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Even though we had a full night’s layover in Frankfurt (see our adventures in Frankfurt here), Jeffrey casanova’d our way into the First Class Lounge at Frankfurt’s airport, duh. Be forewarned that we had just visited the Lufthansa First Class lounge in New York-JFK and this post will make lots of comparisons: Lufthansa First Class Lounge – New York-JFK Airport.
Frankfurt Airport is one of the three mega-hubs in Europe, with more than 52 million passengers/year, 60% of which are Lufthansa travelers (that’s about 100,000 Lufthansa travelers per day!).
Given the above stats, it’s not surprising that they’re a bit stingy with access to [...]
While in the Lufthansa First Class lounge in New York-JFK, we had to scurry and find a place to stay in Frankfurt the following night. Since we had just switched our flights hours before take off, we didn’t have very much notice but were very glad to have an opportunity to visit Frankfurt–a new city!
Booking
Because I have Diamond status with Hyatt and Platinum status with Starwood, I preferred to book a property at either one of those chains. When I jumped online, I found that my only Hyatt option for “Frank…” would be Franklin, Tennessee:
The good news is that Starwood has a few more options:
After a few days in France (see our walking tours of Bordeaux and Nantes, then see how we got engaged in Paris!), we headed over to Italy. Siena, Italy is home to the oldest bank in the world. But it was also home to me for a semester when I studied abroad back in 2009 and lived with a family who has become my family. So, when I got the chance to go visit them when we visited Jeffrey’s sister in Nantes, France, recently, I jumped at it. Why I chose Siena as the city to study abroad, I’m not quite sure. Probably how I make most other important life decisions: a bit on a whim. I liked the movie Under the Tuscan Sun and Siena was the only city in the region of Tuscany with a [...]
Istanbul is a huge city filled with never-ending passageways to explore. No matter which part of the city you’re in, there’s an intriguing little store just around the corner filled with real-life treasures. The tricky part is just deciding what to take home with you.
If you’re in the market for a rug, good: there’s no shortage of men trying to cat call you into their shop just to sell you a very expensive rug. Turns out, I didn’t have the #fancy budget for a rug, can you believe it? So, I focused on more attainable souvenirs – and what I could actually pack in my suitcase.
Without further ado, here are my top areas for shopping in [...]
Florence, Italy was next up on our trip and I was psyched! I studied abroad in Siena, Italy while in college and was so happy to go back to visit the family I lived with while there. But, before heading to Siena (about an hour’s train ride from Florence), we wanted to hit one or two highlights in Tuscany’s most famous city.
With appx. 1.5 million people in the metropolitan area, Florence is also the most populous city in Tuscany and a must-visit on any trip to the area. Most visitors stay in Florence and then day-trip to other Tuscan towns. Not that I would suggest that plan… but, then again, I’m biased: Florence and Siena were equal in size and power [...]
Bereketzade Mh., Galata Kulesi, Beyoğlu, Turkey 18.5 TL (~$8.90 US) Hours: 9am to 8pm everyday
After lunch at another outdoor cafe (…because Charleston has exactly 0 fun outdoor streetside cafes), we walked over the Golden Horn to the more modern side of Istanbul. Trying to get our tourism on, we headed to a must-see site: the Galata Tower.
View of the Galata Tower from across the water
In the context of Istanbul, the Galata Tower is brand spanking new at 650+ years old. This is especially evident in the context of the Hagia Sofia, built in 537, whereas the Galata Tower was completed in [...]
After exploring Paris in the snow, and getting all engaged up, it was time to bid adieu to Paris and hop our short commuter flight from Paris-CDG to Italy’s famed town of Florence-FLR (but be careful, I’ve heard at least half the flights actually land in Firenze, not Florence…yikes!).
CHECK-INAfter having a bit of bad weather, all of the public transit and flights were finally back up and running smoothly. We took the RER from the city out to Charles de Gaulle-Roissy airport. Somewhat annoyingly, they don’t announce the gate or terminal you’ll be leaving from until just a few hours before departure, so we ended up having to wait for a bit in the [...]
We booked our United MileagePlus award ticket appx 6 months in advance so, to say the very least, we were VERY eager and ready to take our trip. So, we originally had 2 flights on Air Canada booked, both of which were very carefully picked and planned:
New York, LaGuardia-LGA to Montreal-YUL — nothing special here Montreal-YUL to Paris-CDG — made sure this was a newly renovated Boeing 777-300ER Executive First Class cabinSo, when I got a call just a few hours before our departure from Charleston-CHS to New York-JFK that our flight for the next day from LGA –> YUL had already been canceled (nearly 24 hours in advance), I knew we had a problem. A winter [...]
