Virtually all airport personal and about 10% of all travelers are wearing some sort of mask in misguided attempts to keep from contracting the Corona Virus. While the mostly flimsy surgical masks will do little for them, I am not complaining as it might help me from getting it… though with the shear amount of time we are spending in…
Luckily we have access to the one good lounge at the airport for our layover. Nice company chairs and plenty of food, though we are both stuffed. Also a nice coffee/expresso machine that we’re taking advantage of. The dinner on the flight was a slight cut above normal airline food, but not outstanding. Decent Wi-Fi in the lounge, enabling this…
Seven hours later we arrive in Addis Ababa. The Airbus 350-900 was very nice although a slight step down from United Polaris Business Class. Service was excellent as were the seats. Probably due to exhaustion, I actually slept for a good solid 4 hours, waking up to the arrival announcements and offers of some wake up Ethiopian coffee. Debarking was…
Boarded our Airbus 350-900 after a marathon 11-hour layover in Frankfurt. It’s a 7-hour flight to Ethiopia where we have our last 4-hour layover followed by a short 2-hour flight into Arusha, Tanzania. We again have “pod” seats so I intend to pop a couple of Advil and try to get some zzzz on this long red eye…if not that…
Finally made it back into the secure area in Frankfurt Flughaffen. Bit of a hassle getting through the scans because not only do you have to take all your electronics out of your bags, you have to take little pieces of paper out of pockets and you have to layout everything in bins in a perfectly flat manner else REJECTED…
And yes, it is every bit as good as you might imagine. Definitely lives up to the Duetsche “liquid bread” title. I do miss German beer…need to hit Oktoberfest sometime!
Still have another day of travel ahead, including the red eye through Ethiopia and on to Tanzania. Found out that the Rex Lounge has shower facilities…wow feel tons better! After that and more coffee I feel alive again.
6am touchdown after a very pleasant flight. Can’t say that we are exactly refreshed as it is 1am DC time; but we were able to take advantage of the seat/beds to get a few hours of rest. Lisa zonked out entirely, whereas I really just dozed due to turbulence and the fact that the bed is about a foot too…
Smooth boarding… and settling in for the first leg of our journey to Frankfurt. For this leg we are in United’s Polaris Business Class seats, so I am looking forward to getting a few hours shuteye crossing the pond. It’s “flat beds” but not sure if it will pass the 6’+ test. Just informed by staff that they are out…
We always get to the airport early, so we’re hanging at the United Club till boarding time. The United Club has truly gone downhill. I asked for a beer and was told that if I wanted anything other than Budweiser it would be $5. Pretty crappy business class service. But hey Gin and Tonic are free so good to go!