a couple, the UA J flat beds are nice enough, get middle seats for both to have direct aisle access. Novelty of flying on a 787 aircraft, if you haven't ticked that off your list before.