Business Class Lounges
Below is the AA Admirals Club re-opening scenario. I'm just curious as to peoples thoughts if other airlines have similar re-opening plans w/r to their lounges and when people think the lounges will return to closer to what they were. One thing of particular importance for long international flights is if the lounge is open 24/7. I look forward to reading posts on the subject that contain the wealth of knowledge that can be provided by fellow Tauck travelers.
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Comments
We always use Amex Centurion lounge at Philly airport. It’s very new but gets crowded so I don’t know how that will work. The food there is by famous Jewish chef who runs the famous Award winning Zahav restaurant. We been there a few times.
cathyandsteve - My concern about hours is in the case of a long layover, whether planned or not planned. If there is no lounge available it might make a certain route unacceptable even if it is way cheaper. As an example, on our way home from the Israel and Jordan tour we flew out of Amman at 1:00 AM for a short flight to Istanbul. Our connection from Istanbul didn't leave until 9 something. So we had a 7-8 hour layover in Istanbul in the very early morning hours. If the business class lounge (which was excellent in Istanbul) had not been open, then that route wouldn't have been acceptable. We could have left Amman at 7:00 and made our connections with a normal layover. The difference in fares between leaving Amman at 1:00am and 7:00am was $700/person. We chose to save the money and spend the time in the Istanbul lounge.
So what I'm saying is a business class lounge being available 24/7 could be the flight maker/breaker allowing me to take or not take a much cheaper route. Just like total time of travel is sometimes a flight route maker/breaker so can the availability of a lounge.
Did they serve Turkey?
cathyandsteve
2:44PM
I agree....first class may very well be the advantage.
When we flew to Africa we had an 11 hour layover in London....YUCK
The Sofitel can provide a ‘day room’ for those type of London layovers ... attached to terminal five. We’ve done it. It actually made the trip much more pleasant than doing 23 hours in the air with a couple hour break. I can’t say we did much sleeping, but we had a drink, and a shower, and had a good ‘relax’ time.
It's hard to get to Zambia from the states in much less time. You've got 24-28 hours of flight time depending on where in the states. Add some layover time for two or three stops and you're hard pressed to get there in less than 30 hours (it could get close to 40 hours) that can stretch over 2+ days on the calendar. Coming home from Cape Town you might be able to do it in less depending again on where in the states.
On the return trip from our Tauck Northern India and Nepal tour we flew on ANA airlines in business class. We had an 11 hour layover at Narita Airport in Tokyo (NRT). One thing that made our layover a bit more palatable was being able to use the ANA lounge and using the robotic beer dispenser. This contraption poured the perfect glass of beer with a proper foam head. The rest of the lounge was nice as well.
JohnS - A good lounge makes a long layover much more tolerable. Imagine that same trip with your layer not having access to a lounge. You may not have survived the trip.
Smiling Sam - I agree that a good lounge makes it much more tolerable. ANA in Tokyo had one of the better lounges we have been in. We flew on ANA using United Airlines frequent flier points. Ever since then we have purchased business class even though it smarts a bit more in the wallet.
cathyandsteve - If you haven't already done so, do a forum search for Northern India and Nepal or use my blue link for the search. I have posted a few things including some pictures from our trip.
With one exception, in a dozen trips we haven't had a layover over 4 hours. I couldn't handle much over that- as some of you know I go in other direction.
The one exception was Botswana,SA, Zambia. We decided to take Delta's direct, non-stop, ATL to JNB flight. It arrived in JNB around 5 pm. Since the connections to Livingstone all leave mid-morning, we had booked a room at the InterContinental which was right outside the terminal. We had a casual dinner, a good night's sleep, and were able to sleep in a bit the next morning before we got up and walked back to the airport to check in for our flight. That turned out to be a great decision. In fact we arrived in Livingstone later that day rested and with plenty of time to check in, unpack, and do our ultra-lite flight over the Falls. (At JNB we met our really tired, bleary-eyed friends who flew via LHR. 
)
We don't have any Club memberships, but access is complimentary with Delta Business tickets with international flights. Other airlines may do the same, but Delta grants access during every same-day segment as long as there is at least one international leg. That is nice since we don't fly out of a major airport.