- Introduction: A Pleasant Voyage To Geneva
- Review: TAP Air Portugal Business Class Airbus A330-900neo (MIA-LIS)
- Review: TAP Air Portugal Business Class Airbus A320neo (LIS-GVA)
- Review: Four Seasons Geneva Hotel Des Bergues
- Review: Marriott Geneva Hotel, Switzerland
- Review: British Airways Business Class Airbus A319 (GVA-LHR)
- Review: American Airlines Business Class Boeing 777 (LHR-MIA)
Welcome to my next trip report series, covering a brief journey to Geneva this spring. This wasn’t a “traditional” review trip (where I flew just for the sake of reviewing airlines), but rather we needed to be in Europe for a wedding. Of course I still did my best to make the journey there and back as interesting and useful as possible in terms of airlines flown.
You can expect reviews of business class on TAP Air Portugal, British Airways, and American Airlines, as well as a couple of hotel reviews. In this post I’ll outline all the basics of the trip, and then I’ll publish the entire trip report series in the coming days and weeks.
In this post:
Why I took this trip
The reason for this trip was that Ford and I had a wedding to attend in Switzerland. As you might expect, when I know we need to be somewhere a certain day, my mind immediately goes to which airline products I can review that would make for interesting reading, and/or that I haven’t reviewed recently.
As tempted as I always am to suggest maybe going to Europe via Asia, I tried to be realistic here, and prioritize spousal happiness. So the goal was to get the most direct routing possible that still includes new product reviews.
Really the extent of this quick review series will be the four flights we took to get to and from Geneva, as well as two hotel reviews in Geneva. The wedding wasn’t in Geneva, though we spent one night in Geneva on the front end just to leave a buffer, and one night in Geneva on the back end, since our flight was departing from there before 7AM.
It sure was nice to have the transatlantic flights both depart from and arrive back in Miami, avoiding domestic connections. That makes a world of difference in terms of the ease of travel.
The airlines I flew on this trip
We redeemed miles for all the flights on this trip, so it’s always nice when you can easily snag transatlantic business class flights at the saver level. As much as finding some super premium products with miles has become harder over the years, I had no issues at all booking this trip, and ultimately it saved us thousands of dollars.
For the outbound portion of this trip, I booked the following in business class for 63,000 Avianca LifeMiles plus $72.60 per person in taxes and fees:
3/06 TP224 Miami to Lisbon departing 4:30PM arriving 5:35AM (+1 day)
3/07 TP940 Lisbon to Geneva departing 7:40AM arriving 11:10AM
The first flight was operated by TAP Air Portugal’s Airbus A330-900neo, while the second flight was operated by the company’s Airbus A320neo. While TAP has among the most attractive business class fares with cash, the airline historically doesn’t make a lot of business class award space available.
However, as I wrote about last November, the airline started making more award seats available, so I took advantage of that. I ended up booking this in late November, so just over three months before departure.
Avianca LifeMiles are super easy to earn, as the program is transfer partners with Amex Membership Rewards, Bilt Rewards, Capital One, and Citi ThankYou, and often sells miles at a discount. I even transfered points to LifeMiles with a 25% bonus, so I paid even fewer transferable points than that.
For the return portion of this trip, I booked the following in business class for 57,500 American AAdvantage miles plus $90.90 per person in taxes and fees:
3/12 BA723 Geneva to London departing 6:35AM arriving 7:25AM
3/12 AA57 London to Miami departing 11:15AM arriving 5:10PM
The first flight was operated by British Airways’ Airbus A319, while the second flight was operated by American’s Boeing 777-200ER.
I ended up only booking the return portion around three weeks before our travel date, as I was waiting to see if any more unusual award availability opened up. However, I then decided that reviewing American’s long haul business class is useful, even if it’s not the most exciting or aspirational product.
For too long I’ve been focused on reviewing foreign and “exotic” products, so my current goal is also to review more products of US airlines, since that’s the most common experience many OMAAT readers may have.
The hotels I stayed at on this trip
At the beginning and end of this trip, we spent one night in Geneva. Geneva is a solid luxury hotel market, and since I pass through there pretty frequently, I try to review something new every time.
Last time we stayed at The Woodward, an Oetker Collection property, which was spectacular. This time around we decided to spend a night at the Four Seasons Geneva Hotel des Bergues. It was interesting to compare the two properties, as they’re both amazing, but very different. This stay was at the front end of our trip, as we had around a 24-hour buffer in Geneva, and we were treated to amazing weather.
At the end of our trip, we spent a night at the Marriott Geneva. While this isn’t formally marketed as an airport hotel, it’s much closer to the airport than the city, and it even has a free airport shuttle (which is exceedingly rare in Europe). This was a “new style” Marriott, and I was positively surprised by the design throughout the property, including the public areas. It was the perfect place to spend a night before an early morning flight.
Bottom line
We recently traveled to Switzerland for a wedding, which included flying into and out of Geneva Airport. While this won’t be the longest trip report ever, you can expect four flight reviews and two hotel reviews. I came into my TAP Air Portugal and American flights with low expectations, and they were exceeded in both cases.
Stay tuned, and thanks for reading!
You were lucky with Geneva. I did the short BA or EasyJet hop over for years in March to the Geneva motor show and nearly always froze my butt off despite almost direct access from Arrivals to L’Expo. Hotels were always booked solid in the city by auto companies accommodating guests and media so, the odd time I overnighted it was a train to Montreux which was an agreeable enough location for a short stay.
You were lucky with Geneva. I did the short BA or EasyJet hop over for years in March to the Geneva motor show and nearly always froze my butt off despite almost direct access from Arrivals to L’Expo. Hotels were always booked solid in the city by auto companies accommodating guests and media so, the odd time I overnighted it was a train to Montreux which was an agreeable enough location for a short stay.
Looking forward to the Four Seasons report after my one stay in their Beverly Hills property a year ago which i thoroughly enjoyed.
Looking forward to this report! I also really appreciate when you say how far in advance you booked, that is very useful and greatly appreciated! Please do that each time or as often as you can! I often look for space via avianca and have a hard time, so this is helpful for many of us know!
Any hotel in Geneva is pretty much an airport hotel, as the airport is just 7 minutes from the city's main railway station. Also, in Spain, hotel buses from the airport are invariably (?) free.
Let’s hope you highlight the comp coconut water in the FS GVA gym!
My only disappointment is that you didn’t try the 3:45 am TAP Portugal departure from Miami LOL
That flight only departs at that time once or twice a week. Other days of the week, it departs earlier. Also, that flight is typically operated by one of TAP's rare standard A330s (not their neo aircraft), meaning it has their old business class seats. Given the small amount of these left flying with TAP, a review of those seats isn't really useful (Ben already reviewed that product a while back before their neo came into service).
A "non-exciting or aspirational" product review at the end of a wedding! I would've thought Ben would've announced his departure from any wedding a bit like this...
"Sorry to not stay for even longer, guys"
"No worries, so great to see you, where are you headed?"
"My Ariana Afghan flight on a 707 is departing from the airport in 1.5 hours"
*Me who knows I have to leave a wedding early in a few months, to catch an Azerbijian airlines flight*
Will wait for your AA J review.
I am taking the same return leg (GVA-LHR-MIA) by BA and will be staying at the same Marriott in Geneva in June.
Curious to see your review on AA J after reviewing Polaris recently. I think that just leaves Delta one, the "most premium" of the big 3 ;)
Lets just hope Lucky didn't order fish on these flights