Air New Zealand

Honolulu Airport gets free Wi-Fi; you may get a free trip.

Contests, Entertainment, Events, Wi-Fi, , , ,

The folks at ShakaNet and FreeFi Networks have teamed up to offer free wireless internet access throughout the concourses, lounges and concession areas at Honolulu International Airport.

Hooray!   Let’s hope the signal reaches out to the cultural garden areas as well.

And if you’re not lucky enough to be in Hawaii this time of year, perhaps you’re somewhere where you need to wear a sweater.  A really ugly Christmas sweater.

If your sweater is truly ugly, take a picture of yourself in it and upload the photo to the Air New Zealand Facebook page by December 31st.

The person with the ugliest sweater will receive roundtrip economy class tickets for two from Los Angeles or San Francisco to Auckland on Air New Zealand.

Enter the ugly Christmas sweater contest here and good luck!

North Pole ice santa

Lounge review: Air New Zealand Koru Club Lounge at LAX

Air Travel, Kids, Kids travel, Layover, ,

Koru Club Lounge LAX

Except for that year when my husband bought me a United Airlines Red Carpet Club membership as a birthday present, I’m not a regular in airline club lounges.

Although I’d certainly like to be.

Especially after spending a few hours at Air New Zealand’s Koru Club Lounge at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX)

Air New Zealand lax lounge

Located upstairs in Terminal 2, this large, bright club room has two walls of windows, great views out onto the airfield and several zones conducive for reading, working, watching news or grabbing a bite to eat.

Amenity-wise, the lounge offers complimentary wireless Internet access, phone booths, work stations with computers, showers, a copy machine and, in among the refreshments, wines and vodkas from New Zealand.

I don’t travel with kids, but I bet families – and other passengers – really appreciate the kids play area equipped with books, games, coloring projects and a flat screen for showing videos.

If you’re traveling Business Premier on Air New Zealand your ticket gets you into the Koru Lounge. But you can also gain access if you’re a Star Alliance Gold Member traveling internationally on other airlines (i.e. Air Canada) in Terminal 2 or if you buy a $55 day pass.

At first that $55 sounds sort of steep. But considering what you’d pay for internet access, lunch and a drink or two at the airport, this pencils out to a great deal.

And how did I find my way into the lounge? I was on my way to London with Air New Zealand as part of a Visit London media tour. My goal: inspect the Air New Zealand airport lounges and find cheap and offbeat places in London to write about.

And of course, to spend some time stuck at Heathrow Airport.

Airports – and now airlines – trash talking each other

Advertising, Air Travel, Airlines, Airports, Baggage, Complaints, Fun Stuff, , , , , , ,

For my At the Airport column on USAToday.com this month, Airport wars escalate with attack ads aimed at rivals, I wrote about a new YouTube video about San Francisco International Airport, that features cameo appearances by SF  Mayor Gavin Newsom and Marion & Vivian Brown, the kooky 83-year-old identical twins who have become beloved San Francisco icons.  Designed to promote SFO as the connecting hub of choice for travelers coming to the United States from New Zealand or Australia, the short video compares SFO’s airy, international terminal to an unnamed airport simply referred to as “the bad airport.”

An SFO spokesperson insists there is no specific “bad airport,” but given the target market I’d guess, oh… that LAX is the airport campaign designers had in mind.

Other airports have no problem calling out the competitor they’re trashing by name. Canada’s Edmonton International Airport recently rolled out a “Stop the Calgary Habit” campaign, urging residents of central and northern Alberta to stop connecting through or driving to Calgary International Airport.  The campaign has tag line: “When you go south, so does your air service,”; videos showing repentant passengers; and a tool kit that includes an “Emergency Hypno Cure” to help break the habit.

Of course, there was the challenge Air New Zealand threw down to Southwest Airlines.  Air New Zealand  produced a series of cheeky commercials and an in-flight safety video that showed airline employees dressed in nothing but cleverly applied body paint.  Then ANZ challenged Southwest Airlines to do the same:

Southwest’s answer?  “We’d rather rap”:

Now we have two airlines trading smackdown videos.  Air Tran Airways and Southwest.  See how Southwest started it.

Air Tran’s response?

“We thought about it and thought about it and decided to not respond at all. After all, focusing on running the best low-cost carrier in America is enough to keep us busy.  BUT…if we were to respond, it might look something like this:”

Can’t wait to see what’s next!

Tidbits for travelers: YVR’s Olympic rings & Air New Zealand’s Skycouches

Air Travel, Airlines, Art, Aviation history, Design, Events, Fun Stuff, Observation Decks, Seating, Sleeping, , , , ,

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?

Air New Zealand Matchmaking Party – kisses all around

Air Travel, Dating, Etiquette, Events, Fun Stuff, , ,

Last night, acting, looking, and in a few cases smelling like a bunch of junior high kids embarking on their first prom, about a hundred of the Americans who flew to Auckland on Air New Zealand’s Matchmaking Flight joined 150 nattily-dressed Kiwis for the Great Matchmaking Party.  As billed, it was a night of inter-hemisphere mingling, complete with dating games and dance performances, including a repeat of this choreographed dance the flight crew performed in the holding gate at LAX airport.

Were matches made?  You bet. Were lives changed? Time will tell… but at least everyone has a great story.

Air New Zealand Match Making Party

More on Air New Zealand’s Matchmaking Flight

Air Travel, Airlines, Dating, Entertainment, Events, Fun Stuff, , , , ,

Greetings from Auckland!  Today many of the 111 folks who flew on Air New Zealand’s Matchmaking Flight from Los Angeles will spend the day prepping and primping for tonight’s gala party.

Air New Zealand bag

Not just a party, but a get-all-dressed-up Matchmaking Ball, where folks who took the 13 hour flight over from the U.S. will get to meet and mingle with 100 or so locals – Kiwis – who have been following the “find the one” festivities from afar.

AIR NEW ZEALAND fancy meeting you

One person who won’t be at the party is 87 year-old Irma Adams. She was one of the 100 or so “regular” passengers who showed up for her Tuesday night LAX – Auckland flight who didn’t know that the back cabin of the airplane was going to be party central. Rather than get irritated, as some other passengers did, she got busy.  Delighted at the prospect of a party and tickled at the idea that there was matchmaking going on, she crashed the pre-flight party and the on-board festivities.

AIR NEW ZEALAND IRMA ADAMS

I couldn’t keep my eye on Irma throughout the entire flight. But on touch-down, Irma told me she’d had the time of her life. And she coquettishly denied that she was the one who’d made a date with one of the pilots.

But I did notice one of the flight attendants slip Irma a bottle of champagne – with a wink – as she got off the plane.

Air New Zealand’s matchmaker flight touches down in Auckland

Air Travel, Dating, Fun Stuff, ,

Just wanted to share a few photos from Air New Zealand’s matchmaking flight from Los Angeles to Auckland, which left LAX last night about 10:30 and arrived in a rainy Auckland this morning around 7:30 am.

First surprise: not everyone was 21 years old.  Folks who signed up for the flight appeared to range in age from 20 to 60.

Second surprise:  the crew!  During a send-off party in the gate area, which included a practice round of speed-dating, passengers were treated to a choreographed dance performance by the entire crew of the airplane. Including the pilots.   The song? Beyoncé’s Single Ladies (Put a ring on it).

ANZ DANCE

Hi-jinx continued on-board, with meet-your-neighbor party games and the unpacking of the goodie bags, which included lip balm, perfume and tiny panties, modeled here by two, um, creative and enthusiastic passengers.

ANZ pantie gals

More later…including the story of the 87-year old who crashed the party.