txflyer77

Working Remote, a month in Penang and Koh Lanta, Thailand + HK, Beijing (CX/JL/KA F)

DEN-LAX-HKG/HKG-PEN/PEN-KBV/KBV-BKK-HKG/HKG-PEK/PEK-NRT-ORD-DEN

(This one is going to be LOOOONG)


Kowloon at night

I work for a small company with a unique benefit: once a year, we can spend a month working remotely from anywhere in the world.

Deciding on the destination took a while. Obviously, good Wifi and stable electricity were a must. The company pays for part of the cost but I wanted to keep my own out-of-pocket expenses below $1500. My list included Vietnam, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong and London. I settled on Vietnam and used my US miles to book DEN-LAX-HKG/HKG-PEK/PEK-NRT-ORD-DEN on CX, KA, JL and AA in F, planning to buy tickets from HKG to Vietnam. I added in PEK for three days using the 72hr TWOV, plus a night in Tokyo on the way home.

Then I realized I'd booked myself over Tet, so I started looking elsewhere.

Eventually, I heard about a coworking space on Koh Lanta, an island in the Andaman Sea off southern Thailand. Penang isn't far and missing it during my post-graduation backpacking trip around Southeast Asia has always been a big regret, so I decided to add that in too. Penang is regarded as one of the great food cities of the world and has a fascinating history of its own. I was most certainly not disappointed, it lives up to that reputation!


Assam Laksa at Keng Kwee Street, Penang

(Well, if you like spicy it does )

One of my coworkers had been on Lanta just after the Boxing Day tsunami and said it was absolutely stunning. From what I'd read, it was developed enough to have good power and internet access without being disgusting like Phuket and Samui. Once again, this worked perfectly. Great food, quiet beaches and no one offered me a prostitute.


Bamboo Bay, Koh Lanta

I transferred some Chase points to BA and booked HKG-PEN on KA. I had some UA miles gathering dust and used those for KBV-BKK-HKG on TG and ET (KBV is Krabi). I'd just been in HK back in November but I was glad to have another six days there, I really enjoy that city.

Grand total, ten days in Penang, two weeks on Lanta. Two days in HK on the way in, four on the way home. Three days in Beijing and a night in Tokyo.

Photos were taken with either an iPhone 6 or an ancient Canon 350D with a brand-new 24mm/2.8 STM pancake lens, which turned out to be a great purchase.

• Kicking Things Off: AA DEN-LAX and the new QF F Lounge
• CX F LAX-HKG
• Hong Kong
• Penang
  • Exploring the Food Capital of Asia
  • Penang on Foot
  • Escaping Georgetown
• Koh Lanta
• Lanta Part Deux
• Krabi, the curry capital of southern Thailand
• Misadventures with TG KBV-BKK-HKG
• Hong Kong, again
• KA F HKG-PEK
• Beijing
• JL C PEK-NRT and a quiet day in Narita
• JL F NRT-ORD

Previously from txflyer77
Tokyo, Taipei and Hong Kong! (JL/CX F, BR Hello Kitty C, lots of city pix)
A conference and some hiking: to Berlin and the Alps in LH F!

gmitchs

[QUOTE
I work for a small company with a unique benefit: once a year, we can spend a month working remotely from anywhere in the world.
[/QUOTE]

What a great benefit! I get to travel to some great places for work but it would be fun to settle down somewhere nice for a month. Even better if I could bring the family along. Think I would pick some island in the Phillipines.

caverunner17

So.... are you guys hiring in Marketing / Email Marketing at all? I was born in Broomfield and want to move back to CO!

On a serious note: How did you work out the time zone differences?

Madone59

I'll see your Kum Loong, and raise you Poon Loong I Look forward to your TR^

txflyer77

I had a lot of late night/early morning Skype sessions. As a software developer I mostly work independently anyways so it worked pretty well.

roadwarrier

Subscribed! This sounds like a wonderful opportunity.

I look forward to the TR.

TOMFORD

I tried really hard to find a 福龙酒店 with a cantonese translation... but no dice. Looking forward to the TR.

txflyer77

Part 1: Kicking Things Off: AA DEN-LAX and the new QF F Lounge

This is the boring part, you probably want to skip to the end of the post unless you just love reading about airport shuttles and TSA lines

The worst part about living in Boulder is the distance to DEN. Couple that with most TPAC schedules and you're either stuck with a 6AM departure to a larger hub or an overnight connection. Last time I flew to Asia I opted for the overnight in ORD, this time I decided on the 6AM to LAX.

