“You do know that Denver is not on the way to Frankfurt, right? Like, not even close.”
- My father

And so it was that after nearly two weeks of obsessively checking award space, I was finally able to get two first class seats in an F5 cabin on Lufthansa’s 744 -- the famous “seat and a bed”, at T-1 (!). It would be our first time on LH F.

Of course, sometimes you have to go through the dark to see the light, and before we could experience the upper deck, we had to take a three hour United flight in the wrong direction.

Was it worth it?

Absolutely. If you’ve got UA miles, I don’t think there’s a better aspirational use for them before the devaluation. It’s something I’d encourage everyone to try.

We’re still traveling, and I’ll be updating this as we go along.

Special thanks to SFO777, not only for emotional support via PM as I sweated out the wait with my placeholder award on UA metal, but for the stellar food tips in his Paris trip report.

United Domestic First IAD-DEN
DoubleTree Denver Airport
Lufthansa 744 First DEN-FRA
Lufthansa First Class Terminal, Frankfurt
Radisson Blu Alcron Hotel, Prague
Eating And Exploring In Prague
Radisson Blu Style Hotel, Vienna
Eating And Exploring In Vienna
Park Hyatt Paris-Vendome
Eating And Exploring In Paris - Part One
Eating And Exploring In Paris - Part Two
Eating And Exploring In Paris - Part Three
Lufthansa First Class Terminal, Frankfurt
Lufthansa 748 First FRA-IAD