Since I have some trips to Europe, N. America and Asia coming up the next 6 months, the various reports on the attractive CAI prices for RTWSTAR tickets caught my attention. I was not keen on the logistics however, and postponed the decision continually. Yet last Thursday night, I thought I would try and get it done over the following weekend.

Friday morning I walked into a travel agent and found a LH fare which looked like it would suit the bill. Leaving Saturday morning at 6.45 to FRA, and connecting at 13.50 on the 2 class 330 to CAI. Return is in August, the ticket is valid for 3 months, and the return can be changed for € 120. Ticket is in H Class and costs € 360. Great ! Take out my wallet to look for the Credit Card, but only find gaping hole where the card was last night. I have enough cash to pay, and decide to resolve the CC problem later. I try to call LH in CAI to reserve my itinery, but had not accounted for the fact that Egypt closes on Fridays.

So, I drive to the airport (no LH City office in MAD), and convince the agent there to reserve a number of flights out of CAI including the Monday morning in A Class. Everything is wide open, so I get the reservations, but the agent wiseley declines my requests to calculate and confirm the fare I wanted (EGP 31170, FRTWSTR2).

It is now 1 p.m. and I can´t find the credit card. The banks close at 2 p.m in Spain, and the earliest I can get a replacement card is Monday. That won´t help me to settle a bill of EGP 31170 plus taxes with LH CAI ! So, I decide to take € 5,000 in cash, which my bank manages to find at such short notice. I rush for a long Spanish lunch, which gets me back home by 6.30, and start to organise myself. I book the Royal Garden Sheraton in Cairo on the internet for $50 per night, all incl., for Saturday and Sunday night.

Mrs Zorro usually dumps all Advertising Mail addressed to me in a special container, and at regular intervals request I sort it out , which usually means I dump it unseen in the dustbin. Today this request comes through, but she insists I open the letters in case there are some good offers. I comply under protest. When I get to some LH mail dated 2002, I become interested to see if I missed something important. The good news is they are two 50k upgrade vouchers. The bad news is they expire in June 2003.

I call the SEN hotline, and request an upgrade for the FRA-CAI to C. C is half empty so there is no problem. I try to convince them that the short nature of the flight should qualify for a continental sector (one voucher) but they insist that Cairo is in Egypt, Egypt is in Africa and Africa is a continent distinct from Europe. Well, since the vouchers expire anyway shortly, I gave up the argument.

LH 4406, 24 May, 737

In spite of another late Spanish Dinner which gets me to bed at 2 am, I haul myself out of bed at 5 am, and show up at the airport at 6 am. I get seat 5A in coach right behind the curtain, so still with the C Class configuration, and hand over my two vouchers for the FRA-CAI upgrade. The agent refuses the second one, arguing that one should be enough for such short segment. What a smart guy! Warns me though that Fankfurt could lift the second one.

I have a coffee in the Spanair lounge serving as the LH Senator residence in Madrid, and proceed to the gate. The plane is not even half full, and I get a good hour´s sleep. No idea about breakfast, but I guess it was the standard cheap LH tray masquerading as food.

Plane lands at 9am, which gives me almost 5 hours to kill in FRA. I take the train to Hauptwache, buy some books at Hugendubel, and then stroll through the Fressgass which appears to open its numerous food stalls for the Fressgass fest. I meet an old acquaintance and we share a couple of breakfast beers and Thüringer Bratwurst, followed by some Rheinwine and Leberkäse. By the time I am back at the airport, I am well fed and of a generally optimistic disposition due to the beers, that I forgot about the risk of having to provide a second voucher for the CAI upgrade. Fortunately the boarding agent must have been similarly lubricated, as he doesn´t even look at the upgrade voucher (should I have slipped in an expired voucher ? No, probably unethical !).

LH 588 FRA-CAI 24th May, 330

I am in Seat 4A, which really is the second row as the numeration starts with row 3. The seat next to me is free.

I have no extensive experience of long haul C class, but it takes me a few moments to realise that I am not in F as usual. Legroom is very generous, and I could easily imagine spending a transatlantic night flight in these seats. If it is not as good as Grand Class on OS, it must be close. It is not LH livery though, and having no recent experience with SN, SR, or SA, I decide to ask the purser. He tells me, but the breakfast beers must have oiled my harddisk too well, so I am sorry, I can´t tell you.

