gleff

Prologue: September 4, 2004

My girlfriend and I both have birthdays at the beginning of September, but we couldn’t leave town over the long Labor Day weekend so we decided to celebrate together with dinner at Citronelle (Michel Richard’s restaurant at the Latham Hotel in Georgetown) and spend the night at the St. Regis downtown.

I decided that would be the night I would ask her to marry me.

But that’s more the story of us, and this is the story of our trip.

So let me focus on the St. Regis: The building itself is tired, the hallways muggy (though the a/c worked well in the room). We were given a large suite and welcome amenity of chocolate covered strawberries (or maybe it was chocolates and strawberries, this was several months ago after all).

We ordered a quick room service burger to share (only one, didn’t want to spoil appetite for Citronelle), it was truly an outstanding burger and delivered in 17 minutes. At Citronelle my Duck a l’orange was excellent, but the highlight of dinner was dessert, ‘Breakfast at Citronelle’ which was a sampling of several desserts all made to look like breakfast foods.

At the hotel, turndown service included slippers and shoe-shine is complimentary if you leave your shoes outside by midnight they’re returned before 6am.

Service at the hotel met my expectations. In the morning I called downstairs to find out when the Starbucks across the street opened. They didn’t know, but sent someone across to find out and returned the call in 2-3 minutes. Water pressure in the shower was outstanding, by the way.

We picked up our dog from daycare and went home to call family. (Fortunately she had said yes.) When the future mrs gleff was on the phone, I got to work planning the honeymoon.

We quickly settled on Memorial Weekend for the wedding because everyone would be traveling and the 3 day weekend would be helpful.

And we knew we wanted to go to French Polynesia for our honeymoon. I convinced her (didn’t take much convincing actually) that we should also go to Australia, because the award ticket wouldn’t cost any extra points. As I explained to my then-fiance, “we can pop over to Australia since we’ll already be in the neighborhood.”

I used the QF website to search for award availability quickly, I noted which flights and dates had 2 premium seats open between SYD/MEL/BNE/AKL-LAX.

I then used smile67’s availability tool to check Air Tahiti Nui’s A class on a whole set of dates.
* found 2 first class seats on most flights, amazing for a cabin of 6
* found 4 Z (award business) seats on most flights, don’t know if there were more than 4 as TN displays a maximum of 4 seats in any bucket

Not sure whether the addition of NW as a redemption partner creates pressure on TN award inventory, or whether the coming addition of DL will add even more pressure, but TN’s award availability is amazing.

With just a bit of playing around, we had sketched out a trip: Friday 5/27 fly to Seattle, get married in the morning on 5/29, leave for Tahiti of 5/30. Our travel onward from Tahiti was constrained by TN offering PPT-AKL only 3 days a week (they start PPT-SYD service in July, no help to us), and of course by finding first class seats back from Australia.

I originally booked PPT-AKL-SYD on 6/7 (arriving 6/8) and a return SYD-LAX on 6/13. Later in the day the AAgent called back to let me know she had made a mistake – she had booked me on QF11, which is entirely blacked out from AA award redemption. A bit of playing around and I settled for MEL-LAX two days later.

One more snag: MEL-LAX departed at 10:30am, the SYD-MEL flight I wanted was about 2 minutes short of a legal connection and all they could offer me was a 6am departure from SYD. Not something I wanted to do before a 13 hour tranpac! So I asked about flying down the night before. No dice. That would constitute a stopover, and I was already using my only stopover (Tahiti). So I booked an AA award as an open jaw, and would just buy SYD-MEL one-ways at about US$69 apiece albeit in coach.

What I wound up with:
290,000 AA miles: 2 F awards, LAX-PPT/PPT-AKL-SYD/MEL-LAX (AKL-SYD is J)
176,000 SPG points: 5th night free award at Bora Bora Nui Resort & Spa
60,000 Priority Club Points: 2 nights at the Intercontinental Tahiti
24,000 Priority Club Points: 1 night at the Intercontinental Sydney (20% off award sale)
7,000 SPG points: 1 night at the Sheraton Tahiti
37,600 SPG points: 13 cash & points award nights for family at W & Sheraton Seattle
10,000 SPG points: 1 night at the Westin Sydney
7,000 SPG points: 1 night at the Westin Melbourne
14,000 SPG points: 2 nights at the Westin Seattle (1 for us, one for mrs gleff’s parents, bringing us back our dog at the end of the trip)
45,000 Marriott points: 1 night at the Ritz-Carlton Marina del Rey

All points aren’t created equal, and it isn’t really fair to just tally them, but I spent a total of 670,600 points on the trip.

