Category: Airlines

Tamarama Beach, Sydney 0

2020 Travel Halted: COVID-19

On March 11th, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 Coronavirus as a global pandemic. This has brought global travel to a halt. The entire industry is frozen and we’ve seen flights been reduced by at least 80%. Here are some of the latest developments:   Emirates is now testing all...

Twin Otter DHC-6 400 0

Air Seychelles Economy Class: SEZ-PRI DHC-6 Twin Otter

After arriving from Johannesburg on Air Seychelles brand new A320neo, we connected to Praslin on their small twin otter plane which they use for inter-island (domestic) flights. The plane seats 19 passengers, but given such a late night flight there were only 8 passengers. We boarded the plane from the...

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Air Seychelles Economy Class: JNB-SEZ A320neo

Flying a new airline and a brand new plane to a new country to scratch off my map made this a fun flight. Air Seychelles has a limited route network, but from Johannesburg they offer a flight 5x weekly. They received their first A320neo aircraft in August 2019 so the...

Cape Town 0

South African Airlines Business Class: JNB-CPT A320

South African Airlines offers an option to bid for a Business Class upgrade on your Economy ticket. We decided to give it a try for the 4 of us on the flight from Johannesburg to Cape Town which is a ~2hr flight. The lowest bid was $55 per person so...

Airlink E190 @ HDS 0

South African Airlink Economy Class: JNB-HDS E190

Getting to Kruger National Park isn’t easy and you have to first get to JNB (Johannesburg) which took ~30 hours of flying from SFO via HKG. With limited airline options in South Africa, you are forced to go with some expensive options compared to other countries in the world. We...

Taking off from SEA 0

Asiana Airlines Business Class: SEA-ICN A350-900

I transferred 95,000 AMEX points to ANA to book my flights for my trip to Japan, I was faced with no award availability in Business Class on ANA. The transfer time of ~72 hours is always a risk with ANA redemptions using AMEX points. Luckily since ANA is part of...

United 747 0

United MileagePlus Award Charts to Disappear

United announced a few weeks ago that they will be eliminating award charts and move to a variable pricing method later this year. This is horrible news as they follow the trend set by Delta. If you have United miles and have been saving for a specific award ticket, I...

SWA Hawaii 0

Southwest begins Hawaii service March 17th. Fares start @ $49 each way

Southwest has finally put Hawaii tickets on sale. They have an opening offer as low as $49 each way from Oakland to Honolulu/Maui. https://www.southwest.com/hawaii/ Oakland to Honolulu flights start March 17, 2019 Oakland to Maui flights start April 7, 2019 San Jose to Honolulu flights start May 5, 2019 San...

Cathay Pacific 2

Booking Africa using Miles/Points

Flying to Africa from the US is a long haul so using miles/points to fly in Business or First Class makes a huge difference. There are sweet spots in various airline award charts and I was able to take advantage of 3 of them for an upcoming trip.   Alaska...