Overview
This trip was the continuation of my nested round trip from my previous Plus Points and Pints Trip Report. My PlusPoint Polaris upgrade for the BRU-IAD leg cleared instantly when I booked, and the IAD-BRU leg randomly cleared four months out in December.

In early February I had to figure out what to actually do for the four days I was going to be in Europe so I pulled up FotMob, a soccer schedule app, and a map. After some browsing I realized Standard Liège and Bayer Leverkusen both played the same weekend on Saturday/Sunday and Liege and Cologne are just an hour train from each other.

Soon my plan was taking shape: arrive Brussels Saturday morning, take the train to Liege, then go to Cologne the next day for the Leverkusen match on Sunday. Monday I plan to head back to Brussels and then fly home on Tuesday. As an added benefit to this plan, I managed to convince a friend who lives in Amsterdam to meet me in Liege.

Itinerary
Polaris Lounge IAD
IAD-BRU Polaris
Brussels to Liege Train
Raddison Liege City Center
DB Liege to Cologne
Urban Loft Cologne
DB Cologne to Brussles
Best Western Brussels
BRU-IAD Polaris

Polaris Lounge IADGot off work early, so decided to save money and utilize the new Silver Line extension by taking s local bus to McLean metro. Unfortunately the bus was a minute early and passed me as I was walking to the stop. Annoyed, I bit the bullet and took the $35 Lyft. Funnily enough, we passed the train I would have been on fairly quickly. FWIW Metro takes 30 min while the drive takes 20 with a near zero traffic risk. Take that public transport!

IAD was a breeze and about 15 min after my Lyft dropped me off I was in the Polaris lounge.

Started with a Stella.

Then talked Whiskey with the bartender and ended up doing a tasting with the Lagavulin 16 (my go-to at home and favorite), Toki, Talisker 16, and one more which I forgot to record the name of.

Having enjoyed my whiskey, I headed to the dining room for a meal.

The salad was a rare miss for the Polaris lounges. Severely underdressed and largely bland.

The pork dish was much better and very good.

Lastly, some sorbet that was so good I had to take two pictures of it. Definitely don’t have a future career as a food blogger.


Then a 15 minute walk to the gate, D26 (almost the furthest possible from the lounge) where boarding was a absolute cluster. Really missing my 1K preboarding now that I am just a Gold. At least there was a good view of our 777-300ER.



To be continued….