The new lounge at HAM - AWFUL!!!
 

I am sitting in the new lounge at Hamburg - which must have been opened some time in the last four months as it wasn't here when I last travelled from here in August.

I must say that sitting here is proving to be the worst lounge experience I've had in a long time.

The furniture is nice enough. The seats are comfortable enough. But boy is this place noisy!

It's not enclosed - and it's right above the security checkpoint. So each time someone sets off the metal detector it's "bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep". Also, there is a loudspeaker right above us, and it's turned right up, and it's been a constant stream of announcements ever since I got here.

The old lounges were what lounges should be - nice quiet places to relax and/or work. This new lounge is just... awful.

Have they moved both lounges the Senator and the other one?

Don't know what the situation is with the Senator Lounge (as I'm with Skyteam not Star*)... the lounge I am in is called "Airport Lounge" which is a replacement for a previous lounge also called Airport Lounge and for the lounge at C11.

Ah - just remembered I picked up an airport guide on the way up the stairs. Have just checked and it looks like there is still a separate Senator Lounge.

Unless I am mistaken, it is also used by BA. At least it was before this change.

Aviatrix is not talking about the LH lounges.

Yep, it is also used by BA and it is a Priority Pass contract lounge. If I am not totally wrong it is (a replacement of?) this lounge.

That's one of the two. There were two lounges that were available to Skyteam Elites, the other one was the Hamburg Lounge at gate C11 (the usual departure gate for KLM flights - so very convenient for this KLM regular!)

There are some improvements - the new lounge has showers, and one no longer has to walk down the corridor to use the washroom - but the noise is pretty unbearable. Will have to remember to bring my Ipod next time to drown it out...

PS - and yes, "replacement of" is correct

I remember using the lounge pictured above when flying BA HAM-LHR a few years ago. Further back (maybe in the latter 1990s) I used to have a Diners Club card and remember using a very small Diners Club lounge - the seating area was very limited, although it did have windows looking out over the central check-in desk area.

I remember using the landside Diners Club lounge in 1999/2000 (when was travelling between STN and HAM on a long-disappeared airline called Buzz), but I think it disappeared quite a while ago - I've noticed the Diners Club logo on the door of the Airport Lounge.

Go about 50 metres further, and you are at the LH lounges. One center check-in desk; SEN/*G to the right (overlooking the gates and runways) and FT to the left (overlooking the roadways and buildings).

I think this information may be out of date. HAM has been completely remodelled over the last few weeks - the official opening of the new facilities was less than a month ago, on 4 December. There is now a new central area known as the Airport Plaza, situated between T1 and T2. The old non-LH lounges have been closed and have been replaced by a single lounge which takes up the entire top floor of the Airport Plaza (two floors up from the ground floor). The Senator Lounge is in T2, according to the current edition of the airport guide.

Then I stand corrected. I've not been to HAM since Oct, and while I have walked past the old lounge, I only have visited the LH lounge. I assumed that is the one metioned.

I see on the HVV website that the S1 extension is finally open - when did it open? (no more 110 bus to Ohlsdorf)!!

Early December - I believe it had been open less than a week when I arrived on the 14th.