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Trip Report: Aer Lingus NEW Business Class DUB-BOS

by Harlan 3 Comments

a plane on the tarmac

Also see:

Happy to continue my Ireland series after the good news that the country is moving to legalize gay marriage. I saw the signs up everywhere when I was there to “Vote Yes” or “Vote No” and it seems that they’ve collectively decided to lead the 21st Century. Congratulations to Ireland!

If you’re interested in the new Aer Lingus business class product, you’ll want to also read my review of the BOS-DUB flight.

The key difference is that BOS-DUB is a red-eye whereas DUB-BOS is a daytime/lunch flight.

After an amazing flight over, I was excited to see how the finer points of service would differ during the day flight.

Flight details:

  • Aer Lingus Flight 137
  • May 5th, 2015
  • Depart: 11:50am
  • Arrive: 1:45pm
  • Duration: Duration: 6H, 46M
  • Aircraft: Airbus A330-200
  • Distance: 2,983 mi

First impressions

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Trip Report: Aer Lingus NEW Business Class BOS-DUB

by Harlan 10 Comments

a room with a logo on the wall

Also see: 

After staying at the Hyatt Regency in Boston, and hanging around in Bean Town for the better part of the day, we headed to the airport around 6pm for the 9pm flight. Check-in and security went quickly, and after only about 20 minutes, we were in the Aer Lingus Gold Circle Lounge in Terminal E waiting to board. After enjoying the small lounge for a short while, we boarded around 8:20pm.

First impressions

There’s something so great about experiencing a brand new product. Aer Lingus recently refreshed their business class cabins (late April, according to the booklet at the seat).

We were assigned to seats 3D and 3G, both aisle seats in the middle of the cabin. I had 3G.

First impressions were… WOW. It looks so fresh. The cabin is done up in shades of gray with splashes of emerald and lime green, which is gives it a very distinct, chic look. They made sure to put their clover branding all over everything – it was done well and added cohesion. It looked and felt very modern, and I was positively giddy to have this flight experience.

The plane was an Airbus 330-300 and right away, I started to feel a little more Irish.

It was a dark overnight flight, so forgive the graininess of some of the photos below!

The seat

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Review: Aer Lingus Gold Circle Lounge @ BOS

by Harlan 6 Comments

By the time you read this, I will be in the air on Aer Lingus headed to Dublin (assuming you read this within the next 7 hours. Hmmm… that opening line doesn’t hold up well to posterity).

I booked the coveted BOS-DUB award with 50,000 British Airways Avios for a round-trip ticket. And now, I’m in Boston at the Aer Lingue Gold Circle Lounge.

A few notes

The Boston airport is super cute. I’m sure I’ve been here before, but my travels pre-Out and Out are such a jumbled blur in my mind that I can’t remember where, when, or how. It reminds me of AUS airport somehow, although with way more international flights. I spotted Icelandair, WOW!, Swiss, Lufthansa, Virgin Atlantic, and British Airways in Terminal E. I… had no idea that there were so many routes out of here. Very cool.

The Aer Lingus lounge is super small. It’s really just one open room. They do a good job of squeezing in a lot of seating, and it doesn’t get seem like it gets too crowded. There are no bathrooms in here though, and definitely no showers. Very limited services and limited hours, too. Just 3:30pm-8:30pm. I’m thinking they’re only open for the BOS-DUB and BOS-SNN flights, then they close up shop.

The Boston airport is easily accessible to/from the city via the T Silver Line. It’s literally 20 minutes to downtown Boston. I didn’t know this before this trip. If you’re keen to take public transportation, I’d recommend looking into this option!

The lounge

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Hotel Review: Hyatt Regency Boston

by Harlan 4 Comments

Hyatt Regency Boston reviews

Since the BOS-DUB flight on Aer Lingus tonight flies out of, um, Boston, I decided to build in a day to explore this culturally rich city. As a base, I decided on the Hyatt Regency Boston.

It’s a Hyatt Category 3 hotel, meaning it’s 15,000 Gold Passport points per night, and also eligible for use with the annual free night certificate given as a perk to cardholders of the Chase Hyatt Visa.

Since I’d already redeemed my annual free night certificate earlier this year at the Hyatt Regency in New Orleans for Mardi Gras, I redeemed 15,000 Gold Passport points.

Daily rate was $313/night

Daily rate was $313/night

This saved me $313 for a one-night stay, which means I got a value of 2.1 cents per point – and meets my 2 cents per point minimum. However, since I’m a Chase Hyatt Visa cardholder, I’ll get 20% of those points back due to a promo they have going on right now until July 31st (but you had to register by March 31st). That gives me even more value out of the points redeemed – closer to 3 cents per point. Considering how easy it is to earn Ultimate Rewards points, I consider Hyatt stays one of the best uses of Ultimate Rewards – especially with this 20% discount going on.

