AKDan

Back in December of 2015, I finally made the decision to attend the Rotary International Convention in Seoul, Korea. My previous travel experience never took me out of North America, so I was certainly excited about the trip and being able to see a new country. I generally fly solely on Alaska, mainly since I live south of Anchorage and they provide the most flight options. Additionally, I don’t fly enough to get status unless I consolidate my flying on one airline, so I generally will only schedule AS flights for that reason.

My intent was to use AS miles, and quick searches were showing many options a few days before I committed to attending. I quickly learned that waiting is not necessarily a good thing, as many of the business class options had disappeared. While I certainly could fly in economy, this was definitely also a vacation for me, so I stuck with finding business class awards. While one plan could have routed me through DXB on Emirates, in the end I decided that was a little too much flying, even in business. The easiest flights were to take DL out of Seattle using their (somewhat) new Delta One business class product.

I will focus more on the travel products for this review, as I had a lot of downtime during the days outside of the conference, some of which I stuck around my hotel due to work commitments or just personal choice – I will say that I had a hard time acclimating to the very warm days I experienced in Seoul. That being said, I had the good fortune of meeting some great Flyer Talker’s who showed me some wonderful sights.

Please let me know if you have any questions – let’s get started!

AKDan

Grant Aviation Flight GV615
ENA – ANC

As usual, my journey started out getting up to Anchorage International Airport. There are a few different options to do this – there are two scheduled airlines that fly from Kenai, Alaska up to Anchorage on a fairly regular basis (hourly on the weekdays) or I can take the 150 mile drive. It’s not cheap to fly this route, a round trip ticket will run $190, more in the summer – which is why I usually drive. However, I had a guest at our house that was flying back with me on this day, then we would take separate flights once we got up to Anchorage. That made it a lot easier to fly and not have to pay for parking etc. in town. In the winter, flying is usually advisable because the one road to Anchorage can get shut down unpredictably because of the dangerous highway – a serious accident will close it for four hours or more.

The two airlines that serve this route are Ravn Alaska and Grant Aviation. Ravn, formerly Era, flies Dash-8 aircraft and serves many communities around Alaska. Typically, they are always late, hire the most surely and unpleasant staff (not all, but most) and have lied to me on several occasions. I use to fly with them on occasion, however one day they were FAA grounded for wrong equipment on the plane, and they managed to lie to everyone for that entire day about when their planes were going to resume operations. The story I got was “2 hours” and in reality it was 2 days. That was the end for me.

Grant Aviation flies Cessna Caravans and is the epitome of real Alaskan flying – despite the reality shows. They have been around Alaska since the 1970’s and generally have nice, easygoing folks and are mostly on time. I’ve had some delays and things with them but they have a pretty realistic schedule, don’t have a lot of extra fees, and their tickets are fully refundable and transferable. I’m pretty proud of them because in 2015 they actually introduced booking online. Yes, I said 2015. Better late than never.

The downside to Grant is that some people are uncomfortable with having only one pilot aboard. The planes are a little less comfortable to some than the Dash 8, and a bit harder to get in to. I have noticed that the Cessna usually doesn’t take that much longer to get to Anchorage than the twin engine plane, so the two airlines are about even in that respect. Grant’s tickets are about $15 less than Ravn for this route.


Our ride to ANC


Flying over the Kenai Peninsula


Starting approach to ANC



With that being said, the flight was fairly uneventful. The flight was about 30 minutes, good weather, and a smooth ride. We picked up our checked bags and headed for check in.

AKDan

Alaska Airlines Flight AS102
ANC-SEA

Alaska check in is relatively quick using the kiosk to print the baggage tag and dropping it off with an agent. I was “randomly” selected at Pre Check to be irradiated, so a side trip for a pat down was in order. At least this one figured out that I wasn’t playing stupid TSA games with him so we got through that relatively quickly. Since I was with someone I didn’t stop by the Alaska Board Room, we hung out at the gate until boarding began.

