nldogbert

Great report.. love all the pictures and very well written. Can't wait for more ^

I do agree with you on the service onboard AF.. they are one of the better European airline compared to the other. They are even better than KLM. I find the AF FA's much easier to speak too and friendlier (irrelevant if you can speak French of English). I find their product intra-europe or trans-continental, much superior compared to KLM. So, i totally agree with you.

As for changing at CDG, even though much to bad remarks of so many people, I still find it ok.. though at times it does take a looonnnng walk to get from one terminal to another.. but other than that, don't have much complain though

Ohh.. i just love San Fran... it is a vecy nice city with nice people. Have been there twice and always looking forward to going back again.. love all the different food and culture you can get and see in just one small place and the beautiful parks that they have..one of my fav city in US.. I hope that I will be able to visit it again next year..

keep up the great work!

Maurits

Great report! Reminds me of my trip to SFO a couple of weeks ago.

Funniest thing though, I also took a picture of the view from Hyde Street! Even the same cars parked on the street... Check it out here:

My pic

Your pic

Keep it coming, tomashi!

Maurits

One more thing, I would certainly recommend the boat tour to Angel Island if anyone is going to San Fran... definitely worth the ~$40!

tomashi

Road-trip pictures are here.
============
From San Francisco via Sausalito to Vallejo
Wednesday, September 7, 2005
The morning was spent with breakfast, packing and some fine-tuning of our routing. We checked out at 12 noon and walked some blocks to the Alamo rental car center on OīFarrell street. The pick-up process took only some minutes and we soon pulled out of the parking lot with our Nissan Altima. Not an American car but still very nice and almost brand-new. Driving down to the Marriott to pick up Mom and all our bags was easy and effortless.

We said goodbye to downtown SF and soon were cruising on Van Ness Ave. and then Geary Blvd. before arriving at our destination: Cliff House. We parked the car directly above the ruins of the Sutro Baths and walked down to the ocean. Fascinating! We were standing at the edge of the Pacific Ocean, more than 6000 miles away from home and with just about the same distance between us and Asia. I always like these moments. Moments when you suddenly realize at the same time how small and how big the world really is. I did the same thing (just the other way round) two years ago when I visited Tokyo and saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time when the plane approached Narita. Anyway! Back to the trip-report! The weather was cold and breezy and the sky was covered in thick gray clouds all the way to the horizon.

After taking many pictures we decided to have lunch at "Louis", an old-fashioned diner near the parking-lot. And another great experience it was. Mostly locals where there (tourists tend to go to the Cliff House restaurants) and the view from the window was awesome. My New York Steak-sandwich was very tasty and while we waited for our orders to arrive we perused the historic picture-books about the area, brought to the table by a very friendly waitress.

At 2 PM we said goodbye to the friendly people at Louis, jumped in our car and after only 500 meters we arrived at another parking lot from where we could get some pretty nice views of the Golden Gate bridge. We did only spend some minutes there before continuing to the California Palace of the Legion of Honor. Again I just left the car for some pictures as we did not have the time to visit the museum. Another reason to come back to San Francisco as soon as possible! Driving along the coast and then through the Presidio was nice and there were some pretty things to see along the way. I especially liked the area around China Beach with all the big pink mansions on each side of the road. Maybe it was only the name ("China"-beach) or the lush vegetation combined with the ocean but I could not help thinking of Hong Kong and the coastal settlements of Repulse Bay and Stanley. And many of the mansions looked like those I saw on Victoria Peak back in 2004!

Some minutes later we reached the entry-gate to the Fort Point National Historic Site and parked the car. No words. Standing directly in front of the Golden Gate Bridge is breathtaking. Itīs almost like standing atop the Empire State Building or the Eiffel Tower for the first time in your life. Youīve seen it in thousands of pictures and movies and suddenly you are right there. As most tourists drive to the big lookout above Fort Point and walk over the bridge, we were almost alone for quite some time. We took the necessary pics and after some wrong turns ended up on the southeast-corner of the Presidio instead of just entering the Highway and driving across the Golden Gate. No problem at all. We just had to drive a steep street back down to The Marina district and soon found the right entrance to Hwy. 101. Driving across the bridge was magnificient and we almost missed the right exit for Sausalito. As expected the sun was shining over there, although it was not significantly warmer due to a strong cold wind.

