Priority Pass Restaurant Benefit

I’ve written before about the benefits of being a Priority Pass member. Priority pass is a stand alone membership that allows you to access hundreds of airport lounges worldwide. Most of these lounges are contract lounges, not necessarily affiliated with a particular airline. They’re particularly useful when traveling in parts of the world that don’t have a major airport alliance lounge, or where you’re off-brand with your ticketing and don’t have access based on status or club membership.

We have some notable places where Priority Pass lounges give us great coverage- Mexico, parts of Europe, etc. They also now allow you to bring up to two guests in with you without charge, which really is a huge benefit.

I might be dubious that this program is the right fit for the average US flyer who has other options since it’s a significant membership fee ($400) annually. However, American Express Platinum members get a Priority Pass card free!! This is yet another reason to keep the Platinum card around. Between Priority Pass and Centurion lounges, you could arguably ditch regular lounge membership altogether.

Now, in addition to this, Priority Pass is adding a new benefit- free meals at select airport restaurants.

The list is short, but growing. Originally, Denver and Portland were some of the early recipients, but now there are three options at LAX as well.

How it works is extremely simple- presenting your priority pass card entities you to a set amount off the check- usually around US $28. This can be applied toward anything on the bill, including tax, but you’ll need to leave tip separately. In addition, if you have a guest with you, you can double that amount. Plus, multiple card members can use their allotment towards the same check, since it operates as a voucher. So, a family of 4 with two card holders could run up a check to $112 before actually having to pay anything aside from the tip!

Recently, LAX has added PF Changs at TBIT to the program, and the restaurant gives a full $30 voucher, instead of the regular $28. If you’re alone, $30 is about right for a drink, soup, and entree. They open at 11am, and have table and bar seating. I’ve made use of it several times, and never had any issues. Plus, with TBIT now connected to terminals 4-8 air side, plenty of people can easily use this benefit.

Travel well!

One Million Miles To Vegas

**This Post was originally published at cruisingaltitude42.blogspot.com on 05.07.2018

 **Deep Breath**

I don't think I quite had realized until recently, though I well should have, that this weekend's mileage run would conclude with my crossing my Million Mile threshold.  Today as I fly over the Nevada desert on the way back from London, someplace over Las Vegas, I will have completed a million- yes a million - miles on American airlines and its partners.

It's been over a decade of many, many, journeys in the making.  This million has touched on every continent Oneworld flies to, and over 20 countries and counting. 

As a practical matter, crossing your millionth mile in the AAdvantage program comes with some modest and lasting benefits along with the bragging rights.  For starters, they toss an extra 35,000 miles into your account.  It's not a million, but with miles ever harder to earn on low fares, I'll take it.  It also comes with Gold Elite status for life.  Sure, Gold benefits are minor, but it's the thought that counts I suppose.  "Elite for life" sounds nice, doesn't it?

Practicalities aside, milestones are times to look back and see what you've learned and also wonder where to go from here.  I am not being cliché when I say that these million miles have been life changing.  I appreciate both the expansive experience of the world, and its smallness and vulnerability.  Our entire planet, our entire home can be circumnavigated on a 777-300 in a long weekend, and that includes time to get out of the airport and have some Dim Sum.

I feel like it calls for some kind of celebration, I'm not entirely sure what's appropriate.  Once again, alone in a crowd and on the way from somewhere to somewhere else entirely.  Maybe this is exactly appropriate after all.

As I wing over Vegas, few 'thank yous' are probably in order.  As much as I've dedicated words and pages to complaining about the changing AAdvantage program, I'll be the first to also acknowledge that it's this program that has shown me the world, and let me share it with my family.   Speaking of family, I'm eternally grateful for Mrs. CruisingAltitude for indulging this bizarre compulsion with only the slightest amount of side-eye when I explain my plan to start a mileage run in Sri Lanka, as if that's a perfectly normal human thing to do.

I also am eternally in debt to the crazy friends I've met along the way who are also plagued by this curious affliction.  These are the friends who when I ask who's up for flying to Copenhagen, or Kuala Lumpur, just to fly home again, are always game.  Flying around the world for the hell of it is fun, but doing it with a bunch of other crazy flyers is amazing.  They're the ones I've flown with to Africa to pet lions, toasted life with at the world's tallest bar, and stood with watching the sun come up over the Persian Gulf from hotel balconies, all just for the sake of the journey.

As for where to go from here?  Anywhere, I suppose.  The next level is two million.  Maybe next decade..... but who really knows. 

As always, fly safe, travel well, and live for the journey.

~CruisingAltitude