Kenya Airways business class fare Mumbai, India to Geneva, Switzerland

At the moment, Kenya Airways is having a discounted, return business class fare from Mumbai, India, via its hub at Nairobi, Kenya to Geneva, Switzerland at S$1105. This price is considered a steal for business class, given the long distance covered. These flights essentially cover three continents: the Indian subcontinent, Africa and Europe. There is wide availability from now till November this year.


There are a total of four sectors, of which two sectors, between Kenya and Geneva is operated by the B787 aircraft with flat beds in the business class, in a 2-2-2 configuration. There are no direct aisle access for passengers in the window seat. The other two sectors, between Mumbai and Kenya, will be operated by the B737 aircraft, featuring just recliner seats in a 2-2 configuration.

I have been wanting to visit India, particularly Mumbai and Chennai, as well as Geneva in Switzerland for some time. So this deal came at the right moment for me. I decided to book myself a ticket on this routing for this year end holiday. This will be my first time taking Kenya Airways, an African airline, on their widebody B787 and narrowbody B737 aircrafts. Kenya Airways is a member of Skyteam, so I credited the flight miles to flying blue. Can't wait for the experiences!

This is my first step towards building my travel itinerary for my year-end trip!☺

Tour of South Korea part 2

My Asiana Airlines flight from the United States brought me back to South Korea, where I'll be spending a few days wandering around Seoul, the capital of South Korea.

I have visited Seoul many years ago, so in this trip, I will be returning to some of the attractions, some of them familiar, as well as cover new attractions that I have yet to visit.

Palace hopping! Seoul's palaces are located close to each other, making it easy to explore its history in a day.

After a day of visiting palaces, I visited Seoul tower.

Nice view of the city of Seoul 😀

In a "plane" with some famous personalities haha!

In an ice cave

One of South Korea's famous cuisine is the ginseng chicken. In Seoul, this is the famed eatery to try the excellent dish.

Costing ~S$15, this filling meal comes with side dishes, with big pots of kimchi.

There are two theme parks in Seoul: Everland and Lotte World, both of which I am visiting for the first time.

Everland !

Lotte World, an indoor theme park with an outdoor component.

The outdoor castle, quite similar to the Disneyland castle

Both theme parks are beautifully set up and definitely worth a visit when in Seoul. I'm glad I have the opportunity to visit both!

While in Seoul for a couple of days, I stayed at various hostels just to try out the accommodations. I shall review and compare these hostels in a subsequent post.

SAS Lounge Chicago review

At Chicago airport, Asiana Airlines uses the SAS lounge which I felt is underwhelming for a business class lounge. It had a great Scandinavian decor. But otherwise, the amenities were lacking.

Star Alliance Gold members had access to this lounge too

This is about all the light bites that the lounge has to offer late at night, in terms of food.

The lounge is on the small side. It does not have washrooms nor showers. On the positive side, it has views of the tarmac and aircraft.

Soon, it was time to board my Asiana Airlines flight to Incheon, South Korea where I will embark on my Asia tour, the last segment of my mega trip last december. This flight sector is on a B777-200 aircraft featuring similar business class seats as the A350 aircraft which I have reviewed, so I will not repeat it here.

In my next post, I shall detail my sightseeing adventures in Seoul !

A Night tour of Chicago

After visiting Hawaii, I took three consecutive, domestic flights to Chicago on mainland United States. On hindsight, I was very fortunate that none of these flights had any delay. Because if there were, then there would likely be a cascading effect. I would probably miss my subsequent connections to Chicago.

Night skyline of Chicago

The first flight is on United Airlines from Honolulu to San Francisco.

It is an overnight flight on a B777-200 aircraft, I think, reaching San Francisco in the early morning hours. There is no PTV, though United offers free entertainment streaming on its app in-flight. On U.S. domestic flights, there is no complimentary meal service in economy class, even if the flight duration is quite long. Only complimentary drink and snacks are served.

My breakfast at San Francisco airport

On my second flight from San Francisco to Seattle, there is PTV at each seat.

Only complimentary drinks and snacks are served in U.S. domestic economy class

On my third flight, I'm taking Delta Airlines A319 aircraft, fitted with PTV at every seat. This is actually my favourite U.S. airline.

A generous serving of snacks and drinks

Across the North American continent

It was sunset upon landing in Chicago

Due to flight scheduling, I'm not able to explore San Francisco and Seattle while in transit. It's alright with me as I have been to both cities before. I did manage to set aside a longer connection time in Chicago so that I can visit the city for the first time.

After landing in Chicago, I wanted to find luggage storage to store my bag while I wander around the city. Fortunately, the airport hotel receptionist offers to hold my luggage for a small fee even though I'm not staying at the hotel. He didn't specify how much though so I gave US$5 upfront. Not sure if that's too much or too little haha! I got a receipt which I need to keep to retrieve my bag.