We left the car at a gated parking lot and explored some of the cute and funny shops. When we headed up one street we found a very old Pontiac from the 1940īs and as we got closer the friendly owner arrived to give us a little tour of the car. He even opened the hood for us so I could take some pictures of the engine. He also gave us directions to the house-boats as we had no clue where to find them. Afternoon-coffee at Starbucks was next, followed by a short drive along the coast to the area of the house-boats. There were many trashy old ones and also a lot of interesting new floating homes to see. Unfortunately the eight-lane Hwy. 101 destroys the whole atmosphere and for sure also the quality of life for the people living there.

The last part of our Wednesday-routing took us via 101 to Novato where we changed to Hwy. 37 and after a wrong turn at the Vallejo Marine World exit we finally found our hotel, the Best Western Inn at Marine World, Vallejo. Our homebase for the next two nights. After unpacking some stuff we jumped in our car again to find something to eat, which was really difficult as we did not have a clue where to go as it was already completely dark. So we ended up on Hwy. 29 and had to turn around at Napa County Airport before stopping at a nearby 7 Eleven for some hotdogs! A true American moment. Eating hotdogs on the parking lot of a 7 Eleven in the middle of nowhere! Driving back to the hotel was equally challenging and after a small detour via Interstate 80 we were lucky enough to find the Best Western parking lot once again.

======
read about our experiences in the wine-country soon!

As Iīm in Germany with a friend of mine from Wednesday to Saturday it might take me some time before I post again!

And I will do some proof-reading in the meantime to eliminate some of the grammar- and spelling mistakes I made in the last few posts!

Have fun with my report!
-thomas

tomashi

I always appreciate comments! And Maurits: the thing with the picture is really amazing! really funny how people have often the same ideas at the same time.

Iīm back on Saturday to post new parts of my report. Iīll try to write the stuff in the next few days.

greetings, thomas

aw

Excellent report. I'm glad you enjoyed Y on AF. It is perhaps the finest Economy across the Atlantic nowadays. Comfort can be improved but meals are generous and of usually high standards. FA's are very professional if not overly warm at times.

I'm glad that you enjoyed SFO. IMHO this is the most beautiful city in the USA and a major gastronomic mecca. You can eat very well here regardless of your budget. If there is one city in the US you must see, this is it...well, make that SF and NY.

tomashi

Iīm back from my 4-day Germany roadtrip and finally managed to upload some new pictures and another part of the report! Sorry for all grammar- and spelling-mistakes. Had no time for proof-reading the stuff!

Here are the Pictures

Napa Valley
Thursday, September 8, 2005
After a pleasant night at the Best Western we went over to the small breakfast room to get something to eat. The coffee was awful (at least thatīs what Dad told me - I didnīt dare to try the grayish liquid) but the pastries as well as the juices were OK. And there also were some bananas and apples around. All in all not that bad for continental breakfast.

As the weather was a mix of thick clouds, sun and some breezy winds we decided to put an extra layer of clothes into the car. But just after our visit at the Napa Premium Outlet Center, our first stop along Hwy 29, the sun came out and it warmed up. We even had to activate the AC.

The Napa Premium Outlet center was recommended by a friend and really featured some interesting stores like BOSE, Calvin Klein, Leviīs, Timberland and J. Crew. I saw many things but did not buy anything as we planned to visit the center again later that day. Just after noon we pulled out of the parking lot and soon were cruising along the beautiful, tree-lined Hwy 29 on our way to St. Helena. What can I say! The scenery is very beautiful. A pool-blue sky, soft green hills covered with vines stretching to the horizon, elegant manors housing winery after winery, ...; Despite the tempting offers (tasting-rooms) on each side of the road we just went straight to St. Helena to have lunch at the world famous "Taylorīs Refresher". Unfortunately there was a small incident (and we first thought it was a major one) on the parking lot of the small roadside diner which almost ruined our appetite. Right at the entrance of the parking lot our car did hit a huge pot-hole and the sound it made was not really nice. Dad was sure that something had happened to the car and as we saw liquid dripping from the underbody at two seperate areas we decided to check it at a used-cars business just down the road. Of course it only was a lot of condensation from the AC! But you never know...

