Lounge Act

I'm not high maintenance.

(OK, now that you've stopped laughing...) Really, I can hang with the rest of the unwashed masses. But if I can find the airport lounge, get the hotel room upgrade, sweet-talk my way into Business Class (can anybody do that these days?) well then, hey, I'm gonna do my best. Really, it's purely for professional purposes. I need to experience these things if I'm going to be successful in the Travel industry.

Which is why one of the best travel investments I made recently was to pay United Airlines at the end of 2005 to buy the last few miles I needed to qualify for Premiere Executive... which is also Star Alliance Gold. As a Gold customer you can visit an airline lounge in just about any airport in the Star Alliance system as long as you are on an international trip on an alliance carrier.

That came in very handy this summer on our way through Frankfurt to/from Croatia. Rob and I, along w/ Tanya and Dan, were able to spend some time in the Lufthansa Airlines Lounge which was just slightly more civilized than the main gate area.

So, I figured I'd use the same trick as I flew Varig on my way between Rio and Buenos Aires -- my last chance to do so as my Premiere Exec runs out at the end of February. (Far too many trips to/from DCA and LGA on Delta this year instead of trans-continental flights on UA.) What I didn't realize was that Varig left the Star Alliance in December. Neither, apparently, did the nice women at the Varig lounges who let me in.

The lounge in Rio (GIG) was actually very nice. Well maintained. Clean. Relatively new furniture. Edible sandwiches. The lounge in Buenos Aires (EZE) was a different story. It reminded me of the old LaGuardia Shuttle Terminal before we renovated it in 1999. Beat up chairs soaked in cigarette smoke. An old coffee machine. And, no Wi-Fi! I didn't stay very long.

I high-tailed it over to United. It's there that the very nice United lady told me that Varig left the Star Alliance and, apparently, took with it my privileges. But, she did point me toward the American Express lounge... which is the moral of this long-winded blog entry.

American Express has a Centurion Lounge here in the Buenos Aires (EZE) airport. Anyone with an Amex card can use the facility. As best I can tell from the Amex.com site, they have a similar lounge in Sao Paulo and Mexico City. I couldn’t find any additional clubs listed on a very quick search of the Amex.com site. And, while the site says Platinum card members get access, I flashed my two Gold cards and walked right in.

The EZE club is very well maintained and spacious. The staff was super friendly. There appeared to be a full bar and snacks. And, yes Wi-Fi and Web access. Finally, the annual fees and bank charges I’ve been paying American Express all these years have paid off. Of course, by the time I found the club, my flight was boarding and I could only glance around before running back out the door. Sigh.