After which, I took the airport train to downtown Chicago for a self-guided night tour. 

My impression is that Chicago isn't really a tourist city. Rather, it is a business city with many skyscrapers. There are hardly any tourists wandering around. Previously, I have read an article on the clean-up of the Chicago river and the addition of a river boardwalk. After alighting from the train, I walked along the city skyscrapers to get to hard rock cafe, then walked along the length of the river boardwalk. It was clean, though it was deserted at some parts. There could be more lighting in the dark. But otherwise, I still felt safe.

With that, I returned to the airport, retrieved my luggage and checked in for my Asiana Airlines flight back to Asia!

Aloha Hawaii !

December '18 was the first time I have the chance to visit Hawaii. Over the years, I have seen many beautiful pictures of Hawaii portrayed as a paradise, so I wanted to visit this place. In recent years, budget carriers AirAsia and Scoot started flying from Southeast Asia via Osaka, Japan to Honolulu, Hawaii so this gave me a chance to travel there on a budget.

From Busan, South Korea, I took a short flight on Peach Airline, a Japanese budget carrier, to Osaka, Japan, so that I can connect to AirAsiaX flight from Osaka to Honolulu, Hawaii.

Upon arrival at Honolulu airport, there are unique airport buses that transfer passengers to the main arrival building for immigration formalities. At the arrival hall, I pre-booked an airport shuttle to send me to Polynesian hostel, where I'll be staying for the night. 

After leaving my luggage at the hostel, I quickly headed out to my first stop: the waikiki beach. Literally just a short walk from my hostel.

Waikiki beach, a tourist attraction in Honolulu

Hawaii has a year round tropical climate, even in december. So for once on this trip, I can put aside my winter coat.

There are many shopping malls and hotels along the main street in Waikiki. There are ABC stores selling Hawaiian souvenirs. To me, the main street is very commercialized.

On my second day in Honolulu, a rainbow !

Polynesian hostel is able to arrange a group tour to visit Pearl Harbour at a low price. It's a place I have known about when I was studying history in school. Truly fascinating to see it first-hand.

There is first a talk in the auditorium, followed by a boat tour around the memorial.

The Pearl Harbour tour took up half the day. 

Upon returning to Waikiki, I visited Diamond Head using the public bus.

After alighting from the diamond head monument, it is a long walk uphill and through a traffic tunnel to reach the diamond head entrance.

After visiting the diamond head, it is soon time to head back to the hostel, pick up my bags and take the same airport shuttle for my flight.

Honolulu airport departure area has an outdoor garden featuring great pavilions! 

 Great outdoor opportunities for plane-spotting!

Hawaii is one of the main highlights of this trip. I am glad I have the chance to visit this place. Waikiki beach, pearl harbour and diamond head are some of the must-see attractions on Honolulu. Next time, probably after visiting other countries, I would come back again, but this time taking the Pride of America cruise around Hawaii!

My travel updates

My June trip is getting closer so now is a good time to update my itinerary. I spent much of today planning and booking my trips to and within Russia.

Since the last update, I have discovered and booked a cheap flight from South Africa to Europe on Expedia, a third party travel site. I have used Expedia previously and found it to be reliable for flight bookings, so I decided to book with it again.

I had been looking out for cheap flights from South Africa, either Johannesburg or Cape Town to anywhere in Europe. The cheapest I had came across was on Iberia for ~S$333, from Johannesburg to Barcelona one way. Unfortunately, the fare was soon gone and the next cheapest was above $400. 

Just the other day, I chanced upon a set of three full service flights from Johannesburg to Frankfurt, Germany at ~S$300 one way. Definitely a bargain. It involves two transfers, starting with Kenya Airways flight from Johannesburg to Nairobi in Africa, then Air France long haul flight from Nairobi to Paris, France, finally another Air France short haul flight from Paris to Frankfurt. The stopover was reasonable at about 1.5 hours to 2 hours. I booked this flight itinerary soon after.

There was another flight option for the same price. It involves taking two flights with Kenya Airways (including the long haul), connecting at Nairobi and Amsterdam. The stopover was as short as 50 minutes. 

A 50-minutes connection time might be too tight for me, especially if the first flight was delayed. Moreover, the checked in luggage most probably wouldn't make it to the second flight, from my unfortunate prior experience.

Comparing between Kenya Airways and Air France, both of which I have yet taken, I would prefer Air France personally. So with that, I went ahead with the first option.

Once in Europe, my next stop would be Russia. But before that, there is one country in western Europe that I would like to revisit: Germany. 

I have transited Frankfurt airport numerous times but have yet to visit the city proper. So I thought this upcoming trip would be a good time to visit Frankfurt and Berlin, another city that I have long wanted to visit. 