Anyway! The incident had pushed a certain amount of adrenaline into my blood, which negatively influenced the otherwise great experience of eating a "Rare Ahi-Tuna burger" at the beautiful backyard lawn of Taylorīs Refresher. Our next stop was V. Sattui Winery, located some miles back south on Hwy 29. I saw many recommendations to visit this particular winery in the "Dining" forum here on FT and therefore decided to give them a try. Despite the dozens of cars on the parking lot the place was far from being overcrowded. The picnic-lawn is very nice as is the deli and the tasting-room. I also liked the self-tour where you could walk into a cellar to see the oak-barrels. They also have a small museum there. Of course we did the free tasting as well and we simply had to buy a bottle of their "Johannisberg Riesling", a wonderful dry white wine. Iīm not a specialist in wine but while tasting you can get a pretty good idea how different grapes, appellations, barrels and aging lead to the special taste of each product.

After taking some more pictures on their grounds we left the winery and drove back on the Silverado Trail, which is a very scenic route running parallel to the Highway. After miles of beautiful landscape, we took the Yountville Cross Road back to Hwy 29 to visit "Chandon" one of the main sparkling-wine producers (they are not allowed to call it champagne of course!) in the region. As we arrived only minutes before closing-time we did no tastings there and just bought a pack of three small bottles of their signature sparkling wine composed of premium Pinot and Chardonnay grapes.

At sundown we arrived at the Napa Outlet Center to have coffee (I had a refreshing smoothie) and to do some more shopping. But soon it was clear that we needed a third visit on the next day. Main reason: I couldnīt decide which BOSE headphones I should buy. I originally planned to get the Tri-Port headphones as the Quiet Comfort 2 seemed to be too expensive, but when I tried them they were just awesome. And 299 USD is still much cheaper than the 399 EUR they charge in Austria.

A late-night visit at our local Safeway in Vallejo was the last activity of the day before heading back to the hotel. We put together a pretty decent dinner consisting of fresh bread, Sonoma Jack Cheese, a sushi-set and fresh California rosé-grapes. Of course we also had some cups (Best Western paper-cups!) of champagne. It reminds me of a Death Cab for Cutie song which goes "Drinking champagne from a paper cup, is never quite the same ...". A beautiful ending to a beautiful day!

tomashi

Pictures
=======
Sonoma and Palo Alto
Friday, September 9, 2005
It was our last night in Vallejo and we checked out before 10 AM because our schedule for the day was already very tight. The Napa Outlet was our first stop and I soon decided to buy the BOSE QC2 headphones. A good decision. By now I tried them on planes, trains and at home - they really cancel all unnecessary background sounds and the music-performance is awesome! I also bought some stuff for friends (cheap Leviīs) and soon we were on the road again. Highway 12 took us directly to Sonoma. With some luck we got a parking place near the historic Sonoma Square and after a short walk we arrived at the "Sonoma Cheese Factory", home of the famous Sonoma Jack Cheese. A funny place where you can taste dozens of varieties, buy homemade sandwiches and even eat a charcoal-grilled burger in a hut next to the main building. As it was too early for us to have lunch we skipped that part and left the building to explore the historic "western"-sights around the square. The historic Toscano hotel building (now a museum) as well as the servants-wing of General Vallejoīsīadobe-house were very interesting.

