Groups Feed

Welcome to our group ReviewSity Forum Group! A space for us to connect and share with each other. Start by posting your thoughts, sharing media, or creating a poll.

My wife and I flew Qatar Airways business class from Karachi to San Francisco in April 2021. It was during pandemic but after vaccines were out. We went (we took Turkish on the way out) exactly two weeks after getting our shots. I used American Airlines miles to book this ticket, it cost 70k points.

This journey consisted of two legs: Karachi to Doha on a 787 Dreamliner and Doha to San Francisco on a A350-1000. The second leg is equipped with Q-Suites, widely reputed to be the best biz class around (spoiler alert: I agree).

787 - KHI to DOH

1-2-1 configuration, we took the middle two seats. The seating was modern, spacious and comfortable. Crew was great. We flew during ramadan and they made a suhoor announcement so that people could start their fast on time (we elected not to fast on that day because we were traveling…

We flew Turkish from San Francisco to Karachi via Istanbul back in September. We used Chase points to directly purchase on the Chase travel site. That was cheaper than transferring points to (say) United and then getting the ticket using Mileage Plus. The ticket was just over $900 which included a stop over in Istanbul on the way back.

I've covered Turkish before so I'll only highlight that things that stood out.

Infotainment

They have forward and downward cameras, which come in handy when you're looking for dawn, sunrise etc. And their navigation explicitly provides Qibla direction and the upcoming prayer time. This is great. Except it is for the current location, not here you'll be when dawn actually breaks. So doesn't take into account time compression when flying eastwards. But then I have not seen any infotainment provide that so this is state of the art.

Food

I flew Virgin Atlantic from San Francisco to London back in May. Used Delta points for the flight, it cost 35k points which is not bad. Sometimes it can be much higher than that.

Overall

I was distinctly unimpressed with this flight.

Seats

The seats were mediocre, there was something about lumbar support or something that was digging into my back and I just couldn't get comfortable. I got a whole three seater so could lie down to sleep on a red eye but still couldn't get fully comfortable with the belt anchors and the immovable armrest by the window. Leg room and seat width weren't great.

Last week, I flew from Chicago to Istanbul in Turkish Airlines business class. This was one leg of a journey from SFO to KHI. We used United miles to get the ticket which cost us 80k points back in March when we got it. The prices seem to have skyrocketed, currently, United doesn't offer SFO -> KHI for less than 300k points in business class. Our journey included a first class leg on United from SFO to ORD (domestic first class in a 737-900 is almost entirely forgettable) and Turkish 330-300 on the IST to KHI leg, which is somewhat comparable to the 777-300ER we had on the ORD to IST leg.

This seemed to an older aircraft. We've flown Turkish many times from SFO and LAX and those legs appear to have newer planes. This is manifested as older seats, older infotainment etc. Turkish has decided we are in…

My wife and I stayed at the Conrad Bora Bora the week after ThanksGiving 2019 for four days (since we used the Citi Prestige card to make our reservations, we got four nights for the price of three (minus taxes and things).

We had booked the cheapest room there (a King Lagoon View suite) but got upgraded to a King Garden Villa upon checkin (we have Hilton Gold status due to another credit card).

Getting There

We took Air France from LAX to PPT, then Air Tahiti from PPT to Moorea (where we stayed four nights) and Moorea to Bora Bora. The flight was very scenic (wee were told to sit on the right hand side coming in to Bora Bora but we must have taken a different route 'cause Bora Bora and lagoon etc were to the left. We also did not book the Conrad transport from the airport…

In ThanksGiving 2019, my wife and I flew to Tahiti to spend 4 nights in Moorea and another 4 nights in Bora Bora. Expected Bora Bora to be more exotic so elected to stay in Moorea first. Moorea can be reached from Papeete by ferry but we booked a flight on Air Tahiti to get there (since we had to fly to Bora Bora anyway, the incremental cost to fly to Moorea was small).

We contacted the hotel and arranged transportation from the airport to the hotel. Wasn't cheap (nothing is cheap in Tahiti) but not too bad since we decided not to rent a car. The car was waiting for when we landed and collected our luggage.

We had booked a (Premium) Lanai room but got upgraded to suite upon checkin. We stayed in room 303. There was a proper living room and a separate king bed room. Our…

We flew to Tahiti from LA on ThanksGiving 2019. We got a relatively good fare from San Jose to PPT via LAX (it was actually a Delta fare but with Air France as the carrier from LAX to PPT).

This configuration is 10 abreast seating with narrower seating than those with 9 abreast. However, we paid extra to book the first two seater towards the back of the plane. That allowed a little more privacy to us and made our journey more enjoyable.

The flight time was such that we only had to pray one prayer in the 8 1/2 hr journey (the pre dawn or fair prayer). The restroom at the back the plane was ok. Their navigation didn't have any indication of prayer times. I think it also didn't have a camera (sorry I can't remember - if any reader can confirm, please post in the comments). I…

After finishing my work meeting in Lisbon, my wife and I rented a car and drove down to the south of Portugal to explore the Algarve region. And made this hotel our base. It is pretty much western and southern most point of continental Europe. And of the rare places where you can see both a sunset and sunrise looking out to the sea (not the same direction, obviously).

We got upgraded to a full suite but without seaview, pity. A seaview room would have been spectacular with a view of the coast, lighthouse, cliffs and/or the marina.

Having said that, the accommodations themselves were quite good. Large living room

A decent bedroom