Bleh.

Originally I was going to take one of the shared shuttles with a lovely 3AM pick-up from my apartment. The night before I decided to spend the night out at DEN and take the bus after work. I found a cheap rate at one of the Hamptons by DEN and took it.

This didn't work out very well.

My office is near the station so after work I grabbed an early dinner on Pearl and went to grab the bus. After waiting inside for a few minutes, I walked out and saw a bus labeled "OUT OF SERVICE" at the stop for the airport bus. When the departure time rolled around, the driver appeared, shouted "airport!", slammed the door and took off.

So I had another hour to kill.

I walked to Johnny's Cigar Bar, a old-school joint one block from the bus station and sipped a whiskey while I waited.


I might have to start shelling out the eighty bucks for the cab

Once I reached DEN, I still had another hour before the Hampton shuttle finally showed up. I hate hotel shuttles. I didn't get to my room until nearly midnight, defeated the entire point of staying at DEN the night before.

I don't remember anything about the AA flight to LAX except that we landed almost 45 minutes early, but I do recall seeing this at DEN and thinking someone hadn't had their coffee:



At LAX I walked from T4 to TBIT and checked in at the CX counter. Check in was quick. The agent pointed to the security line with 100+ people on the floor above and assured me I wouldn't have to wait in that line, there would be a priority line for premium pax.

Oh boy.

I made my way to security and the line dragon refuses to let me in the priority line, she claimed it wasn't open. TSA only had one line open so I had the joy of standing in it for an hour.

Anyways, once that was done I went straight for the new QF F lounge, which serves as the F lounge for all OneWorld airlines in the new TBIT.

As someone who was born in the LA area and has been using LAX at least a few times a year for 25 years, I am absolutely stunned by how nice TBIT is post-renovation. Seriously, I assumed this would be a disaster like all other LAX projects. Other than the TSA being their usual TSA-y self, this terminal is fantastic.





That said, I have no words for the odd video display next to the QF lounge. An endless loop of people jumping in slow motion, including a man I can only describe as "shirtless Mario."

The QF lounge is fantastic. It'd only been open for a few weeks when I passed through. I was the only guest in the lounge when I arrived around 8am.







I went straight to the restaurant, a full service sit-down affair with an extensive menu.



I started with a black coffee and a cup of grapefruit juice.



After that, a bowl of yogurt and fruit.



Followed by two poached eggs with spinach, grilled mushrooms and tomatoes.



The lounge uses high-quality crystal glassware:



Without doubt, this is one of the best lounges in the US.

When boarding approached, I headed down to the gate for my CX flight. We were delayed so I wound up standing there for a bit before boarding the flight to HKG.



(Apparently the TBIT renovation didn't include cleaning the windows)

Up next: CX F LAX-HKG, in which I forget to take photos of the menus so I have no clue what I ate

stevie

Looking forward to this....

grandgourmand

Looking forward to this one.

Just a question, I noticed on your upcoming segments, there doesn't appear to be a section for how you get to Penang.

i'm planning a trip to Maldives, transiting through SIN. I'm wondering if I can squeeze a couple day side trip to Penang. I imagine it's easier from SIN than HKG, but just would like your thoughts on whether or not it's worth it for only 2 days (that's all I can afford given time commitment to other stuff on this trip). Thanks!

txflyer77

I flew KA HKG-PEN using BA Avios transferred from Chase. Pleasant enough.

If you had two full days (three nights), I think you could get a lot out of Penang. OTOH, if you really only had a day and a half, or two half days, I would just stay in SIN.

grandgourmand

Thanks!

txflyer77

No problem. Penang, or at least Georgetown, is a city that takes a bit of getting used to IMO. I was glad to have a full ten days there, though after seven I just had to get out of Georgetown so I moved to one of the beach areas. I can only breath in so much motorbike exhaust. Make no mistake, it's a loud, hot, dirty city but at the same time, the food and history are unbelievable. Seven days gave me plenty of time to sample all sorts of street food and local specialities.