After some window-shopping we decided to continue to Kenwood for some wine-tasting. The scenery in the "Valley of the Moon" was surprisingly different to what we had seen in Napa the day before. The valley is not as wide and the hills are not as dry as the ones in Napa. Very interesting. Soon we arrived at the parking lot of Kenwood winery in Kenwood. We had a great time there and some of the wines were really outstanding, especially the red ones. I also liked their bestseller, the Sauvignon Blanc. The guys serving us were extremely friendly and we had a nice chat about Austria, Austrian wines and of course Arnold Schwarzenegger as he was born in Graz, where I currently live. After paying for our bottle of Pinot we said goodbye to our new friends and decided to have a light lunch at "Cafe Citti", a small Italian place on the other side of the highway next to the Kenwood fire station. The penne with fresh mushrooms were awesome as was the variation of three salads we also ordered. The atmosphere was great and when I recall it now, it was probably one of the most memorable moments on the whole trip.

Too soon the wine country-part of the trip came to an end. We drove back via Highway 12 and 29 to Vallejo where we stopped at Safeway to buy some water and to enjoy some afternoon-coffee and pastries at the adjoining Starbucks. Traffic around Vallejo was heavy but fortunately not on I-80 and Hwy 780. We reached the Benicia-Martinez toll-bridge (no toll southbound) in no time and enjoyed the view of the impressive Mt. Diablo on the horizon. Traffic on Hwy 680 towards San Jose was moderate, only some small jams at the Walnut Creek, Danville and San Ramon exits. After we took the 262 connector to Hwy 880 there was a strange situation and we suddenly were on an exit leading us towards an empty tech park somewhere in the Fremont area. No problem at all. Time for a short break. Soon we were back on the 880 and after some miles took the 237, direction Sunnyvale. Another connector finally put us on the northbound 101 at the Moffett Airfield. Two hours after we left the parking-lot of the Vallejo Safeway we finally took the Stanford University exit on Hwy 101 and the diagonal Embarcadero Rd. took us directly to El Camino Real and the Westin Palo Alto parking-lot.

Check-In was quick and we got a beautiful room on the ground floor with direct access to the small swimming pool. It was my first time at a Westin and I immediately liked the modern, luxurious decor and the Heavenly-bed. Of course the room also featured a big bathroom with a Heavenly shower (an interesting dual-head shower) and Heavenly bath products. Dad also appreciated the in-room coffeemaker with Starbucks coffee.

After unpacking some stuff we went for a walk to the Stanford shopping center. A difficult affair as we soon found out that Palo Alto is not a pedestrian-friendly city. The hardly illuminated bikepath along El Camino Real was the only way to get there and we were not surprised that we were the only pedestrians walking around at 9 PM. At the shopping center we were surprised that most stores were already closed but we managed to secure some cookies at Starbucks for our breakfast. Back on the bikepath we soon reached the Caltrain-station and took the underpass (quite dangerous as itīs also mainly used by bikes) to get to University Avenue. I had a restaurant-recommendation from the Dining Buzz forum so we went straight to "Zao Noodle Bar" where I enjoyed a very tasty "Bangkok"- salad with chicken satay. Completely stuffed we walked some blocks and discovered many, many other great restaurants as well as some bars and shops to visit next evening.

At midnight I fell asleep in my Heavenly-bed. Another great day.

jarino

Great report! and very nice pictures!

tomashi

new Pictures
=========
Palo Alto
Saturday, September 10, 2005
Our last full day in California. There were so many things I still wanted to do (a trip to Half Moon Bay, visiting Apple in Cupertino to see where my computer was born, Intel Museum,...) and only so little time left. I hope there is time to see all that stuff on our next visit! The main attraction in Palo Alto is obviously Stanford University so it was our first destination. Like genuine Californians we used the car for the short hop over to the shopping center. We left our Nissan there and continued as pedestrians from the shopping center, through the nice, very Arboretum-park to Palm Drive and the campus of Stanford.

