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Volume 6, Issue 17, April 30, 2008 |
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Eos, the all-premium airline that flew between the New York and London metro areas, folded its wings on Sunday, the last in a recent spate of airline closings that has included ATA, Aloha, Skybus, Oasis and MaxJet. So what does this portend for its fellow airlines in general, and your future travel plans in particular?
Yes, oil prices are having a severe impact on all the airlines, and those without deep pockets may not survive. As Frontier, which filed for bankruptcy but is still operating, found out, the credit card companies are also getting squirrelly. Because an airline folding leaves the credit card companies with a lot of exposure, they require what is called “holdbacks” from the airlines, i.e. upfront money the airline escrows with the credit card company to mitigate against loss. Because Frontier’s financial picture looked wobbly, at least one credit card provider asked them to put more money “down,” and to make a long story short, they didn’t have the cash to do it.
Are the bigger airlines a safer bet? Probably. However, as seen with the recent equipment-related delays, problems with a big airline can snowball. If you have a ticket on a smaller airline that goes under, it’s more likely that another airline will have the room and the graciousness to accommodate you, though you might have to use a different airport. But one of the advantages to the big airlines is that they are almost all publicly held companies, so you can read their financial statements (or read what the analysts are saying about them) and be less likely to be caught by surprise by sudden failure.
Paying for your ticket by credit card is a must, since if you pay by cash or check, you’ll wind up getting pennies on the dollar after waiting in the bankruptcy-court queue. Travel insurance plans are also a good idea if they cover the cost of replacement transportation and any extra nights waiting for an available flight at a reasonable cost.
Expect ticket prices to keep going up as low-cost carriers get knocked out of some markets; current price hikes don’t come close to covering the rising cost of fuel to the airlines. And one more piece of advice: Use your miles, and look into the rules of your “mileage bank.” In addition to more bankruptcies, mergers and consolidations are in the wind and all your miles may not survive intact. 
American Airlines is doubling elite-qualifying miles on all routes flown on the airline, including American Eagle and AmericanConnection, through June 15. All miles flown since April 16 will be counted, as long as you register by June 15. The bonus miles cannot be used toward travel-award redemption. A similar program was recently offered by Delta, but registration for that one expires today.
Want to get in a full day of business in New York and fly to Paris overnight, or vice versa? Then you might like Air France’s new schedule. Effective June 23, Air France is adding an eastbound flight out of JFK departing at 1 a.m. and arriving in Paris at 2:10 p.m.. There will also be a similar new flight in the other direction: You’ll be able to leave Paris at 8:45 p.m. and arrive at JFK at 10:50 p.m. the same calendar day.
The St. Regis Singapore, now officially open, has become the first new international luxury hotel in Singapore in more than a decade. The hotel has 299 deluxe guestrooms and suites, a central location, multiple restaurants and bars, a spa, and butler service, plus an outdoor swimming pool and indoor and outdoor tennis courts.
Ever wonder what happens to all the stuff that gets confiscated at airport security? No, it doesn’t all get thrown away, or donated to charity. The TSA turns over non-hazardous items to state surplus property agencies through the General Service Administration. As long as the state agencies arrange to pick up the stuff, they can sell it along with other confiscated good. According to Fox News, for example, the State of Pennsylvania has averaged $80,000 a year in income from such merchandise, selling it on EBay or via other Internet outlets.
Northwest Airlines has signed a deal with SuperShuttle, the shared-ride service that operates at 28 U.S. airports, and with ExecuCar, the luxury-sedan service owned by SuperShuttle that operates at 11 airports. As long as you book your ground transportation online, you earn 50 WorldPerks miles for each one-way SuperShuttle trip and 150 miles for each ExecuCar ride. SuperShuttle has a similar mileage arrangement with US Airways.