Even though I was travelling on a mileage ticket, AS had put me on the first class waiting list because there was no award space in first on this particular segment. I had been watching the availability and it was staying at one open first seat up until we got to the airport. There were two names on the waitlist, one of which was mine. For some reason, even though I was first on the list, the other person was upgraded. Not a big deal to me, but as boarding was finishing I overheard a gate agent come in and offer an upgrade to someone a few rows ahead of me. I was a little upset by that, but it wasn’t worth the conversation. I ended up having a middle seat next to me free, and I was in the exit row, so it was still quite a pleasant flight.



Alaska offers Gogo Inflight streaming entertainment, as well as tablets that have movies and TV shows loaded. I typically use the inflight internet as opposed to any IFE, but I have rented the tablet a few times. It has a decent selection but I guess I have never rented it when there are things I wanted to see.

Alaska has a good BOB program for meals. In addition to the snack boxes, there is usually a hot option on longer flights in addition to the fruit & cheese platter. I generally will order the platter as it is fairly substantial for $7.50 and I enjoy Beecher’s cheese which is featured on it. In May Alaska was offering the angus cheeseburger, which I haven’t had on one of my flights in years. It doesn’t get any points for presentation, but is very filling and served as a good dinner for the evening.




In-flight chocolates. Provided to elite's that don't take advantage of the complimentary beverage in Y.


There is not too much to say about this flight – another beverage service was done after the meal service, and we arrived on time. Amazingly, there was a complete disaster when it came to baggage claim. I would estimate I waited about 30 minutes for bags to start coming off the carousel. Alaska has a 20 minute bag guarantee, and I have found that it is almost fulfilled. If bags don’t start on the carousel within 20 minutes of arrival at the gate, a voucher for $25 off the next flight or 2,500 miles can be obtained. Because I was completely worn out, I didn’t bother to stop at baggage service to redeem, although I saw many who were doing so.

After going over to the hotel shuttle area at SEA TAC, I just happened to immediately see my hotel shuttle coming through. After flagging him down, we took the short drive to the hotel.

AKDan

Hilton Seattle Airport Hotel & Conference Center

I am fairly loyal to Marriott, however there are a few things that will make me change my mind. First, the prices for this evening at the Seattle Airport Marriott were a bit high. I like the hotel, but about a year ago they began the nonsense of charging $4 for a shuttle ride from the airport. I don’t care if I miss out on the points – I just couldn’t bring myself to pay more for the room and an additional fee for a shuttle ride.

I haven’t stayed at the Hilton in Seattle since about 2004, and I don’t have much to report and no pictures of the property. Using the app I checked in and used the digital key, a feature that might make me switch to Hilton. Don’t ask me why, but generally hotel check-in processes just annoy me in general. I skipped the other folks in line at the desk and went directly to my room on the fourth floor. The room was of nice size and featured a good sized desk, a fair amount of outlets, a refrigerator, and coffee maker. I hung up my clothes for the next day and promptly went to sleep.

The next day I got up and headed on to the shuttle, which was just a few minutes late from it’s scheduled departure. After a quick ride to the airport, it was on to check-in.

AKDan

Delta Flight DL199 SEA-ICN

I stopped by the kiosk to print boarding passes and proceeded to Delta One check-in. With only a few people in line ahead of me, I was at an agent in just a moment. After dropping bags and receiving lounge directions, I headed straight through Pre Check. I have noticed that for some reason a lot of the people that have Pre Check have no earthly idea what to do/not to do, but the line at SEA went very quickly and I was through in less than five minutes with no issues. It seems in my home airport of Anchorage, I get a lot of people ahead of me that are fairly confused.

I was departing from the A gates, and the agent pointed out that the lounge nearest was The Club at SEA, accessible by stairs from the main level. The lounge was fairly small and in my opinion, not worth much. First, there was some sort of beeping that was happening randomly but fairly consistently, so out came the headphones. When I arrived mid-morning there was a selection of packaged snacks and drinks. As I was leaving, they had put out some soup and a few hot items, although I can not remember the details of exactly what was offered.

I left the lounge and walked around the concourse a bit before boarding my flight. Boarding was fairly orderly, and I boarded with the Delta One group/premium zone. I had seat 1D at the bulkhead. The first impression of the seat was a little clouded because of all the stuff that was at the seat. I found a pillow, bedding, amenity kit, slippers, headphones, a bottle of water, and a package of nuts at my seat. Trying to get all of that stowed so I could sit down took a few minutes.