The weather was beautiful and the green palm trees, the red stone of the mission-style buildings and the blue sky made for some very nice photos. The campus was pretty empty as the summer-holidays hadnīt ended yet, but we still got a pretty nice notion of how campus-life is like at Stanford. After a very long (and not inexpensive) visit to the Stanford Bookshop (I found some nice T-shirts and notebooks) we finally reached Lake Lagunita. Unfortunately the lake was completely dry. It was funny to see the non-existing lake and at the same time read the security-advisories on a board claiming that water activities are permitted at your own risk! Anyway! Still a very nice area. The long walk back to the shopping center was quite exhausting and we were lucky when the Nordstrom-store finally appeared on the horizon. The afternoon was spent with some tasty snacks at "La Baguette" (a nice french-style sandwich and pizza-shop at the shopping center) and of course shopping, shopping, shopping. All too soon it was early evening and after the usual coffee-stop at Starbucks we decided to drive back to the hotel to pack our bags.

Back at the Westin I decided to give the small heated pool a try and jumped in for some refreshing and rejuvenating minutes. Itīs amazing how the strains of the day become irrelevant after only five minutes of splashing-around in a nice swimming pool. At sundown me and Dad went for a last drive with our Nissan Altima along Palm Drive and El Camino Real. A great experience! On the way we also stopped at "Andronicoīs Market" to buy some water and cookies for our long journey back to Austria.


At about 9 PM we left the battlefield (the room during the packing-process) and walked to University Ave. to enjoy our "last supper" in California. We found a very appealing Italian restaurant called "Pasta!" and had a wonderful time there, sitting on a curbside table and enjoying our creative and tasty pasta-dishes as well as a glass of white zinfandel. While eating, I saw many passers-by with Borderīs bags, so I decided to visit the store after our dinner to buy some last stuff for me and my friends. We soon discovered it in a former theater some blocks down the road and I got some magazines as well as a Rand McNally map of California to plan future trips! Maybe I should mention that it was already past 11 PM when we visited the Borderīs Store! I love those liberal opening-hours.

=====
the last part is about our return flights from SFO via CDG to MUC and will be posted tomorrow! I hope you still enjoy my report! And Iīm sorry that it took me almost three weeks to put the thing together!

tomashi

The last set of Pictures
===========
Flying home
Sunday, September 11, 2005
We woke up early and after some final preparations and a quick check-out were on the road at around 11:15 AM. A little bit too late, as we soon found out that the traffic-situation on HWY 101 was not as relaxed as we expected it to be on a sunday morning. To make things short: We arrived at the SFO rental car center only three minutes before our scheduled return-time of 12 noon. No problem at all! Itīs all about perfect timing isnīt it?

The Airtrain ride to the terminal building was quick and after a nice chat with a friendly Korean guy (who borrowed Dadīs lighter) in front of the terminal, it was finally time for check-in (I think they started at 1 PM). The strict agent quickly tagged our bags and issued our boarding-passes but was not very happy with our carry-on luggage and with a strong french-accent claimed that they were too big. In the end she finally gave up and sent us away saying that we should repack some stuff to make them a little bit thinner. No way! They were exactly within the allowed measurements and weight-restrictions, we always flew with them and this flight would be no exception!

After lunch at "Loriīs Diner" and some shopping at the SF-MOMA store we continued to security which was a breeze. Just the usual "take your shoes and belts off" affair. No problem with the size of our carry-ons of course! Some duty-free items made it into our shopping bags and when we arrived at the designated gate we discovered that we had to use these new US VISIT machines to "check-out" from the United States. The machine looked like one of these self-check-in kiosks and was quite easy to use. The whole fingerprinting and picture-taking process took only some seconds and with the printed receipt in hand we continued downstairs to the waiting area of gate A7, where they soon started with the pre-boarding process for people travelling with small children and Skyteam Elite-members.

