World Traveller 73 
American Airlines operates out of several hubs across the United States that include Miami, Los Angeles, Chicago and Dallas Fort Worth in the United States of America. As American Airlines operates in the One World airline alliance, it is a major competitor to United Airlines who operates in the Star Alliance airline alliance. We would get the opportunity to explore their American Airlines Admirals Club at their Dallas Fort Worth – Terminal C hub prior to our early morning departure.
This post is one chapter on our trip during the pandemic to Curaçao in the Southern Caribbean. This trip was enhanced through Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status and Hertz Gold Plus Rewards. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.
If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.
Read more from this trip:
- Introduction: The Caribbean Coves of Curaçao via American Airlines First Class
- American Airlines Business Class: Vancouver – Dallas Fort Worth
- Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott, Texas, USA
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge – Dallas Fort Worth C Gates
- American Airlines First Class: Dallas Fort Worth – Miami
- American Express Centurion Lounge Miami
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge Airlines – Miami Gate D30
- American Airlines Business Class: Miami – Curaçao
- Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort, Curaçao
- Cas Abo Beach
- Grote Knip Beach
- Klein Curaçao Island
- Crossing the Queen Emma Bridge into Willemstad, Curaçao
- VIP Lounge Curaçao – Hato International Airport, Curaçao
- American Airlines Business Class: Curaçao – Miami
- JW Marriott Miami, Florida, USA
- Turkish Airlines Business Lounge, Miami, USA
- American Airlines First Class: Miami – Los Angeles
- American Airlines Business Class: Los Angeles – Vancouver
Review: American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge – C Terminal, Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, Texas, United States of America
We departed a strange stay at the Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott hotel by Uber Black and headed to the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport C Terminal.
Checking Into American Airlines First Class:
We arrived to the Dallas Fort Worth airport at about 2:50 AM and wandered over to the American Airlines Check in. There were about fifteen people waiting in the economy check in line. We queued up as the first in the Priority Line for today.
The American Airlines attendants started work at 3 AM. We were among the first in line and were dealt with promptly. We checked our bags to Curaçao. We were re-issued new boarding cards and given our bag claim checks.
We immediately passed through TSA security which also opened at 3 AM. We arrived into a deserted terminal where there was almost nothing open.
Locating the American Airlines Admirals Club C Terminal:
The AAdmirals Club for the C Concourse is centrally located across from Gate C20. The AAdmirals Club is relatively easy to find and is well marked. You would be hard to miss it. Gate C20 is right in the middle of the circumference of the C Terminal semi circle.
The AAdmirals Club opened at 4 AM, which was early enough to capture the earliest banks of flights. Some carriers don’t open their lounge early enough to capture the first flights of the day. American Airlines should be commended for making it’s lounge available to all travellers, regardless when their flight leaves.
Accessing the American Airlines Admirals Club:
We rode the elevator up from the concourse floor to the top level “3”. We presented our boarding cards at the reception desk.
Thanks to complex lounge access rules in the United States where memberships are offered, it’s a little more challenging than most countries to access American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge. American Airlines also offers among the more restrictive access between the three airline alliances of One World, Star Alliance and Skyteam.
Access to the Admirals Club is permitted under the following circumstances:
The most likely way into the American Airlines Admirals Club is through a qualifying First or Business Class flight to an international destination. The qualifying destinations include:
Flights between the U.S. and:
- Asia
- Australia
- Canada (not always found on the eligibility list)
- Caribbean (not always found on the eligibility list)
- Central America
- Europe
- Mexico
- New Zealand
- South America
Access can be granted through select international itineraries. While Caribbean access is not normally on the list of international itineraries, we were able to gain access through Caribbean flights “for a limited time”. Normally, American Airlines considers international flights of the longer haul variety which include Southern South America, Europe, or Asia. Flights to Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and Northern South America are not always included.
If you’re in International First Class, you are entitled to bring one guest under this category.