I found the seat bottom very firm, too firm for my taste. The seat controls available include switching to the takeoff/landing position, bed mode, and adjustments for the foot rest and back. Other adjustments include the lumbar support and a massage function, which works primarily on the lower back (which I have on as I type this).

The seat featured a personal video screen, with a very comprehensive listing of movies. Even though I generally work during the flights, I managed to catch a few movies during the flight. I believe that it is the same system used on domestic flights, but I am not completely sure.

Menus were handed out and dinner orders taken. PDB service consisted of orange juice and sparkling wine. I am not a drinker so I am not sure what type of wine they were using.

Tonight’s menu:

SETTLING IN
Toasted Fregola Salad with Lemon Pepper Salmon
With spring peas, mint and pine nuts

STARTERS
Sugar Snap Pea Salad
With radishes, asparagus, marinated feta cheese and mache lettuce

Sweet Pea and Edamame Soup
With minted cashew cream

MAIN COURSE
Herb-Crusted Lamb Chops
Paired with saffron quinoa, spring vegetables and green apple gastrique

Grilled Chicken with Tomme Cheese
Served with fregola and spinach risotto, fava bean salid and basil jus

Mustard-Crusted Tuna
With coconut rice, wakame, Asian mushroom salad and pickled ginger

Five Spice Pork
With plum sauce, steamed rice and vegetables

DESSERTS

Vanilla Ice Cream Sundae
With your choice of sauces, biscoff cookie crumble and whipped cream

Lemon Tart

Selection Of Fine Cheeses
Cypress grove midnight moon, kaltbach gruyere and buttermilk blue afflinee offered with fresh fruit and fig compote










SNACKS

Skybreak Basket
A variety of sweet and savory snacks will be available for your enjoyment

ALMOST THERE
Served with seasonal fresh fruit and assorted breaks

Potato and Parmesan Frittata
With tomato hollandaise and asparagus
Black Pepper Beef
With egg noodles and vegetables

The food was very good, I ended up having the chicken as a main with the ice cream sundae dessert.

During the flight the FA’s came through with the snack basket and had snacks/drinks set up in the galley. At one point I checked the map and realized that we flew exactly over my town. My cynical thought was about how long it had taken me in planes to fly back to this exact point.



About an hour before landing they offered the breakfast meal. I had the black pepper beef, which was good but not very warm.




On arrival in Seoul I quickly got to immigration, trying to stay in front of the plane. I’m not sure I was successful in that, however it looks like a majority of the folks went to the Korean passport line. There were only three people ahead of me in my queue, and I was through immigration in about five minutes. That resulted in a 30 minute wait at baggage claim. Once I retrieved my bag I was waved through customs and was off to the hotel.

AKDan

I originally booked a hotel in Gagnam, however after additional research on that hotel found some negative reviews. This hotel had some distinct advantages including nearby subway access, as well as it being in a large shopping mall that has many stores and services.

The hotel has a ground lobby off the parking lot, with the main lobby and reception areas is on the fifth floor. After taking the elevator to the fifth floor, reception was relatively quick and I was assigned a room according to my preferences and was given information about the executive lounge.

If you are familiar with the Courtyard brand in the United States, this property is more like a full service than a Courtyard. Among the additional features is the executive lounge and this was open from 06:30 – 22:30 7 days a week, including weekends. The lounge featured breakfast, including some western selections, an Asian dish typically, and salads, cereal, yogurts and bread.

During dinner, beer and wine was available as well as several hot dishes and salad options. I don’t drink much so can’t comment on exactly what the options were. There was a dessert time, however I never was in the lounge during those hours. The lounge was open via key access throughout the day.

The room was of good size with a very nice view of the Seoul city line. One interesting aspect of the room was the bathroom is glass and has a door that does not lock, so be aware if traveling with a companion. There are shades that can be drawn over the glass walls. Also in the room was a desk, nice television, minibar, and coffee/tea service.







