Millionmilesgirl

haha - Fiji washed away the nail polish…. Too much time under water

Kmxu

My wife and I just returned from New Zealand; it was a long journey as far as the trip/flight time is concerned. When we landed at IAH, the trip clock struck at 24-H from the time we left a hotel in Christchurch.

I had a little bit trouble with NZ e-visa. A fat finger clicked “Australian resident” when applied a week before the trip began. ANZ lounge agent in SYD was unable to check me in. So, I reapplied in the lounge but the approval email did not come at all while in the lounge. The agent checked me in anyway. I received the e-visa approval email about two and a half days later. I did not cause any trouble while illegally stayed at NZ. 😄😄

ANZ’s system did not let me check in online or App for all three segments, including one domestic flight. The reason was the “third party” purchase. So, I had to leave my hotel very early for the return trip. The check-in cutoff is at T-90 min. It took almost five minutes to issue boarding passes. The agent did a lot of typing. On the day before the flight, I did call ANZ and talked to an online service agent. No dice! 😂😂

Finally, I earned a lot of PQP for the return part of this award travel: 2010 PQP (see a new thread; https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/united-airlines-mileageplus/2106421-pqp-pqf-posting-award-travel-ua-flights.html ).

GoSh4rks

Following up on this now that I've completed the trip: upon check-in for my return leg at BKK, TG still was seeing an unflown BKK-HKT segment from the outbound. Not sure what happened, but it took about 10 minutes and a couple calls to somewhere by the check in agent to get everything sorted out. I was getting ready to call UA...

Kmxu

Thank you for the head up!
Did you fly back from HKT or BKK? I dropped BKK-HKT. But I will still fly back from HKT. I won’t deal with TG agent at HKT because I will fly HKT-SIN on SQ.

GoSh4rks

The return leg started at BKK.

GTBuzz

Thanks for the heads up! I have a very similar itinerary coming up next month. IAH-SYD-WLG and CHC-SYD-IAH with a separately purchased WLG-ZQN in between.

Can I ask how you accessed the ANZ lounge in SYD en route to NZ? It's not clear to me whether my itinerary qualifies since the SYD-WLG leg does not have a biz class cabin.

cfischer

As a *G you get access to the NZ lounge.

Kmxu

If you are *A Gold, you can go straight to ANZ lounge after passing the I-I transit security at SYD. That is, you can skip the transit desk before the I-I transit security for printing out your SYD-WLG boarding pass at SYD unless UA checkin desk at your local airport or at IAH prints out one for you. (I checked in on UA App; I got UA’s only). If you do not have *A gold status, you cannot enter ANZ/SQ lounge inbound, but eligible for return if you are in business for SYD-IAH.
Have a good trip. We enjoyed it very much. We are still recovering from the trip/jet lag.

GTBuzz

Thanks...that's just the info I was looking for. Glad you enjoyed your trip! Since we can access ANZ lounge on return, we'll probably try one of the others en route w/ AMEX Platinum or Priority Pass since I don't have elite status.

escapefromphl

Centurion lounge was pretty small and crowded. ANZ lounge was much much nicer.

cfischer

after the expansion ???

ms_go

We just came back yesterday from our trip to Bangkok on this deal. When I booked it, I was sure something would fall apart over the next eight months - but it never did. Our itinerary was ORD-FRA (UA Polaris), FRA-CPH (LH economy), CPH-BKK (TG business), BKK-CDG (TG business), CDG-ORD (UA Polaris). The outbound connections were 1:30 and 1:20. The UA flight to Frankfurt left an hour late due to a catering problem (loaded all the food but not the plates to serve it on), but we made up time and were at the LH gate well before boarding started. The LH flight left 45 minutes late (no stated reason). That caused some worry, but with some fast walking and luck, we made it to the TG gate late in the boarding process. Plenty of time and no connection drama on the return. The renovated T1 at CDG is nice, with plenty of comfortable seating. We didn't feel compelled to go through passport control twice (and maybe security) to use the LH lounge. It was great to spend a week in Bangkok - it's been about 10 years since the last time we were there.

Kmxu

Great to hear this.
A few friends of mine and I will be there in a few weeks, i.e., early March.
Hopefully, Bangkok won't be overwhelmed by Chinese tourists yet in March.

ashley1245

I’m a newbie to business class flying so thank you in advance for your help. I am flying SNA-IAD-SYD from the 60k deal. I can use the Polaris Lounge at IAD correct?
Once I arrive at SYD, I have a separate ticket to fly SYD-ZQN economy on Qantas. What lounges, if any, can I access in SYD? I have Priority Pass, Amex Plat, and I’m United Silver and AA Plat Pro.

On the way home, it’s CHC-SYD-LAX. I take it from the above comments that the Air New Zealand lounge is the best place to spend my layover until SYD-LAX departs?

Thanks for all your help!

everywhere

Yes you can use the United Club at SNA and the Polaris lounge at IAH (you say IAD as in Dulles, but I think you mean IAH as in Houston).

As oneworld Emerald flying on QF you have access with one guest to the Qantas International First Lounge. Very pleasant, although the service is hit or miss.

Don't forget to apply for your online electronic travel authorisations for New Zealand and possibly Australia (as a local passport holder, I am unsure what it is required transiting on separate tickets). Use the government websites (.gov.au and .govt.nz suffix), be wary of extra fees from whatever pops up as the top results in a search engine.