My family has a place outside of Sydney and most of our time in Australia would be there, just a couple of hotel nights were all that would be needed.

And I still had to pay for DCA-SEA/SEA-LAX/LAX-SEA/SEA-DCA and PPT-BOB. We used mrs gleff’s AS MVP Gold status and purchased Q fares for the domestic flights, allowing us to upgrade at booking… reducing the sting of the higher fare with BofA companion certificates which handily book the companion in whatever fare class the paid ticket is booked in.

PPT-BOB was a bit trickier. I wasn’t using a travel agent for any part of the trip, but it looked like I might have to for this segment. You can book intra-French Polynesia flights once you get there, and it’s even cheaper to do so. But I was paranoid and wanted my tickets in advance.

Among the major online booking sites, only Travelocity seems to display and price Air Tahiti (VT – the local carrier – as opposed to TN, Air Tahiti Nui, the international carrier). I even discovered TN’s ex-PPT pricing glitch but didn’t immediately recognize its full potential. Alas, Travelocity kept spitting up when I tried to ticket PPT-BOB, so I made my first purchase from BoardingArea.com which worked out perfectly by the way. They didn’t even charge a shipping fee to overnight my paper tickets, and were in email contact with me over when the tickets would arrive, etc. Kudos to Randy’s staff.


Friday, May 27

9:15 am Depart Washington-Reagan National (DCA)
Alaska Airlines Flight 1
First Class Seats 2A, 2C

Caught a cab to the airport at 7:20am, at DCA before 7:30. We were bringing our 3 year old Yorkshire Terrier with us to Seattle, leaving him in daycare over the weekend, and mrs gleff’s parents were taking him home while we went on our honeymoon. We paid the $75 pet-in-cabin fee. This was the first time in many many trips with our dog that we were ever asked for his health certificate.

The security line was 40 minutes long, not surprising for Friday morning of a long holiday weekend but still wholly unnecessary. Security checked our tickets and receipt for pet-in-cabin fee, something I’m pretty sure the TSA isn’t charged with, but I’m still glad to have done everything by the book on this trip. I find that if you check in online or even at a kiosk at a busier station than DCA, AS won’t collect the fee.

There wasn’t any time to stop by United’s Red Carpet Club because of the long security wait. Turned out though that we were boarding a bit late. Tons of folks charged the gate agent when he called for F and elites. Full flight with lots of missed upgrades. We get down the jetway but no one is allowed to board. Turns out that an improperly credentialed Gate Gourmet staffer was on the plane and we had to wait 20 minutes for the police. Flight departs 30 minutes late.

AS F really isn’t F at all, even by today’s diminished domestic standards. “Breakfast” is a blueberry muffin, fruit, and choice of omellette or keish. Looks on the tray like what used to be mid-con breakfast in coach. I watched National Treasure on the Dig-E-Player – a bit absurd but better than expected. Why does AS pick up Dig-E-Players so early, 45-60 minutes before landing?

We landed a bit late, had a long wait for baggage (surprise), and headed off to our hotel. We couldn’t take either of the first two cabs because of small trunks and their large spare tires. Shocked me, actually, that these cabs couldn’t fit four pieces of luggage and they’re on airport runs. We don’t usually pack so much, but are going to be away for 3 weeks and in 3 distinct climates.

W Seattle

I arrived at the W just ahead of mrs. gleff’s parents and checked in. Rooms weren’t ready at 1pm, which was alright as it gave me a chance to head over to the Sheraton where several family members were going to be staying.

Starwood has a quirk that allows only 3 award rooms at a hotel per member. But you can transfer points to other members at the same home address. So mrs. gleff and I can each reserve 3 rooms, or 6 per hotel. And Starwood has 3 hotels roughly within walking distance in Seattle (the W and Sheraton are 4 or 5 blocks away, the Westin a bit farther), allowing for a maximum of 18 award rooms.

