Departure at MEL, Air NZ Lounge
Feeling rejuvenated after a 1 night stay at the Westin Melbourne (forgot to take pics, sorry!) I headed to MEL all pumped up for my month long vacation. The air conditioning of Terminal 2 was a great relief from the scorching Melburnian sun. I confused the poor TG check in agent a fair bit as hardly anyone (any sensible person that is) uses TG982 MEL-BKK to go to the USA and she didn't know what the code for Chicago O'Hare (ORD) was. She was mildly freaked out when I recited all the codes and flight numbers she needed to type into her computer to tag my bags and issue my BPs. My bags were tagged to ORD via BKK and FRA. Unfortunately IRT wasn't working too well and I would need to pick up my LH BP at Suvarnabhumi. I headed straight to a relatively quiet passport control and then to the Air New Zealand lounge which is located 2 levels below the departure concourse.
The Air NZ lounge is by far the best lounge in MEL. Stylish and warm decor, and comfy couches. Better variety of food and beverages than the SKL, and surprisingly children-free compared to the QC. Spotters will love this lounge as it is one of the few lounges in MEL with windows looking out to the tarmac. This also means that natural light is plentiful - another reason why this is one of my favourite lounges.
Unfortunately you'd need to be flying either NZ or TG (who signed an agreement with NZ) to gain access, even if you're a *G customer. Or butter up the lounge dragons (well worth a try!). Otherwise you will be sent up the escalator to the SQ lounge. And technically they are well within their rights to do so, due to a Star Alliance 'capacity control' clause for airports where there are more than 1 Star Alliance airline-operated lounges in operation, which they enjoy invoking. And understandably so as the lounge can get pretty busy during peak hour departures for NZ's transtasman flights.
And so it was with much glee that I waltzed into the NZ lounge near Gate 15 without needing to think of an excuse as to why they should let me in instead of exiling me up to the SKL.
You'd need to look at the pics starting with the bottom one. Apologies for the reversed chronological order of the pictures. I have no idea why they got uploaded to photobucket in that order.
Feeling rejuvenated after a 1 night stay at the Westin Melbourne (forgot to take pics, sorry!) I headed to MEL all pumped up for my month long vacation. The air conditioning of Terminal 2 was a great relief from the scorching Melburnian sun. I confused the poor TG check in agent a fair bit as hardly anyone (any sensible person that is) uses TG982 MEL-BKK to go to the USA and she didn't know what the code for Chicago O'Hare (ORD) was. She was mildly freaked out when I recited all the codes and flight numbers she needed to type into her computer to tag my bags and issue my BPs. My bags were tagged to ORD via BKK and FRA. Unfortunately IRT wasn't working too well and I would need to pick up my LH BP at Suvarnabhumi. I headed straight to a relatively quiet passport control and then to the Air New Zealand lounge which is located 2 levels below the departure concourse.
The Air NZ lounge is by far the best lounge in MEL. Stylish and warm decor, and comfy couches. Better variety of food and beverages than the SKL, and surprisingly children-free compared to the QC. Spotters will love this lounge as it is one of the few lounges in MEL with windows looking out to the tarmac. This also means that natural light is plentiful - another reason why this is one of my favourite lounges.
Unfortunately you'd need to be flying either NZ or TG (who signed an agreement with NZ) to gain access, even if you're a *G customer. Or butter up the lounge dragons (well worth a try!). Otherwise you will be sent up the escalator to the SQ lounge. And technically they are well within their rights to do so, due to a Star Alliance 'capacity control' clause for airports where there are more than 1 Star Alliance airline-operated lounges in operation, which they enjoy invoking. And understandably so as the lounge can get pretty busy during peak hour departures for NZ's transtasman flights.
And so it was with much glee that I waltzed into the NZ lounge near Gate 15 without needing to think of an excuse as to why they should let me in instead of exiling me up to the SKL.
You'd need to look at the pics starting with the bottom one. Apologies for the reversed chronological order of the pictures. I have no idea why they got uploaded to photobucket in that order.
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