(Well maybe not 8 bottles, but 8 different brands this time...
)
So I’m back again! With some new adventures in the skies of the world...
No it’s not another 108 hours trip, but long enough that I’ve had enough glasses of wine, champagne and premium whiskies for some time to come.
Another wonderful experience! I can just consider myself luck getting the chance to try all these things.
Many parts of the trip have been covered here before (well most things have by now) but as usual I’ll give a rather extensive and thorough account of what I have experienced with plenty of photos and menu transcripts. Hopefully a good source that others can use to plan their own trips.
However there will also in fact be one very unusual part, which I can guarantee no one has covered.
Table of content
Part 1: ARN-FRA on Lufthansa in C
Part 2: Lufthansa First Class Lounge, Frankfurt A-pier
Part 3: Lufthansa First Class Terminal, Frankfurt
Part 4: First class limousine transfer in FRA and FRA-MUC on Lufthansa in M
Part 5: MUC-NRT on Lufthansa in F (part 1)
Part 6: MUC-NRT on Lufthansa in F (part 2)
Part 7: Hotel Metropolitan Marunouchi, Tokyo
Part 8: The lounge hopping that wasn’t
Part 9: Baptism of an Airbus A380 in celebration of Lufthansa 50 years in Japan
Part 10: NRT-BKK on Thai Airways in F
Part 11: Arrival in Bangkok and Thai Airways Royal First Arrivals service
Part 12: Trying out the brand new Radisson Suites Bangkok Sukhumvit
Part 13: BKK-KBV on Thai Airways in M
Part 14: Krabi and Koh Lanta
Part 15: Royal Lanta Resort & Spa
Part 16: KBV-BKK on Thai Airways in M
Part 17: Novotel Bangkok Suvarnabhumi Airport
Part 18: Thai Airways Royal First ground services and lounge in Bangkok
Part 19: BKK-NRT on Thai Airways in F (The Jet Airways Suite) Part 1
Part 20: BKK-NRT on Thai Airways in F (The Jet Airways Suite) Part 2
Part 21: Narita - Not just an airport!
Part 22: A nice start of my ANA First Class experience
Part 23: First class lounge hopping at Narita
Part 24: NRT-MUC on All Nippon Airways in F - Part 1, settling onboard
Part 25: NRT-MUC on All Nippon Airways in F - Part 2, the main meal service
Part 26: NRT-MUC on All Nippon Airways in F - Part 3, the seat, IFE and getting some rest
Part 27: NRT-MUC on All Nippon Airways in F - Part 4, last meal service and arrival in Europe
Part 28: Lounge hopping in Munich
Part 29: MUC-ARN on Lufthansa in C
And finally, the 8 brands of champagne...
Summary
Background and booking
In November 2010 I resigned from my old job, I had been offered another job (a slightly better one) in another company, in a new industry, which I had accepted.
As part of the job switch I made sure to get a few days off in the second half of January. It’s always a good thing to take some time off to recharge the batteries properly before everything starts again with new high expectations in a new work environment.
And of course this meant another opportunity for some nice travels...
I had loads of points in my SAS Eurobonus account, nearly 250,000 points. I still don’t quite know where all these points actually come from, I keep on spending them every now and then, but my account just never seems to get even close to empty. Well that’s a pleasant problem to have!
Looking at the points chart I realised I had enough points for some really nice treats and the choice eventually fell on an F-award to Asia.
A second reason for going was to visit a friend who is currently studying Thai in southern Thailand during five months.
I spent many sleepless nights looking at Star Alliance award availability through ANA using the KVS Availability Tool, which actually makes it much easier and quicker to search for available flights than doing it directly on the ANA webpage.
Eventually I had an itinerary I was happy with and which was as optimal and maximised as it could possibly get. There was only one problem, it was serious detour! A far cry from the most direct routing... And I know they are not too happy about this at SAS Eurobonus.
Anyway, I decided to give it a try, nothing to lose (and I had actually prepared a plan B just in case).
On New Year’s Eve at 4 pm I called SAS Eurobonus member service. I had not had the time to call earlier, but I realised the timing could psychologically be to my advantage.
The line was quite busy, most likely they had just a very few agents working this afternoon who had more than enough to do, fortunately gold members have priority on the line.
A really nice young woman answered. I explained my intention to book an F-award and started reading from my notes.
When we got to the first abnormality in the itinerary she actually made a comment about it and said she would check if there was availability on one of the direct flights. There wasn’t... Phew!
I explained to her how difficult it is to find availability in F and that I was happy having created an itinerary with what looked like full availability.
We got back to my original notes, and believe it or not, she booked the rest without a comment! Everything was available with just one tiny exception which I simply couldn’t care less about. Just wonderful!
After having finished the call I jumped around like crazy at home. So happy!
Obviously a nice new year’s celebration followed during the night.
So it’s time to hit the road again on another fabulous trip!
A new feature in this trip report is that you can enlarge a photo by clicking on the smaller photo in the report. The larger photo will open in a new window.
Comments and questions are welcome, as always!
And finally some of my previous trip reports:
Read all my latests trip reports here!
My craziest trip to date - An odyssey of premium travel! 108 hours, 16 airlines, C/F
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=970257]Jacob_m does 66 hours in C for a quick visit to APW (and reviews EK/FJ/KE/NZ/OZ/TK)
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=857191]Ni hao Taipei! A crazy itinerary on SK/QI/CX/CI/LH, all in business class (with pics)
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=845338]Turkish Airlines Business Class - A review of the newest *A member!
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=761237]ARN-SIN and back in three day on LH/SK/TG in C + Shangri-La Singapore + lots of pics!
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=676816]European Business class can be pretty nice!! LH/TP/LX/LO/VO/OS in C with 100+ pics!
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=626793]The trip of trips!! FRWSTAR2 around the world! 57 days, 34 flights, and a few trains…