September 11, 2005
SFO-CDG / AF83
Sched: 16:15-11:50
Actual: 16:20-11:30
Boeing 747-400
F-GEXA
Tempo - Economy Class Seat 31G

All in all boarding was done in a very orderly manner (zones) although there are always some passengers who donīt understand the concept of queueing at all. Shortly after boarding through 1L I found out that this plane did not feature PTVīs on every seat and again was not outfitted with any appealing premium-class. Economy class seats were the modern ones though, with legrests, adjustable headrests and cupholders. The nice thing about the missing PTVīs was that legroom was better (no IFE boxes) which is generally more important for me on overnight flights than appropriate entertainment. Boarding was completed soon and the flight ended up being completely full in Y and what I could see the load in C-class was also very high.

We pushed back just five minutes after the scheduled time and after the security video was shown on the green or pink-tinted broken screens, there were only some minutes left for the FAīs to prepare the plane for take-off. We lifted off at 16:40 and flying-time was exactly nine hours and thirty minutes. The routing took us via Sausalito and Sacramento straight to Montreal, where the captain announced a beautiful view of the city-lights from the windows on the left side. Unfortunately I was already to tired to get up and make my way to a window. Otherwise it was a typical Atlantic crossing via Hudson bay, south of Greenland and Iceland before making landfall again on the western coast of Ireland.

Soon after we reached our final cruising altitude (35.000 feet If I remember correctly) service started with the delivery of amenity-packs and menu-folders. Drinks and some nuts were next. Champagne (Gauthier) was again included on the fully stocked cart so we did not hesitate to ask the friendly FA to pour us a nice full glass. He was in a very good mood and even had the time for some jokes and small-talk while serving us.

Tempo Menu:

While the food was prepared in the galleys they started the main movie on the old-fashioned screens: "Herbie - Fully loaded". I did not expect anything else but the movie was quite silly and not really entertaining or even funny. Soon my tray with beef (!) arrived, accompanied by some more water as the champagne was already enough to make me dizzy and tired. I took the beef as the chicken-fricassee with rice sounded horrible and so I could at least eat the noodles with the sauce. As expected the beef was not edible. Fortunately we were not hungry after the burger-lunch at the airport-diner. After the meal they did another drink-service and also offered coffee, tea or cognac. The daylight soon was gone and the plane was enveloped by a deep, black darkness. Meal trays were cleared, cabin-lights were dimmed and after a short stroll around the plane I returned to my seat to prepare myself for the night with the eye-mask, an inflatable neck-pillow and some anti-dryness gel for my nostrils.

The rest of the flight was spent with sleeping or what I always like to call "sitting on a seat in a strange position with my eyes closed", so I donīt know anything about drink-service during the night or such stuff. Unfortunately Iīm not equipped with very good sleeping-capabilities in any other position than a flat bed. I think within the five-hour "sleep"-period on this flight, my combined time of real sleep was around 3 hours, which is almost a new record!

Ninety minutes before our estimated arrival-time, cabin-lights were turned on again and the crew soon started to distribute the breakfast-trays as well as coffee, tea, hot chocolate and different juices. The tray included some cold cuts (cheeses, cured ham), yogurt, a small fruit-salad and the regular continental breakfast items like jam, honey, butter and croissants. Too bad that the bread was almost unedible as it was cold and too soft. Otherwise a pretty decent breakfast. Far better than what is now standard on most airlines serving the north-atlantic routes.

Final descent into a gray and foggy CDG started soon and touchdown was about 40 minutes ahead of schedule at 11:10. But as it was CDG it took us another 20 minutes to reach our parking position, somewhere in the French countryside. There was literally not a single building of the airport anywhere near our plane! But I have to admit that deplaning a Boeing 747 via steps is a nice experience, especially for an airplane-afficionado like me! A long and bumpy bus-ride later we finally arrived at the run-down arrivals-hall of terminal 2C - only some minutes before our scheduled arrival time of 11:50.

Paris CDG Airport
Transfer at CDG was again horrible but as we already knew how to get to 2D it was much easier and less stressier compared with our first time 10 days ago. Having the chance to catch some fresh, polluted air after more than twelve hours of dry airplane air was quite nice. This way the concept of leaving the transit-area to go your connecting flight was almost appealing. But donīt get me wrong! I still think that the transfer-concept at CDG is one of the strangest and most chaotic inventions in the history of European airports!