All of my out of town family were on cash & points awards, and both the Sheraton and W were participating this quarter, so I was using 2800 points and they were paying $45 per night at the Sheraton and I was using 4000 points and they were paying $60 per night at the W. I checked into the rooms of those that would be arriving that night, including mrs. gleff’s brother and grandparents and my brother and grandparents.

I wasn’t staying at the Sheraton so wasn’t technically entitled to any elite benefits there, and would only have been entitled to benefits on a single room in any case (though mrs. gleff is an Ameniti $10 trial SPG Gold…) but I managed to talk the desk into club rooms with nice views, including several of their best views of the water (which one doesn’t usually think of the Sheraton as having) for everyone. And I also talked them into 4pm checkout on all of the eventual 6 rooms there as well. I’ve never understood people complaining about not getting hotel upgrades. Sure there are problem properties, and properties that are genuinely full, and problem or unhappy checkin staff, both those aside it’s how you ask; your rapport at checkin.

Back to the W Seattle, I really do love this hotel and always have. Note that I didn’t have a suite. There was a large conference booked over several days staying at the hotel, and they’d wrapped up a bunch of the small number of suites that the hotel had. Plus Snoop Dogg was staying there and his concert was actually paying for a suite. So I was in a Kool Korner room.

View from our room
Hallway off the room (actually, there’s a long hallway, turn left, and this is the hallway into the rm)
Bedroom
Bathroom view one, two, and three

I did notice a few areas where form overtakes function. I didn’t have enough drawers in the room for both mrs gleff and myself. 1/3 of the chest is taken up by the safe and it’s only about half the size of the usual hotel chest.

That night we had dinner with mrs. gleff’s parents, my grandparents, and my brother at the hotel’s restaurant, Earth & Ocean. It’s much improved over two years ago. The chef is very creative with presentation and they offer very high quality meat and fish. Mrs. gleff had very large sweetbreads with no sinew whatsoever. Despite the food, it’s not a great restaurant, at least it wasn’t on this occasion. Service lacked. Several times they dropped silverware by the table. I cringed when someone in the party asked for a Miller Lite and the waiter said “I don’t think so. But I’ll check.” with a roll of the eyes He never returned to the subject (such as to followup and apologize for not having the first choice, and perhaps offer a suggested alternative).

One wrinkle that came up on Saturday was that I realized I was going to have a problem taking pictures on the trip. The plan was to use a digital camera but not bring a computer to transfer photos to. I was just going to transfer pictures from the camera to my photo iPod (thank you, Gratis Networks). I didn’t have a camera connector, but I picked one up at an Apple store on Saturday. Got back to the room and – whoops – I didn’t bring the camera’s USB cable. It was sitting in the box at home. I went to a camera store down the street from the W but no luck. They sent me to a second store, nothing. They called two other stores and determined that there was no usb cable for sale for this camera in all of Seattle. I managed to talk the salesman into opening a new box and selling me the cable out of it. Actually I was just charged for joining their ‘camera club’ which was less money than a USB cable would have cost, I assume he just returned the open box to the manufacturer.

I was already feeling some difficulty getting away from my computer. Saturday morning I read about federal government (DOJ, Homeland Security – a moniker which still creeps me out) opposition to cell phones in flight due to terrorism risk, because terrorists might use phones to coordinate an attack. I wanted to blog about it. Don’t phones already exist on planes (airfones)? Will terrorists decline to use their phones because it’s against the rules? If that were true wouldn’t they worry about terrorism in the first place, since that’s against the rules too? Without a computer, I couldn’t vent in my usual fashion. Then again, this was probably a good sign that I needed a vacation – including from the news.

From there it became mostly wedding activities, such as Saturday night dinner and Sunday morning photos, so I’ll skip most of that and save the stories for family, rather than forcing them on readers here.

The W was the perfect place for us to get married though, and some of the things we did a bit differently worked quite nicely. Our officiants were a husband and wife couple. We had a harpist rather than a pianist. Flowers and candles and tables and comfortable couches were done in harmony with the W overall. And everyone had their own individual wedding cake, although they were all displayed with an ice sculpture of a large wedding cake. Very much to our taste and personalities.

