I’m currently in the midst of an extended trip to Hong Kong, the UK and France – the one that I summed up my planning for a few months back.
I’m travelling (yes, lucky us, all flights in Business Class thanks to points) with my better half and our 3 year and 3 month old daughters, and will be writing up my thoughts on each leg independently in due course, but here’s a quick sample of what we’ve been up to…
Packing was a 2 week ordeal, including bag purchasing, wardrobe questioning and despite being 90% ready the weekend before we were due to leave, we were still up late packing the night before we left.
Bags for the four of us for a month
We were booked on QF127 to Hong Kong on one of the couple of days a week it’s operated by a 747 in Qantas old configuration, so we had the front row of the upper deck. This came in at 60,000 Qantas points each.
Making use of the play area in the Qantas International Business lounge
Our 3 year old on the upper deck of a Qantas 747 to Hong Kong
In Hong Kong for 4 nights, I booked us into the Hyatt Sha Tin which is around 40 minutes north of Hong Kong Island on the MTR in a 2 bedroom suite – I’ll go into the reasons why and the benefits of staying out of the city when I come to write up the review, but we were really pleased with the decision and the Hotel.
View from the Hyatt Sha Tin
Lounge in the 2 bedroom suite at the Hyatt Sha Tin
After the Hyatt, we were off to London on Cathay Pacific. While I originally grabbed 3 premium economy seats, a couple of days before the flight 3 business class seats opened up on the same flight so I took a risk and rebooked us. This was using both Avios and Qantas points, and I’ll go more into this process (it was stressful!) and travelling with kids in the new Cathay Business Class in the write up.
Me and the kids hanging out in the Cathay Pacific Lounge, The Cabin, at HKIA
The most excellent CX Business Class seat
Little one sampling the evening food on CX253
We’re heading back on Malaysia Airlines on their A380 to KL and on to their relatively new A330 to Sydney. That will be an interesting 23 hours!
Reviews to come on these experiences soon – with an inevitable family focus given all of these bookings have been made with this purpose in mind.
From This Trip
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Qantas… What can i say? Huge Fuel Surcharge!!!! Keith – today the best route from Aus to South Asia now is…. United miles – 30,000 miles for business class one way starting Feb 2014.
Qantas business class is best valued by British Airways redemption in domestic travel – ~10,000 for business class one way. United and BA are both Ultimate Rewards transfer partners.
Oliver – given this is an Australian centric site, both UA, BA and Chase are all fairly unattainable rewards programs… I also needed direct to HK flights so Star Alliance a no go. There are lots of factors other than the points and taxes cost when booking award travel – I find it easier to accrue Qantas points and needed to fly them direct to Hong Kong, so QF it was!
Keith – I’m manufacturing at monthly 30k-50k UR points here in Australia at almost no cost – this involves an office supply store, a chain supermarket and a shopping centre – the recipe is a secret that I will not share publicly. I’m so excited to see that United dropped Aus-Asia redemption point requirement!
But I’m guessing you’ll need a Chase card to take advantage which requires a US card application?
chase ink plus
I’m very new to the Australian cards and points system – guess the starting point will be an AMEX platinum edge card
From Australian east coast (MEL / SYD) to LAX the best redemption will be British Airways again with a stopover in HNL! Happy travel
Looking forward to hearing about how the kids enjoyed business, and how other passengers received them (I’ve heard some rather grim stories!)
No issues with the kids – the 3 year old princess has flown around the world and now to Europe and not once set foot in Economy, so she knows no different. On asking about seats being made into beds, she thought that was the captain’s job. Classic.
On the passengers – no issues. I don’t take offence if people move when they see us in the cabin as I’d do the same – and it’s nice when we’re leaving, some go so far as a complement on the relative quiet. But it’s never always that way. We just do our best as parents to keep them happy and hope that others recognise that.
I can never get PEco on CX..I read with interest Upstairs 74 is so good And a little out gives you great value in HK I now stay CHI 138 just west of Central
The general rule with CX seems to be that they open up good space in most cabins / routes both 3 weeks and then 3 days out from departure – I snagged those Business seats at 3 days and the Premium Economy seats at 6 months, just for reference.