The staff was very attentive and truly embraced the service culture in Korea. It should be noted that there is very little Korean anywhere in the hotel – it feels very western and the staff is almost all proficient in English. There were a lot of eateries in the mall, as well as high end stores and the emart store for any essentials. To access the mall, take the hotel elevator to the fifth floor and cross the lobby to the elevators that take you to ground level.

AKDan

The next morning I took a taxi to the USO for the DMZ/JSA tour with FlyerTalker nme7. The tour went to the joint security area, the unification platform, the Dora observatory, and the third infiltration tunnel for a cost of $92. We departed Seoul at about 07:30, and arrived back to the USO office about 15:00.

The first stop was the military base Camp Bonifas, where an MP provided a briefing and then conducted the tour, stopping at several points along the way. The first stop was conference row, where we were shown inside one of the temporary buildings that serves as meeting rooms. This is where one can officially go over the border and stand in North Korean territory. Several other stops were made, unfortunately the conditions were very poor due to haze and fog so there was not a lot to see or photograph. I personally enjoyed as we were standing at one of the checkpoints listening to the MP, the music started blaring from the North. I would like to think they did that especially for us.

After being sure to stop at the gift shop, we went to Dorasan Station, where there is the ‘unification platform’ for train service between the North and the South, not currently operating. After that stop, we had a buffet style lunch at a nearby restaurant. The Dora Observatory was next, however the visibility had not improved and there was not much to see.

The final stop was the third infiltration tunnel, which was discovered among many others to allow for infiltration from the North. You can walk through the tunnel, but we were warned that it was strenuous and those with medical conditions were advised against it. I will admit, I didn’t go. I was tired from the time change and early wake up call, and I wasn’t yet acclimated to the heat. It turns out you can get a pretty good view of the tunnel from the surveillance cameras, since they have a monitor there in the lobby. We spent the time exploring the grounds, and looking in the gift shop where they have genuine DMZ rice for sale.















I didn’t feel too bad about not going in the tunnel because we ran in to a group of military folks that were on the tour, and they were coming out very winded – and these people were actually in shape. I am not, so it turned out to be a wise choice. They were based in Texas, and it took almost 20 seconds before one of them brought up gun control in the U.S and asking me about how it was in Alaska. Because I flew 6,000 miles to have a political discussion, right?

The tunnel was the last stop, and we then got to experience the long ride home in Seoul traffic. I have to admit that I was pretty beat, and a nap was in order. So a stop in the hotel to rest and then a trip to the University area of Seoul where I got my first run in with chicken and beer. Honestly, had no idea that was a thing. I didn’t last much past the first few beers because of the long day and time change, so off to sleep I went.

AKDan

So, let me admit something. I’m not a drinker. Please don’t ban me from FT, but I don’t really understand what makes a good wine or not. Champagne and sparkling wine distinctions are lost on me. I’m also old and not one to be out bar hopping or clubbing. That being said, nme7 and mikesaidyes decided to get me in the spirit of the Seoul nightlife. I will admit, it was pretty darn fun. I guess sometimes it takes being far away from home, daily grind, and responsibilities.

We started the evening at a chain restaurant with Korean BBQ and another dish, which may have been kimchee stew (don’t remember) – all of which was delicious. This was all eaten while being introduced to soju, described as drinking nail polish remover. It was, but funny enough after the first few it started to taste better. The soju continued throughout the night.

We then moved on to a food stall on the street, where there was more food, and more drink. I’m going to be pretty vague here because I was full, and drank more that night than I had the entire year! Overall, I was impressed by most of the genuine food I ate in Korea. Ignore the international chains and the terrible vendors they had at the convention hall and I became a big fan of Korean fare.



I don’t remember exactly when we called it a night – somewhere around 2am. As I started moving around I found out what a night of soju will do! I don’t really want to know what I looked like as I staggered back to my hotel room, passing through the lobby with three folks on duty at the desk. As I experienced throughout my stay, the Korean service culture was in full force with greetings and bows frequently given as I walked through the lobby. This time however, I am fairly sure that I was not walking in a straight line and have no idea what I said when trying to return the early morning greetings.