The menu is handed out, and it looks good. Apparently Harald Wohlfarht of Traube Tonbach in Baiersbronn has cooked it. Starter consist of asparagus shrimp salad in vinaigrette, main course is Duck Breast with something else or choice of some fish dish. I am fully sated, but make an effort in order to pay hommage to Harald Wohlfahrt. The salad is edible, but nothing to write home about. The duck that I have chosen is an insult - difficult to say whether more of an insult to Wohlfahrt or to the passengers. What are the economics of these promotions ? Does the cook get paid by LH to accept the wilful destruction of his reputation ? Does the cook pay in order to improve his business, mistakenly believing that this will drive more people to eat in their restaurants, buy their books ?

Except the seats, the only aspect that made the trip different from short haul interEuropean C Class, was the provision of German white wine. In Europe we tend to be served whatever odd lot could be acquired cheaply in New Zealand or Chile. (and the Kirsch of course, which was discontinued in European C long ago).

I was first out of the plane, and walked through a deserted airport past the SARS health Check (temperature strip on front) to the Thomas Cook desk where I bought the Visa stamps for €15, and on through immigration and customs. Lots of people in the transport business begging for my custom, and the combination of the still strong sun and the weight of the € 5,000 cash in my wallet began to cause me a headache. I believe I paid 50 EGP for an airconditioned Mercedes to the Royal Garden Sheraton, or €7. The driver could not find the hotel, gave a free tour of the more rundown parts of Cairo, and the weight of the €5,000 in my pocket increased in proportion to my headache. Both the money and I arrived intact though eventually.

Royal Gardens Sheraton

The Hotel has been described at length somewhere else in FT, and it is certainly adequate with a nice pool. It is definitely good value for $ 50. The lack of custom was astonishing though. I believe I saw no more than 5 guests during my stay there. As *Gold I was upgraded to a nice Executive Room, spacious, high ceilings, a bit tired looking though. Bathroom again was spacious but the shower had similarities with those in London in the seventies.

On Sunday I took a hotel car to drive me to the LH City Office, where I got my ticket more or less the way I wanted it. The fact that most sectors I needed don´t provide F any longer caused me to change to C instead (and save € 1.400 in the process). Service was superb, even though the routing caused the computer to refuse cooperation in the venture, and all taxes had to be calculated by hand, and the entire ticket written manually as well. I got rid of my Euros, and acquired a 21 sector hand written CRTWSTAR2 in Cairo stating Payment: Cash . Lets see what happens at security control in the US when they see that one !

Since I had the driver for another 3 hours, I toured the pyramids (impressive), and returned to the Hotel for some drinks by the pool.

I left for the airport at 12.30 where I arrived at 1.30 for the 3.15 flight. I had arranged at the city office to upgrade to F with the MM 50k voucher that had survived the risk of being collected on the outbound. No arguments at the airport about 1 or 2 vouchers either, and I proceeded to the sad waiting room claiming to be the F Lounge for LH. Security at the gate was extensive but did not appear particularly efficient. Nothing can be said about the flight, except that I slept well on the short trip of 4 hours. For some reason I ended up with two Shirts though.

We landed at B22 in Fra at 6 am. and I went straight to the C Lounge, only to find out that it only opens at 7 am. Proceed to SEN Lounge, which is already packed in spite of the downturn . 18 people in front of me for showers ! I try the other C Lounge at B44, which looks empty, but has also 18 passengers waiting for the showers. Finally my name gets called at 8.am, 2h after landing. Not impressed.

I go into town for a meeting, and return to the airport by 1 pm for the connecting flight to MAD on JK. I had not flown C on JK before, and had no expectations either way. The C seating looks flimsy and cheap, with 3 - 3 seating on the 320. The cabin is maybe 25% full, so nothing to worry about. The legroom however is surprisingly good, allowing me to cross my legs comfortably. On closer inspection I also discover that the arm rests have all been slightly moved to the center (maybe 5 cm) making it effectively 2-2 seating. Food is edible, much better than Harald Wohlfahrt´s grub on LH. Spanair cliams to be the most punctual European airline, and we arrive before schedule.