There’s a calculation every regular
long-distance traveller ends up making at one time or the other. Say you’re
travelling intercontinentally, with six-hour legs (or more) on either side of a
two-hour (or longer) connection. Or you finished your meeting early, and rather
than risk traffic to the airport in an unfamiliar city, you decide to arrive
early, and the check-in queue is a lot shorter than you thought. Should you, or
should you not, check into a lounge?
Often, the answer is a simple one. If
you’re an elite member of a frequent flyer club, and your access is
complimentary, then you make use of lounge facility with nary a second thought.
But what if you’re not on a qualifying flight (many times, even elite members
are barred from complimentary access if their flight is not on the same day);
or your flight is not on the airline whose system you’re on? Should you pay the
fees?
Let’s look at three lounges I have had the
chance to visit in the last few months:
Emirates
Sky Lounge at Dubai International Airport
Emirates Airline makes a big deal of its
first class service, so it follows that there’s a swanky first class lounge at
Dubai International. I didn’t have the chance to visit this one, but I have had
the chance to sample the Business Class lounge – which is slightly more
plebeian, but still pretty good. It’s open to business class passengers either
departing from, or transiting through, Dubai.
Its charms are the usual ones you find in a
lounge of this kind – complimentary snacks and drinks, showers and lots of
seating.
It can get a little crowded, though, and
you need to be careful that the gate isn’t too far from you, which will
necessitate a mad dash through a crowded airport.
The major advantage you will have is that
you’ll avoid the temptation for an expensive bout of shopping, which seems to
be the standard economic activity at the airport.
Delta
Sky Lounge at Terminal 4, John F. Kennedy International Airport
Terminal 4 at JFK, which serves Delta Air
Lines and its associated partners, has been rebuilt recently, and part of its
improvements is the Delta Lounge. This is a pretty good lounge, especially as
you anticipate many hours and connections before you reach a destination such
as Nairobi. Several things recommend it.
First, because American airports are a
simulacrum of shopping malls, with sports bars, diners, fancy- and not-so-fancy
restaurants, the lounge needs to compete. So it has a decent bar (with mostly
free drinks, but also cocktails and other drinks that you can run a bar tab
on).
Secondly, it offers an excellent view of
aprons, runways and gates. There are desks (with power ports) that directly
overlook the action airside, and you can spend hours (if you’re an airplane
buff) staring at behemoths from Singapore Airlines, Virgin Atlantic and British
Airways taking off and landing, as well as private jets which use the airport.
Apart from the bar and the free snack area
(you should try the ginger biscuits), there are showers and quiet areas.
KLM
Crown Lounge at Amsterdam Schiphol
This might be one of the most useful (at
least for me it is), because every time I visit it is between two lengthy
flights, mainly in the cramped quarters of economy class. Because KLM flights
from Nairobi land at Schiphol in the morning, the shower and complimentary
breakfast are extremely useful. So is the automated kiosk where you can
re-confirm your onward connection and change seats, should you feel the need.
There are also major newspapers (sadly, the Business Daily is not one of them).
The most useful feature is a series of private rooms, where you can sleep off
the depredations of your previous flight, and look forward to the oncoming one
(just be sure to not sleep so deeply as to miss your next flight).
Word is that Kenya Airways is in the final
stages of completing their lounge at Terminal 1-A at JKIA. If it is even half
decent, it will be a world’s difference from what’s currently on offer – a
cramped, ill-thought out, claustrophobic space with inedible food and
inadequate service.
Enjoy your flight!
Also published in the Business Daily on 19 September 2014 at http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/To-lounge-or-not-to-lounge-when-you-fly/-/1248928/2457118/-/12rei3p/-/index.html
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