Getting there and check in

After getting off the Amtrak train at Boston’s South station, it was a short 10-minute walk to the Hyatt Regency. The streets in Boston drive me absolutely batty. I’m a lover of the grid. Well-planned cities like Chicago and Phoenix appeal to my sense of order greatly. I can deal with New York’s mish-mash of a kinda-sorta grid. But Boston is something else altogether.

Once I found the Hyatt Regency, I entered through the sliding glass doors. You have to take an elevator up to the lobby on the 3rd floor, and from there, you have to take another elevator up to your room. So to enter and/or exit, you always have to take two elevators. This design feature/flaw was not my favorite thing in the entire world, and I can see how it could be confusing to some.

Ground floor entrance of the Hyatt Regency Boston

Ground floor entrance of the Hyatt Regency Boston

Check-in area on the 3rd floor

Check-in area on the 3rd floor

The desk agent was very, very welcoming and acknowledged that I was Platinum with Hyatt. After just a couple of minutes, we headed up to our room.

The room

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Trip Report: Riding On Amtrak Business Class NYP-BOS

by Harlan 4 Comments

Whew!

I’ve been a bad boy here lately with the updates. Between the Airbnbs, real estate, freelance articles, and other bits of life, I’ve had to neglect my posting schedule. The upshot, though, is that I’ve been getting ready for my first trip to Ireland, and am now writing this on an Amtrak train from somewhere in Connecticut.

Tomorrow is the day of the British Airways devaluation, and I was lucky to’ve booked BOS-DUB on Aer Lingus in business class (there is still some availability in October and Novermber FYI!). It’s an award I’ve long wanted to redeem, and in light of the devaluation, I decided to go ahead and pull the trigger. I was already going to Ireland anyway (on a Delta attack fare), but then when this happened, I pushed up my trip and redeemed some British Airways Avios. This particular award will be increasing from 50K round-trip to 75K round-trip. Still not bad for business class to Europe, but less is obviously better.

Anyway, being based in New York, I had to get myself to Boston. Getting back from Boston was easy: 4,500 Avios BOS-LGA and boom. But going to Boston, availability was dismal.

Redeeming Ultimate Rewards for Amtrak

NYC is Amtrak heaven. New Yorkers can get to nearly anywhere in New England, the Northeast, or Mid-Atlantic in just a few hours with relative ease.

The last time I rode Amtrak was probably in 2008 when I went down to DC for a weekend – but my memories of it don’t exactly allow for a full trip report. 😉

This time, however, I’m in business class at a seat with a table, connected to the (very very spotty) wifi, and writing a blog post with a rum and Coke Pepsi from the snack car next to me. Safe to say life is pretty good right about now.

There are blackout dates on Amtrak. Luckily, April 27th isn’t one of them. The blackout dates are centered around the holidays: New Year, Easter, July 4th, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, with a couple random dates through in throughout the year. If you want to travel any time that isn’t a holiday, you’re pretty much golden.

To boot, their zones are large and generous, and redeeming Ultimate Rewards for a bedroom or a business class ticket can make since if:

  • You want to experience the country by train
  • You have time to take the train
  • The train experience to where you wanna go will be roughly equal to flying (ahem, NYC-BOS or NYC-WAS)
  • You have to travel and simply must stay connected to a cell network
  • Flights aren’t available but the Amtrak availability is wide open (my case)
Amtrak zones

Amtrak zones

Here is a the Amtrak zone map and here is the list of award redemptions by zone.

NYP-BOS falls into the Northeast zone, so a regular ticket is 4,000 Amtrak Guest Rewards points. However, I redeeemed 6,500 points to be in the business class car. It was only a little more and still met my 2 cents per point minimum, so I went with that.

Screenshot 2015-04-27 12.13.49

Northeast zone chart

Note that you can only redeem points for one-way tickets. So if you need a round-trip, you will have to redeem for two one-way tickets.

My ticket selection

My ticket selection

The photo above is the price for two one-way business class tickets AKA 13,000 Amtrak Guest Rewards points. That’s still 2.2 cents per point, and a great stopgap when flights from NYC-BOS were over $400 for a one-way and there was no award availability on American or US Airways with Avios! And also better than paying cash…

Over $400 for a one-way

Over $400 for a one-way

$431 for a one-way flight that’s a little over an hour? No way. Amtrak was the best option for this trip.

The experience

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