One of the reasons I love Seattle is that Starbucks is open when I want coffee at 6am, as I did on the morning of the wedding. Actually, this Sunday morning I think the Starbucks across from the W may have been open at 5 or 5:30.

Ordered room service breakfast around 6:30, it arrived in 14 minutes. I had an excellent avocado, bacon, and cheese omellette. Truly delicious. The food at the W, from the restaurant to room service to banquet, is good across the board.


Sunday, May 29

4:50 pm Depart Seattle (SEA)
Alaska Airlines Flight 576
First Class Seats 2A, 2C

After our ceremony and brunch we quickly changed and headed off for the airport around 2:30pm. We were at the airport at 2:50pm for our 4:50pm flight and found a more or less deserted airport. There was no elite security line today, but then there was really no security line whatsoever anyway. We went to the Boardroom, got some drinks and snacks, and settled in and relaxed after a long weekend.

Boarded the flight at 4:20pm after picking up a comb, which I’d stupidly left in the bathroom at the hotel. ‘Dinner’ choice was a mozzarella chicken sandwich or a salad with chicken. Mrs gleff and I both saw the chicken on the sandwich and thought it was a big piece of mozzarella. Wrong, but still tasty.

Two hours and two minutes flying time to LAX. There was one empty seat in F, our upgrades would have cleared on this flight at 72 hours without paying a Q fare but possibly only this flight – the F bucket on our 3 other AS flights had shown F3, F2, and F0 even weeks before flight so I’m glad we confirmed the upgrades at booking, plus not having to sweat it out on this trip is nice in and of itself.

Ritz-Carlton Marina del Rey

It took 40 minutes to get our bags after the AS flight, but it felt like more. I know that AS baggage problems are really centered around SEA, but it has me worried about my luggage generally and I was nervous that the bags wouldn’t make it to LA the day before leaving the country. They all finally arrived, though, and we headed off to the Ritz-Carlton.

Since we were heading out to PPT the next day, I wanted to stay relatively close to LAX rather than heading out to Laguna Niguel or some such. But I didn’t want to spend my wedding not at an LAX airport hotel. I thought about Beverly Hills (e.g. the Pen, Hotel Bel Air), and auh2o has often suggested the Beach House) but finally settled on the Marina del Rey Ritz, about 10 minutes from LAX.

I vacillated for a long time on the rate to book. I could have booked the FHR rate at about $275 with an upgraded room (really a regular room, but with a Marina view, only 275 sq ft) which came with late checkout and meals. That was probably the best deal, but my conceit about using points for pretty much everything on this trip got the better of me. I had booked an award with Marriott points, probably not the very best use of 45,000 points but I felt the need to do it anyway. I was booked into the lowest category of room. At work we do a reasonable amount of business with Ritz-Carlton properties, and that gave me a bit of juice to work with. A simple prompt a few days in advance about the volume of business and I checked in to find I had been assigned a suite on the 9th floor with a Marina view. Late checkout wasn’t a problem, either.

The bellman brought up our bags, brought us ice, and may generally have been the friendliest and most enthusiastic hotel employee I’ve ever come across. He pointed out their complimentary shoeshine service which required only leaving shoes outside the door (a nice feature, very common, but I really like it).

In the room we found the bed turned down with slippers, chocolates, and water bottles on each nightstand. There was a real marble bathroom and a nice bed. Bathroom had some of the most extensive amenities I’d seen, products by Bvlgari plus toothbrush, nail file, etc etc etc.

Room
Bed
Bath and Bath 2
Balcony View

TripAdvisor reviews of this property are frequently negative, suggesting that it’s well-worn and uncomfortable, but that couldn’t have been farther from my experience perhaps because I was in a suite.

The balcony extended only about 3 feet, conducive to walking outside briefly but not to spending any time out there. We placed a couple of our leftover wedding cakes out there for the night as a substitute for refrigeration and ate them in the morning with room service coffee.

We walked around the Marina mid-morning and had a nice but pricey lunch at the hotel’s restaurant, Jer-Ne. The duck and cheese eggrolls were outstanding.

To be continued...