It helps that Easyjet, an European budget carrier has reasonable fares from Berlin to Helsinki, Finland, for the date I need to travel. Due to lack of budget carriers flying to Helsinki, flight prices between other European countries and Finland has always been expensive. So quickly, I booked this Easyjet flight to get me to Helsinki.

From Helsinki, I was hoping to get to St Petersburg, Russia. Either by overnight ferry, or by train taking a couple of hours. Due to my limited travel schedule, I will be taking the day train. From online review, it seems that immigration formalities are carried out on the train, so hopefully less waiting time and longer tour time !

From St Petersburg, I will be taking the overnight train to Moscow. There are numerous daytime and overnight timings so I chose the cheapest timing. I booked a third class berth for myself at a price of S$28, simply for the experience. There are cheaper seat options too, but since it is an overnight journey, a bed option for sleeping would be more comfortable. There is also the more expensive second class compartment, the difference, from my online research, is that it is enclosed for quiet and privacy. This is the main and probably only difference.

Russian train tickets can be bought online at the official Russian railways website offering the cheapest rate, or at third party travel sites but often with higher rates.

At Moscow, I hope to visit the main attractions: Kremlin and the St Basil Cathedral. They have appeared in many travel commercials and have enticed me to visit over the years.

After Moscow, I would like to embark on the famed tran-siberia railway, a six-day continuous train journey, from Moscow, passing through Siberia, which is Russia's hinterland, to either Beijing, Mongolia or Vladivostok in the Russia far east. I chose to travel to Vladivostok mainly because of price. It is far more expensive to travel to Beijing, which sees more tourists. The date didn't work out for me to get to Mongolia either, a country I would like to visit as well. But probably for another time.

The tran-siberia train stops in many Russian cities. I can choose to get off and explore these cities, but I will need to book separate train tickets to continue my journey. After doing some combinations, I realise that it is much cheaper to do the continuous journey than to make stops. And the more stops I make, the more expensive the journey becomes. As budget is a big concern for me, I decided to ride the train without stops. On the comfort level, I decided to book myself in second class. First class is beyond my reach, financially, so second class it is.

The Russian railways website is quite easy to use and book train tickets. There is an option for English, so no need to use google translate. I can select the seat number I want without extra charge.  There is a train schedule which lists all the stops en-route and how long each stop is. Hopefully the train will be on time.

I have yet to finalize my travel plans beyond Vladivostok. But by then, I guess it will be time for me to return home. Otherwise, I will be over my travel budget. Haha!

From Vladivostok, I am planning to take the weekly ferry from Vladivostok to Donghae, South Korea or to Sakaiminato, Japan. I have yet to make up my mind, though I did prefer heading to Japan. I realise that Sakaiminato is near Tottori, a place that I recently just thought of visiting. So why not visit it if it's on the way?

So I'm getting really excited about this trip. Quite some unique experiences waiting.. Visiting my sixth continent, first time visiting South Africa and Russia, taking the tran-siberia railway. As well as taking a number of airlines for the first time.

Hopefully in time to come I can finalise the last segment of my upcoming trip. 😀 

Tour of South Korea part 1

During my December '19 trip, I went to South Korea twice. My two-day stop in South Korea happened after my Turkish Airlines flight from Gothenburg, Sweden. My second stop in Seoul for a longer tour will happen some days later.

My flight landed in Seoul at night. After immigration formalities, I took the airport train to the express bus terminal and purchased a bus ticket to Busan on the same night.

The ride was quick and uneventful, with a short stop in a town. I reached Busan in the early morning hours. After alighting the coach, I walked in the terminal building to find a spot to spend the night. On the second level, there was a 24-hour lotteria fast-food restaurant within the terminal building. I ordered a meal and spent the remaining of the night in it. There were few other patrons and it was safe. There are power plugs at some seats to charge my devices too. More importantly, this saved me a night's accommodation cost.

Lotteria restaurant, Busan bus terminal

As day breaks, my first order of the day is to get to Haedong Yong Gung Temple. This temple is located by the sea, and is the most beautiful temple in South Korea. I have visited it once before in 2009-2010. Its sunrise views is simply stunning!

To get there on public transport, a subway followed by a bus ride is necessary. After alighting from the nearest bus stop, it is then a ~30 minute walk to reach the temple by the sea.

After watching the sunrise and having a cup of tea at the teahouse, it is time to visit the haeundae beach, made famous by the movie of the same name.

Great views from the haeundae beach😀

After which, I went to visit the Gamcheon culture village for the first time. This involves hiking up a hill.

This view of colourful houses more than makes up the effort to walk up the hill. Definitely worth it !

This sums up my quick tour of Busan in South Korea. I headed to the airport on the subway for my peach airline flight, a Japanese budget carrier, to Osaka, Japan then transit to an AirAsiaX flight to Hawaii. This is my first time visiting Hawaii and I'm looking forward to it!