Posts in the category "Observation Decks":

Lufthansa pilots have scheduled a four day strike beginning on Monday, February 22, 2010.  Negotiations are currently underway, but if those talks fail to avert the strike, the carrier will be forced to cancel most of its flights. And that will leave passengers stuck at the airport.

The upside? If you do end up spending more time than you planned at a German airport, you’ll be able to find plenty of things to do.

Munich Airport, for example, has an outdoor observation deck and a great indoor/outdoor beer garden with an on-site brewery.

The Hamburg Airport also has observation decks as well as the Airport Model Exhibition – a miniature version of the airport complete with buildings, taxiways, runways, landing strips, and 8,000 light-emitting diodes that light up the tiny airport’s night sky – all on a scale of 1:500.

And at the Dusseldorf, Munich, Hamburg, and Berlin airports you’ll also find Lufthansa WorldShop stores, which offer a promising spot to do some Souvenir Sunday shopping.

The airline recently opened its second WorldShop store at the Frankfurt Airport (Terminal 1, Area B) and, like the others; the store is filled with travel items, backpacks, travel accessories, electronics, model aircraft, toys, and some other fun stuff.  Shoppers can earn Miles & More award miles for items purchased here and – here’s a nice twist – also buy items using accumulated miles.

I’m especially taken with this A380 Cookie Jar

The cool container sells for about $107 – or 22,000 miles, so we can’t make it our pick for Souvenir Sunday, which usually has an upper limit of $10.  But poking around the WorldShop catalog I did find this cute guy, which sells for 9 Euros (about $12) or 7500 miles.

But since this is Souvenir Sunday and do we have that under $10 rule (which may need to be re-adjusted soon for inflation..),  we offer these items sent along by the folks at Virginia’s Richmond International Airport(RIC), where a variety of local museums are represented in the  Hudson News store in the airport’s Atrium area, next to the security screening checkpoint for Concourse B.

These items are from the Edgar Allan Poe Museum

(Beer mugs! )

(Poe action figure – with removable raven! )

Have you found a great souvenir while stuck at the airport? If it’s under $10, “of” the city or region and, ideally, a bit offbeat, please snap a photo and send it along. It may show up as our pick for a future Souvenir Sunday.

Categories: Airport shops, Airports, Bars, Fun Stuff, Layover, Museums, Observation Decks, Shopping, Souvenir Sunday, Souvenirs
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The Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics kick off in just a few weeks and Vancouver International Airport (YVR) is getting ready to welcome more than 230,000 athletes and Olympics-bound visitors. Actually, the airport has been sprucing up for quite a while. In addition to its swanky new Observation Gallery, the airport has had these giant Olympic rings on site since last spring.

The installation is almost 46 feet tall, weighs more than 9,000 pounds and has 20,385 individual LED lights. Here’s a video that shows the installation process and some of the colored-patterns that can light up the sky.

In other shiny news, the folks at Air New Zealand unveiled their “Skycouch” today. It’s a specially designed row of three seats that can transform into a flat space suitable for stretching out and sleeping.  That is of course, if you’re not too tall, you don’t mind snuggling up with your seatmate, and you have purchased the entire row.  (The airline says it will sell you third seat at a discount if you’ve purchased the other two).

(Photo courtesy Air New Zealand)

Twenty-two sets of Skycouch seats will be available on Air New Zealand’s new Boeing 777-300 ER planes, which will arrive in November.

And since this is the airline that sponsored a recent Matchmaking flight and created an adorable “nearly naked” commercial and safety video, I fully expect the airline to offer a program to find travelers the perfect snuggle-mate for these flights.

Otherwise- why bother?

Along with the Skycouch and other new amenities, the airline also introduced upgrades for the Premium Economy cabin, including the cool-looking “Spaceseats” you can see in the airline’s promo video.

So what do you think? “Groundbreaking” or just really darn cool?

Categories: Air Travel, Airlines, Art, Aviation history, Design, Events, Fun Stuff, Observation Decks, Seating, Sleeping
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Flying to or through Germany’s Munich Airport anytime soon? If so, be sure to download the free new stopover guide, which includes detailed information about all the airport amenities – from the “erotic boutique” and the Airbräu (the world’s first airport brewery) to the outdoor observation deck, the art exhibits, and the spas.

In addition to coupons for on-airport shops and restaurants, including free beer, wine, ice cream, and coffee (with very reasonable minimum purchases), the stopover guides offers discounts and information for tours in town.

Right now the airport is having its huge outdoor Christmas Market, complete with 300 fir trees, more than two dozen market stands, an ice-skating rink, live entertainment and visits from Santa.

Categories: Air Travel, Airport guides, Airport shops, Entertainment, Events, Food, Free Stuff, Holidays, Music, Observation Decks
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I recently put together a USATODAY.com column highlighting some of the observation decks at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP), Baltimore-Washington Thurgood Marshall International Airport (BWI), and other North American airports.

Today I’ve got a column about plane-spotting sites outside airport terminals.

The sites listed range from Millbrae, California’s Bayfront Park, which offers great views of take-offs and landings at San Francisco International Airport (SFO), to Gravelly Point near Washington, D.C.’s Reagan National Airport (DCA), and a few unusual but, we’re assured, legal spots nearby Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL).

For a photo-gallery and a list of other highly-recommended plane-spotting sites  around the country, please see the full column on USATODAY.com.

(Raleigh-Durham International Airport’s Observation Park)

And of course, please share your favorite plane-spotting sites.

Categories: Air Travel, Observation Decks, Planespotting
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I spent two hours touring the Prague Airport recently and found loads of welcome amenities; many of them brand new.

In addition to the free Wi-Fi service rolled out a few weeks ago (there are still a few kinks to work out; we couldn’t get it to work), the airport has a museum with vintage photos, documentary film footage and a replica historic aircraft that you can climb into.  The three-month old “Sky Relax” center offers salon services, showers, manicures and massages, while two new childrens play areas provide a fun place for kids to work off energy before their flights.

And both terminals have outdoor lookout terraces accessible before security.

Why all these fresh amenities?  “We started doing surveys and asking travelers what was missing from the airport and these were some of the things they mentioned,” my airport guide told me, “So we gave it to them.”

Makes sense to me.

Categories: Observation Decks, Wi-Fi
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