Bos- Montreal-Brussels (curse you mother nature)

This is a multi-part trip review of our trip to Japan using miles & points to fund our trip.  The main purpose of these posts is reflection.  But, it's also a way to share with my family and friends all the minute details we enjoyed along the way. As much as I love re-telling the trip face-to-face, it would be way too long! Plus memory is failing me already.  Hope you enjoy this recount while it's still fresh in my mind.

Getting to Japan: Bos-yyz-bru: curse you mother nature
Getting to Japan: Munich -Tokyo (airlines & lounges)
Day 1: 12/24/13 Hyatt Regency Tokyo, N'ex & suica cards, Japan Rail Pass, Shinjuku
Day 2: 12/25/13 Park Hyatt Tokyo, Tsukiji fish market, Roppongi, Kichijoji
Day 3: 12/26/13 Room Service,  Club on the Park, Akihabara
Day 4: 12/27/2013 Girondole buffet, Yokohama Ramen museum Meiji Shrine, Shibuya, Gold Rush
Day 5: 12/28.2013 Biking through Yoyogi Park, Harajuku, Shibuya, New York Bar
Day 6: 12/29/2013 Harajuku & Shibuya Shopping, Ramen alley, Hyatt Regency Kyoto
Day 7: 12/30/2013 Kyoto, Good Samaritan Tours
Day 8: 12/31/2013 New Years Eve, Fushimi Inari Shrine, Kaiten Sushi NYE Traditions
Day 9: 1/1/2014 New Years = Black Friday Maddness, No place to eat!
European stopover: Zurich, Park Hyatt Zurich, Brussels, Delays

I'll admit it. I'm an airline snob. You might have gleamed that from my previous post when I mentioned we wanted to try as many business class flights and lounges as possible. For expedience sake, I'm going to use airport acronyms for short. Boston (bos), Montreal (yyz), Brussels (bru), Zurich (zrh), Tokyo (nrt), Munich (muc).

The problem when we booked our flights was that we were looking for flights during the holiday season. EVERYONE is traveling during the holidays. Hence, availability is already limited. Add on top of that that we booked less than 1.5 months from our anticipated departure date of 12/22. This resulted in the crazy routing our initial trip itinerary booked as follows:

bos - yyz via United depart 7:00am; arrive 8:30am
yyz - bru  via Brussels airline depart 7:40pm; arrive 8:45am
bru-zrh via Swiss airline depart 9:55am; arrive 11:10am
zrh - nrt via Swiss depart 1:05pm; arrive 8:55am (+1)

We were set to depart on 12/22 and arrive 12/24.  If you notice, we had a whole chunk of time in Montreal.  It was basically a whole day, but that was the only option available, so we took it. We thought we would pass the time by visiting downtown Montreal or maybe visit some friends?

WRONG!! Mother nature said, "I don't think so, b***es!" This sight welcomed us as we arrived in yyz.

For my Bostonians, this may not look like much, but if you notice in the last photo, the only airplane you see, is grounded. That's right all flights are either severely delayed or outright canceled. We kept our fingers crossed. Hoping that our late departure time would spare us from any cancellations since the weather conditions were suppose to ease as the day wore on.  

We actually trekked out to Downtown Montreal as originally planned. We thought it couldn't be that bad. Big mistake. We were dressed for the balmy 40-50 degree weather in Tokyo, not the frigid cold of 20-30 degree with crazy wind chill. Only later did D and I realize that neither of us actually wanted to venture into Downtown, both preferring to stay in the warmth of the airport lounge.  Too bad we were walking through 2 feet of snow outside looking for a way to get into McGill station when this revelation came to light. D'oh! We spent the remainder of the time sitting in the Air Canada lounge, slurping soup and sipping hot tea and coffee. 

Unfortunately, more bad news of delays came our way. Our aircraft, coming from Toronto (which had worse weather than Montreal) was delayed arriving. Once it parked, more delays ensued as there were mechanical issues with the craft. What irked me the most, was that Air Canada would not properly update it's information.  They delayed the flight using unrealistic times.  The gate display would show "boarding: 9:00PM, departure 9:30PM" while we stood physically in front of the gate at 9:45pm. What? How does that work?

 Here's the problem that had me wracking my hands in worry.  If you notice on the itinerary, we had a very short connection time to catch our flight from bru - zrh. If we missed our flight to zrh, we would miss our long haul flight from zrh to nrt. A quick search on the interwebs showed no Swiss flights leaving for nrt until the next day, meaning we'd have to stay the night in Zurich. Crap.  We needed to make our flight from zrh - nrt!  On the delays went for hours.  Air Canada did announce that the ground crew in Brussels would try to re-route any passengers that might miss connecting flights. Did I believe them? Nope. At some point, we were resigned to the fact that we were spending the next day in Zurich.  Which wouldn't be terrible except for the fact that Zurich is crazy expensive! What can you do?

We finally made it onto the aircraft at 12AM. Waited another 30 minutes to de-ice the plane. Another 20 minutes waiting in the take-off queue. Finally around 12:50AM we were airborne!!

Air Canada's 767-300 v2 seats are fully lie flat seats, meaning they recline to 180 degrees, like your bed. Here's what it looks like on the air canada website, under classic pods. The pods are very private, but the sad part is you can't easily communicate with your traveling companion. G'ah we were too tired to be very chatty anyway.

Dinner was served not long after we were airborne. Here's what I had.

Appetizer: lobster and shrimp with mustard sauce, garden salad with balsamic vinaigrette and hot roll 

Main: Salmon with tarragon sauce, haricot verts, carrots and rice

The app was good. Salmon was a little dry but okay with the sauce. I skipped the cheese and dessert plates because I could barely keep my eyes open. Most of you know I would forego the cheese plate anyway. :) It was literally lights out for me. Next thing I knew we were making our descent to Brussels (finally!) I had one of the  best sleeps ever on Air Canada. But that might be combination of fatigue and jet lag?

Bleary eyed, we made our way to the arrival gate. Standing at the end of the walkway, an air canada attendant was holding a sign with our last names! Excitedly, I wheeled our carry on quickly to her. 

"That's us!" She asked if we had any bags checked in. NOPE! 

She replies, "Great! This only works if you don't have bags checked in.  Your connection was difficult to route! You're going to Narita, Tokyo!" Yes, we know!

"We booked you two seats on All Nippon Airways (ANA) from Munich to Tokyo. But the only flight available to Munich gives you only an hour before your ANA departure. That should be enough time though." 

Ever the logical one, D asks her gently, "Is the ANA flight business class?" 

"Yes, of course!" Priorities, people. lol. 

We arrived in Brussels around 1pm. We had another 4-5 hours to kill. No problemo, off to the lounge it is! Air Canada also gave us each a 25euro voucher for food. Sweet.

The moral of this story is business class is awesome! JK. No really it is. We saw a very long line of people queuing to get their flights re-routed to catch their connections. I don't know if we received preferential treatment because our routing was so crazy or we were business class. My hunch is probably both but more of the later.

Not having checked bags in was key. Our bags would have made it through to the Swiss flight that we never had a chance of boarding. If you're going trying to make a lot of connecting flights, as annoying as it is, carry on when possible. You never know when things might go wrong.

Finally, if you're booking award tickets or even revenue tickets, and you are traveling with a companion, make sure to call each airline and kink your tickets. This way if you do get delayed and rerouted, the airlines will keep your tickets together. Nothing is worse than being separated on a long haul trip.