We managed to get to the crowded security-checkpoint at terminal 2D five minutes before our scheduled boarding-time and after taking some free newspapers (offered everywhere in the terminal), we arrived at our designated gate. Another bus gate, as we soon found out that the plane attached to the finger was not the one going to MUC. The flight seemed to be overbooked as some people were discussing loudly with the employees serving the counters and the whole gate-area was full of people. But as the flight ended up with almost five free seats, I think they didnīt need any volunteers at all. Boarding was quite chaotic as almost all passengers tried to get to the gate at the same time. After we hauled our bags down the stairs, we had to wait another fifteen minutes in the bus.

September 12, 2005
CDG-MUC / AF2022
Sched: 12:50-14:45
Actual: 13:15-14:55
Airbus A-320-200
F-GFKT
Tempo - Economy Class Seat 23A

The bus ride was quite short by CDG standards as the plane was parked near the terminal and we sat down on our seats five minutes ahead of the scheduled departure-time. It was soon clear that the flight would be late and after they closed the doors, the captain came over the PA to announce a 20-minute wait due to bad weather in Munich. Flying-time was announced with 1 hour and 15 minutes so we still had a good chance to arrive in MUC only some minutes behind schedule.

Push-back finally commenced at 13:15 but it took us another 25 minutes to get to our designated runway. This included an interesting tour of all CDG terminals, even the ugly, bunker-like structure which is terminal 1. I saw many interesting planes there: two AA 763īs, SQ 744, TG 744, CO 777, US A-330-300 and many others. Our take-off roll finally started at 13:40 and we soon were bouncing away through the thick, dark clouds. The remaining flight was quite smooth with only some occassional bumps. Service consisted of some pre-packaged egg-salad sandwiches (a simple ham- and cheese sandwich tastes better) and a fully stocked drink cart. Otherwise the flight was uneventful. A typical short European flight.

When we started our descent into MUC the thunderstorm was already over and some sunrays already made it through the clouds to illuminate the green Bavarian landscape. Touchdown was just five minutes behind schedule and after a very short taxi our journey came to an end at MUCīs terminal 1. We said goodbye to the friendly AF crew and our bags came out a minute later on the designated belt.

Me and Dad went over to the holiday parking-lot with the S-Bahn train, got our good old Volvo (we miss you Nissan Altima!) and picked up Mom in front of the terminal. The next three or four hours of the day were horrible as we were extremely tired and the "Autobahn" was full of detours and construction-sites. We had to stop several times to catch some fresh air and do some exercises - otherwise it wouldīve been impossible to stay awake for a longer period of time. At around 8:30 PM we finally arrived in front of our house in the west-Austrian province of Vorarlberg.

Conclusion
San Francisco is one of the nicest places Iīve visited in my life so far. The city itself is beautiful, the people are very relaxed in that typical Californian way and the surrounding Bay Area offers hundreds of other attractions - from scenic highways to top notch wineries. We decided to come back as soon as possible to explore areas such as coastal Sonoma County, the Monterey Bay, Half Moon Bay and revisit many of the places we saw this time!

Concerning the flights I can only say that I was extremely surprised by the high quality of service AF offers in Economy class. The food was good, the seats were OK, the IFE offered on the CDG-SFO flight was satisfying and the FAīs were very friendly and helpful. As some of you already pointed out, I think that AF offers the finest Economy-class product across the Atlantic nowadays! At least they do a far better job than OS, LH or LX. Transfer at Charles de Gaulle is horrible but you can get used to it. All in all I will always prefer AF (if they offer decent fares) on all future longhaul-flights!

Thank you very much for your patience!
Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any further questions about the report!

Greetings from Austria,
thomas

moondog

just in case you're curious, they let "lake lag" fill up in the spring (or at least they used to; haven't been back in several years). i learned to windsurf there, which proved to be a fine way to pass hot afternoons in may.

tomashi

thanx for that information moondog!

I just thought the lake dried up because there were no rainfalls at all for a long time!

-Tom