At the beginning of last week I wrote about my desire to fly Air Peace between Lagos and Sharjah. I love start up airlines, and this start up airline seems especially… interesting?
I might have a few spare days in the next couple of weeks where I could take a trip, and my gosh I can’t even say how much time I’ve spent piecing together crazy itineraries (in fairness, this is what I do for fun in my spare time).
Basically I have two flights I’d really like to take, as they’ve both just recently launched:
- Air Peace’s 777 first class between Sharjah and Lagos (yes, I know I wrote about safety concerns with the airline, but I also don’t avoid airlines because of their safety records)
- Air Tanzania’s 787 business class between Dar es Salaam and Mumbai (at least it’s supposed to be a 787 — yesterday they used an A220 for the flight, which is quite a downgrade)
So I build all of these awesome itineraries, but then the problem is getting a flight that somehow connects my goal of flying the two airlines.
For example, I’ve been looking at redeeming 60,000 Virgin Atlantic miles for Delta One from Atlanta or New York to Lagos. The route is operated by an A330, which I haven’t reviewed yet.
That allows a nice 2-3 hour connection before the flight to Sharjah.
From there I could easily get over to Dubai, but then what? There are flights to Dar es Salaam, but they’re either on:
- Emirates, which I’ve reviewed before in great detail
- FlyDubai; while FlyDubai is now part of Emirates Skywards, award pricing is revenue based, so award prices are outrageous, as paid one-way tickets are $2,500+
So then I instantly get less excited again.
Then I wonder if I should instead skip Air Peace and Air Tanzania, and instead fly Air France from Miami to Pointe a Pitre, then Air Caraibes to Paris, and then redeem Air France-KLM Flying Blue miles for Air Mauritius’ A330-900neo or A350-900 business class from Europe to Mauritius to Johannesburg.
Then I could fly back to Europe on Air Namibia, as they have a route from Windhoek to Frankfurt on an A330, which has long intrigued me…
And then I could fly back to the US on Aer Lingus’ A321LR…
But that all seems sort of boring by comparison?
Help? 😉
The South African government has recently granted Air Peace approval to commence flights between Lagos and Johannesburg. Hopefully this will create more options for you to review their premium product.
I'm voting on Jordan's DXB-BOM-DAR-JNB route. Infact Air Tanzania utilizes the new DAR terminal III, for international flights. The Air Tanzania 787 from BOM then A220 to JNB are worth reviewing.
Voting for @Aditya's itinerary.
The new Terminal 3 in Dar is now open. That's where Air Tanzania flies it's Bombay and Joburg flights from.
Everyone I knew was right, this is a sickness.....
Hope you have a better experience in the Dar Es Salaam airport than we did!
I'm with @Aditya and while I understand the point @Jordan is trying to make I still don't think its that bad. I mean its not like he's gonna leave the airport. I'd rather go to Nigeria than St. Louis or Baltimore.
I vote for @Aditya's schedule! - all in one!
We should not live in fear, but neither should one publicize certain trips.
Ben - Im not going to say do not go, like @Daniel from Finland suggested, but, you're an awful non First World/ non-First Class traveler....and they see you coming! Many people probably are jealous of you or deem your travels uber extravagant, needless, a complete waste that is thrown in their faces when its brought to their attention that you are traveling...
We should not live in fear, but neither should one publicize certain trips.
Ben - Im not going to say do not go, like @Daniel from Finland suggested, but, you're an awful non First World/ non-First Class traveler....and they see you coming! Many people probably are jealous of you or deem your travels uber extravagant, needless, a complete waste that is thrown in their faces when its brought to their attention that you are traveling on them (think CAI). People in these parts of the world have very little and here you come!
I truly think for your safety you should refrain from publicizing your travels to some of these places, especially Nigeria and post after you clear those countries/airlines. Yes you might lose out on a posting, but it could save your life.
CAI should be a warning to you!. You should really be considering your security when traveling. Everyone should do a security check of sorts for third world travel, and that is do not disclose until you clear those countries.
With that said, safe travels.
1. JFK to Lagos in Delta
2. Lagos to Sharjah on Air peace
3. Sharjah to Dar es salaam on Fly Dubai
4. Dar es salaam to Mumbai on Air Tanzania
5. Mumbai to Nairobi on Air India (new route from end sept)
6. Nairobi to JHB on any KQ or SAA
7. JHB to Mauritius to Europe on Air Mauritius A330 neo
8. Paris to Point e pitre on air caribe
9. Point e litre to Miami on air France
See I got you an itinerary for both your desired options.