AKDan

Most of my time was spent out at the KINTEX convention center in nearby Goyang city. The convention center was an impressive place that guarantees any attendee the appropriate amount of steps for the day. Simply going between the two halls probably put a good ¾ of a mile on my feet. The center was impressive and of sufficient size to accommodate a convention with over 43,000 attendees, not to mention exhibitors, speakers, and staff.

As I mentioned before, this event was the convention for Rotary International, of which I am a proud member. If you are not familiar with Rotary, it is a service organization that is comprised of about 35,000 individual clubs around the world supporting a membership of about 1.3 million people. Those clubs belong to Rotary International and members, clubs, and districts perform service projects locally and around the world. Please don’t hesitate to send me a message if you are interested in learning more about Rotary.



During the time at the convention, I had the opportunity to interact with people of many different parts of the world. Just like the international nature of FT, a convention like this reminds me of how small the world really is. Although I know I am missing some countries, I met people from Nigeria, India, South Korea, Canada, the U.S., Philippines, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand.

Because of the heat, humidity, air quality, and general being busy at the convention, I didn’t get to see much of Seoul. Things that were on my list such as the Seoul tower and temples didn’t happen – I guess that means I have to come back! On my last night I once again met up with nme7 and got to sample a phenomenal sushi place. Don’t ask me exactly where it was or what it was called, there was no English to be found. I have never had sushi that fresh and well prepared. The meal, paired with some sake made a great conclusion to a very enjoyable trip.


The convention had about 45,000 people in attendance, so I suppose cellular on wheels is a requirement!

AKDan

I am going to admit that I suffer from lazy. In this case, it was taking a cab back out to ICN instead of the airport bus, but I had two full bags from all the stuff from the convention, and I just didn’t want to deal with navigating through people. That being said, I wish I would have taken the bus. I think I got either the worst taxi driver in all of Seoul, or a driver that was twenty minutes from the end of his shift that I made go out to Incheon. He sighed about every thirty seconds, and made excellent time. I know this because there was an alarm that kept going off that I think was the “you are speeding!” alarm – lots of numbers that went up to red, then back down to yellow until he got impatient and sped up again.

I got to the check in counter and used the Sky Priority lane. There was a couple ahead of me in it but the agent waved me around them and started with ‘I assume you are priority, right?” She was very nice but I never did figure out what the other folks were doing standing there. She thanked me for being an AS elite and pointed me on my way.

As they scanned my BP or passport (can’t remember which) at security some sort of alarm went off. The guy didn’t seem at all concerned and sent me on my way, but I am still curious as to what that was. Security was easy, laptops out but nothing else and I was through in just a few minutes.

One of my favorite scenes in the movie “Up in the Air” is when the young women is typing on the plane, very loudly. When the Clooney character asks about it, she replied that she “types with purpose.” That is exactly how I type all of the time, and my wife tends to make fun of me, especially since I apparently like to hit the enter key quite hard. I don’t do it on purpose, it’s just the way I type. I say this because the folks at exit immigration have me beat. I believe they mainly scan the passport and hit enter about ten times for each person that goes through. Very hard.

KAL lounge

I visited the KAL lounge at ICN for about an hour before the flight. The lounge was fairly spacious and very bright. There wasn’t anything particularly special about it – I camped out near the windows with an outlet and did some work on the computer. The lounge featured restrooms and shower rooms near the back of the room and various seating arrangements.

There were some options for hot and cold beverages including soft drinks, as well as alcohol. I don’t recall what the options were but I didn’t recall a huge selection. Food included some light snacks such as sandwiches and salads. Again, a small selection but it was not a mealtime, so that may change later on in the day.

The lounge reminded me a lot of the Alaska boardrooms in its offerings, but I honestly was not looking to spend a lot of time in the lounge nor partake in food or drink, so I left to walk around the terminal.

AKDan

Delta Flight DL198 ICN-SEA


At the boarding gate, staff established some lines by zone before beginning the process. Random security was at the gate that seemed a bit upset I was no longer holding my boarding pass when I went by them, but there were no issues.

At the seat was a bottle of Evian water, bedding, soft sided amenity kit, a packaged snack, and headphones. Most of that immediately went into the overhead bin and out of the way.