If you have only a short time, you could go on one of the food tours. That's what I did. You'll get to sample most of Penang's famous dishes in one evening.

txflyer77

Part 2: CX F LAX-HKG

Using AA/US miles for Asia travel out of DEN has some serious drawbacks. Chief of which is that the only connection point that really makes sense is LAX. Unfortunately, DEN-LAX is all regional, so not only do you have to put up with a CRJ, you land at the Eagle terminal, take the bus to T4 and then have to walk to TBIT. At least when I was a UA flyer I could use SFO.

About ten minutes prior to boarding I made my way to the gate, the very last gate in the pier. Boarding started about 15 minutes late so I just stood at the gate waiting.

The seat map had shown 4/6 seats taken but once I board I realized there were only three people in the cabin. I had the “A” aisle to myself.



An FA brought over a glass of Krug and the amuse bouche—the same one I’d had ex-HKG three months ago. This one was much tastier though. Rather than the anonymous gelatinous mass under the salmon last time, this was a tasty bell pepper cream sauce that went will with the smoked salmon.





Our scheduled departure time came and went. The captain eventually came on and informed us that an indicator was intermittently showing an alarm in a cargo compartment but none of the other alarms in that compartment agreed, so he and an engineer were going to go down into the hold for a manual inspection.

Meanwhile, the FA’s brought around another glass of champagne and some warmed cashews.





The pilot and some ground staff were talking near the 1L door just in front of me and I just can’t help eavesdropping in those situations. The engineers were insisting the problem was just a faulty alarm but the captain, an American, refused to accept that alone and insisted on a visual inspection, even though it meant re-opening the door. He looked pretty young, I would’ve expected CX captains to be older. Good for him for standing his ground though.



He took an engineer with him into the hold and eventually agreed that the alarm was the problem, nothing else, so we took off about an hour late.

We had a very bumpy climb out of LAX over the Pacific and turned north, flying up the California coast before turning west towards Asia just north of San Francisco. Shortly after reaching 10k ft. the purser distributed menus. Unfortunately I forgot to photograph them.



On my last CX flight I chose the western option with the steak. It was okay. Today I went with the Chinese main but the western soup and salad—I just can’t refuse anything pumpkin based! The soup was a delicious pumpkin cream soup and the salad was a Caesar with duck prosciutto. The meal of course began with caviar and a bread basket. That was followed by the soup and then the salad.



We began with caviar of course.




Welcome note from the purser.




Pumpkin soup


Caesar salad with duck prosciutto

The Chinese main today was braised pork ribs with jasmine rice and a side of chili sauce. These were fantastic. The chili sauce could’ve been a bit spicier but other than that I was very pleased. One of the best meals I’ve ever had in the air. Lots of flavor, the sauce wasn’t too heavy and the pork was so tender it just fell apart.




Beautiful greens


Braised pork ribs


Delicious chili sauce

With the main I had a glass of the Hahn Winery Meritage, which I didn’t finish. I mostly stuck to the Krug.

I skipped the cheese plate today and went straight for dessert with a cup of decaf coffee. Today was a pistachio-strawberry crumble with vanilla ice cream. CX managed to put two of my favorite flavors—pumpkin and pistachio—into the same meal, so I was very pleased with today’s menu!


Pistachio-strawberry crumble with vanilla ice cream


Coffee


Pralines

The dessert was fantastic and was quickly followed by another cup of decaf and a small plate of pralines. After that I changed into the pajamas and got to work on this trip report.

The FA made up 2A as my bed and I slept for a few hours. I only got about four hours the night before and slept soundly for a few more after the meal.

When I woke up I ordered the burger. Better than expected.



(A 24mm lens is really the wrong focal length for this...)

Followed by a fruit plate:



I read and watched a movie but for the life of me can't remember which one.

Shortly before landing I had the Chinese pre-arrival meal. Steamed fish with greens. I didn't write it down and as I said, I forgot to photograph the menu. If anyone has the menu from CX 885 for January, I'd appreciate it.



IIRC it was tasty, and I normally avoid fish in flight.

Despite the delay, another solid CX flight. Good food, my champagne was always topped up and a comfortable bed.

I took the Airport Express to Kowloon and grabbed a taxi to the Intercontinental. Good to be back in Hong Kong.

maortega15

Hey, nice report man.

Happen to catch the name of the CX captain? Just to let you know, he could've been Canadian. We have alot of Canadian CX crew that are based in LAX/SFO.