Skip Air Peace and Air Tanzania and take the Pointe a Pitre itinerary forward, sounds infinitely more interesting to this reader.
RwandAir flies from Lagos to Kigali, and Kigali to Dar Es Salaam. Their 737 business class doesn't look bad! https://www.rwandair.com/media-center/news-press-releases/article/rwandair-acquires-two-brand-new-boeing-737-800ng-with-inflight-connectivity
And they sometimes have the A330 on the route... https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/wb203
Long time lurker here...
I feel like if you don't fly Air Peace, you'll continue to wonder about them and wish you had made that flight. Worst case, you take that Emirates flight - even if you've reviewed them many times before, you can always post any new thoughts (or not!). Then you'll be able to hook your two desired flights together.
I say you fly Air Peace and get it out of your system! :)
Lucky, I would strongly suggest you do not fly to Lagos. While it was superinteresting to read about your TAAG Angolan adventure, it also revealed that you are not an experienced 3rd world traveller.
And Lagos, Nigeria is on the very very low end of that 3rd world category. Not only will it not meet your expectations, I also fear that something bad might happen to an inexperienced white American down there. Bribes, robbery, assault, you name it. Please don't go.
If you can get to Dubai, hop over to Egypt and book a return on BA to YYZ for like $2000 which will route you on BA93 which later in the year will be the BA A350 with the new Club World
If you are flying through Lagos, I wouldn’t bank on 2-3 hours being enough time to navigate their system.
We were sitting in immigration for 2+ hours last December, before even getting our bags and getting through!
KL rarely( not mean never) release O class ticket in JRO-DAR-AMS flight.
Take the short flight from DXB to BOM, Air Tanzania to DAR and KLM's supernew 787-10 from DAR to AMS. From there: enough options, depending on your time and preferences.
What about flying Air Arabia SHJ-BOM? It's coach-only, but the pitch is 32", the flight is only 3hrs, and the fares are very cheap.
A couple of suggestions out of Dubai:
1. Once you get to Dubai, you can fly Philippine Airlines' A330 business class to Manila and then take their A350 business class back to either Toronto or JFK. I don't believe that you've reviewed either their A330 or A350 business class.
2. Take Egyptair's 787 business class from Dubai and then their 737 business class from Cairo to Casablanca (or just fly Emirates' A380 business class...
A couple of suggestions out of Dubai:
1. Once you get to Dubai, you can fly Philippine Airlines' A330 business class to Manila and then take their A350 business class back to either Toronto or JFK. I don't believe that you've reviewed either their A330 or A350 business class.
2. Take Egyptair's 787 business class from Dubai and then their 737 business class from Cairo to Casablanca (or just fly Emirates' A380 business class there). From Casablanca, you can take RAM's 787-9 business back to JFK.
3. To get to Dar es Salaam, you could take Ethiopian's new A350 business class from Dubai to Addis Ababa and then take their 787 or 737 business class to Tanzania. Take your flight on Air Tanzania to Mumbai and then fly back to the US. The flights back to the US could be either on Turkish Airlines (connect in Istanbul and take their 787 flight to MEX - easily bookable with miles), or just take Air India's nonstop flight to Newark
You really want to fly out of DAR? Terminal 2, which is the current international terminal, is horrible. The new terminal (terminal 3) was supposed to be opened months ago, but I couldn't find any news. Seriously, you don't want to voluntarily travel through that airport. And as for Air Namibia, as has been pointed out, they are well known for dealys, cancellations, and horrible customer service. Frequent travellers to southern Africa tend to avoid them.
Well, you could always position on Kenya Airways (via NBO). Those flights are shorter, so the experience might be different from what you got on New York-Nairobi.
I’m fact I'm seeing pretty good BOM-DAR-JNB flights on Air Tanzania, 787 then A220!
DXB-ADD-DAR? Could trial Ethiopian short haul? Or, if you have the time and energy, from DXB you could go to Mumbai and take the return to DAR, on Tanzanian, then continue to Joburg, then trial either the United flight from Cape Town, or the Air Namibia one.
Air Namibia is experiencing a lot of schedule issues with their Frankfurt services lately. Don't plan an itinerary involving them that will have any sort of connection +/- 12 hours.
Great
Go get them done!