On the return I had Seat 8D, which I noticed seemed to be a lot more comfortable than the seat on the outbound flight. PDB was served and the purser came around taking meal orders. He was very personable, but frustrated at his caterers for not loading enough of the choices. My first two choices were not available. He offered to take my choice away from someone else, but I told him not to worry about doing that, as there were plenty of choices that were fine. The western menu for today’s flight was:

Starters

Mixed Green Salad with assorted pickled vegetables and macadamia nuts

Tomato Capers Soup topped with goat cheese

Main Course

Stewed Beef
With gnocchi gratin and buttered vegetables

Chicken Breast
With mango sauce, orzo pasta and tomato medley

Paella
Chicken, shrimp and chorizo sausage with saffron rice and vegetables

Sweet and Sour Pork
With steamed rice and mixed vegetables

Desserts

Vanilla Ice Cream Sundae
With your choice of sauces and whipped cream

Lemon Cake with Fresh Raspberries

Selection of Fine Cheeses
Red Leicester, Tillamook pepper jack and saint Andre offered with fresh fruit








I ended up with the chicken breast. I will admit that I am writing this now a few weeks later, and I don’t remember exactly how the meal was, although I seem to recall it being just average – about what you would expect an airplane chicken breast with a sauce to be.

For some reason on this flight I could not sleep, so I passed the time watching the IFE and doing a little work on this TR. The route we took on this flight seemed to be much more conducive to good coverage on the satellite internet, as it seemed to drop out much less than heading to Seoul. The only unusual event was paging for a doctor or nurse about two hours in to the flight, but whatever the situation was did not affect anything about the flight.

The disappointment in this flight came from the FA serving my aisle, as she seemed to be somewhat unhappy being there and provided a poor level of service. She disappeared after the dinner service, and finally came back ahead of the pre-landing meal with drinks. She was never rude, but I am sure many of us have experienced someone that is just doing the bare minimum in a service role. She even managed to deliver the wrong entrée on the last meal. Not a huge deal, but was obviously a downer.

On arrival in Seattle we ran into a line of at least 100 people on the way to immigration, with the conversation in line centered around how the systems at immigration were down. I don’t know how true that is, I wasn’t very worried since I had a four-hour layover. We were in line for about a minute when someone came up and called for everyone with global entry, promptly bypassing the line and getting us to the kiosks. After a few minutes I was down to claim bags, but ended up having a 45-minute wait for my bags. Once our flight was unloaded, the priority tags worked and my bags were quickly off.

I dropped off my transfer bags and cleared security after having to opt-out and dealing with the typical incompetence. Lesson learned for next time was to leave and go back in at the main terminal, since I didn’t realize that there was no pre-check line.

I spent some time in the AS board room doing some work and also grabbed a lunch at the pacific marketplace before heading to my last flight.

AKDan

ALASKA AS 115
SEA-ANC

The PDB service on Alaska consists of small bottles of water, which is ok since everyone is boarding through one door on the 737, so there is not a lot of room to maneuver. This is a frequent gripe of people on the AS board, but it’s honestly not something I care about. Our FA was very welcoming, and we took off on time, bound for Anchorage.

The flights to/from ANC don’t qualify for the small plates meal service that AS recently unveiled, and honestly I am usually not a fan of the meals on these segments. Today was the first time I had what I would describe as Beef Stroganoff, and it looked and smelled terrible. I was actually surprised that it tasted very good, but ended up being mostly noodles that I didn’t eat. It was served with a side salad. I apologize that I apparently didn’t take pictures of the meal.

I caught up with e-mail the majority of the flight, and we arrived into Anchorage a few minutes ahead of schedule. My wife was waiting and we quickly got out of the airport with a three-hour drive ahead of us to get home.




Thank you all for reading, and please feel free to ask any questions. This was a great trip and my first one outside of North America. I am already working on another trip for a service project in September – hopefully it will work out, followed by attending the Japan Do and Seoul Do in 2017.

Thank you to all who write TR’s, I enjoy reading about the service and locations around the world.

Jaimito Cartero

Nice report!

lamphs

Thanks for posting the report!

Flyingfox

Thanks for the report!

Delta's business class food looks worse than economy food 15 years ago.
Nothing looked even remotely appetising, and the trays look like something from a school dining hall!