Robata Bar
1401 Ocean Ave.
Santa Monica , CA 90401
tel 310 458 4771
www.robatabar.com
The scene was crowded and noisy, perhaps 100 people packed into a small restaurant that was bursting at the seams. Sake cocktails were being consumed as if they were glasses of spring water, at the tables or along the 20-foot walnut bar, and every few minutes, when new customers opened the front door, the sushi chefs would scream, in unison, “irasshaimase,” welcoming the guests with a traditional Japanese robatayaki greeting.
Despite the commotion, or because of it, I was able to enjoy the food and the atmosphere of this relatively new restaurant (it opened last October). Robatayaki defines itself through its robata cuisine, which means placing almost anything on the menu — aged rib-eye, chicken meatballs, Chilean sea bass, jumbo shrimp, shiitake mushrooms, filet mignon, foie gras —on a grill that sits over a bed of 1,000-degree imported Japanese charcoal. The food sears almost immediately, the flavor and moisture retained. The robata items were small, with prices around $3 a portion, the problem being that each was so good I could not stop at three or four or six.
Other menu choices included larger servings: seaweed salad with ginger vinaigrette; sea bass “harumaki” springroll; a wonderful hand-roll trio with spicy tuna, salmon, and lobster. I also tried the salmon, Japanese snapper and mango tartare from the raw bar. A refreshing drink was the restaurant’s signature cocktail called Robata Infusion, with sake, vodka, cantaloupe, watermelon, pineapple and cranberry juice. With dinner I savored Japanese Red Sun beer.
Robata Bar is across the street from Palisades Park, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean. The restaurant is a little kitschy, with more than 5,000 tassels hanging from the ceiling. Its sister restaurant, Sushi Roku, owned by the same company (Los Angeles-based Innovative Dining Group), is right next door, part of the same busy dining complex.
Robata Bar offers a good opportunity to experience beef, fish and vegetables cooked in the authentic robatayaki tradition, and don’t be surprised to hear the chefs thank you when you leave with a sincere, “arigato gozaimashita" .
Score: ••••• Ron Bernthal
If you can plan ahead, Continental Airlines is offering some sweet deals on business-class airfares to Europe this summer. Round-trip tickets must be purchased either 30 or 60 days prior to travel, and are good for departures through Aug. 29 (return by Sept. 5). The 30-day-advance-purchase fares start at $2,258 New York (EWR)–Manchester (MAN), while the 60-day fares are as low as $1,598. The Summer Sale is good from multiple Continental gateway cities in the United States to most of its European destinations.
London ’s luxury hotel The May Fair is offering a Let Loose in London package on weekends through Sept. 8 that equals about a 30 percent savings off regular rates. Good on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, the package is priced at approximately $430 a night and includes a full English breakfast, free WiFi, tax, 20 percent off at The May Fair Spa, and vouchers for 25 percent off at affiliated restaurants and local attraction entry fees.
Spend a little time on the WorldHotels.com Web site and you could be amply rewarded. To enter its sweepstakes (no purchase required), browse through the hotels on its site (there are more than 500, in 70 countries) and when you spot one for your dream vacation, click to enter the sweepstakes. Two winners will each get to bring a guest for a week to their chosen hotel, and will also be awarded 500,000 premium miles in the Lufthansa/Swiss Miles & More program, which can be redeemed on Star Alliance carriers.
Add a few days to a China business trip to step back in history. The recently opened Shangri-La Hotel, Huhhot, just an hour’s flight from Beijing (PEK), is offering a three-day, two-night package called Grassland Culture & Genghis Khan’s Footprints. For approximately $625 double occupancy, you get city and country tours, one night in the hotel and one night in an inner Mongolian yurt, plus some meals; extra nights are $143.
Save on flights to Europe if you can depart before May 15 (seven-day advance purchase is required) and return by June 15. Lufthansa is holding a sale on coach seats to a wide range of destinations. Sample round-trip fares: New York (JFK)- Munich (MUC) $438; San Francisco (SFO)-Budapest (BUD) $734.