You can also get in with Qualifying transcontinental flights as flights with seats ticketed as Flagship®, including flights from Los Angeles to:
- New York (JFK) and Los Angeles (LAX)
- JFK and San Francisco (SFO)
- JFK and Orange County (SNA)
- LAX and Miami (MIA)
Qualifying AAdvantage® Executive Platinum, Platinum Pro and Platinum, and qualifying One World Emerald and Sapphire level members to the above international destinations are also permitted access.
Admirals Club® members, including annual and lifetime members, Citi® / AAdvantage® Executive World Elite™ MasterCard® primary cardholders, ConciergeKeySM members and AirPassSM members with Admirals Club privileges. If you have a paid annual membership, this allows you access to:
- Domestic and international Admirals Club locations
- All Alaska Airlines Lounges (when departing on flights marketed and operated by American or Alaska Airlines)
- All Qantas Clubs (when departing on same-day flights operated by Qantas, or operated by American out of Auckland, New Zealand or Sydney, Australia)
- Select partner lounges operated by third parties (on same-day flights operated by American)
You can also purchase a day pass for a visit in advance or at the counter for $59 USD. The day passes sales are based on lounge capacity constraints.
In short, there are many ways to get in, if one can figure out the assortment of complicated access rules. Our access today was courtesy of the International Business Class ticket status of our American Airlines ticket.
Inside the American Admirals Club DFW – Terminal “C”:
After passing through reception on the fourth floor, I entered in to the main part of the lounge. The American Airlines Admirals Club at C Gates Dallas Fort Worth is a pretty large space. There are ample lounge chairs with lounge seating occupying about 90% of the available space.
Lounge Seating:
The primary part of the lounge offers lounge seating. After getting to the top of short stairs behind reception, the main lounge space is dissected by a large pathway that runs through the lounge. Unlike many lounges, the walkways is quite pronounced and makes a statement on the space.
Work Station Area:
At the far left hand side of the lounge, the lounge space offered a work station area for those looking for a little productivity.
There were floor to ceiling angled windows that ran the length of the airside portion of the lounge. The windows assisted in providing some natural light into a variety of seating spaces sprinkled alongside the windows. The seating surfaces are traditional men’s study leather and chocolate browns leading to a comfortable familiar environment.
The window shades were drawn the entire time we were here and I happened to notice that the view was of a concrete parking structure. As a result, I wouldn’t expect to get aspirational plane side views from this particular lounge facility.
In addition to the window seats, the lounge offered several other square seating environments. There were spots to sit almost everywhere. Unlike other lounges, American Airlines didn’t make the lounge higher density by offering tables and chair seatings in order to squeeze more people in.
Food and Beverage Area:
Heading towards the back of the back of the lounge down the hallway, I located the dining and the primary food services area.
There were some tables and chairs set up at the rear. These were set in a socially distant setting during our visit.
Food an Beverage:
Lounge Dining:
The lounge was serving breakfast during our visit. The center station offered a selection of continental toasts, bagels.
The rear bar area of the lounge offered the only hot breakfast area of the lounge.
It offered Tex Mex scrambled eggs with pico de gallo sauce, salsa, shredded cheese and bacon bits to top over the eggs. A variety of yoghurts were also offered.
There was even a Korean Styled Condiment area with Old Bay Seasoning, Red Pepper Flakes, among other seasoning items.
There was also a combination of filtered coffee and an espresso machine.
I was able to get a small snack in the form of scrambled eggs with all the usual toppings.
While the bar wasn’t open during our visit, American Airlines Admirals Club offered scan by table menus for drink offerings. They offered some simple table wine along with Miller Lite and Heinkein as the house beers. Many of the other beverages were at charge.
They also offered a number of plated menu items during breakfast hour that ranged from $12 to $16 USD a plate.
I was able to take a coffee to go from the lounge to enjoy while I waited for our American Airlines First Class Dallas Fort Worth – Miami flight.
My Thoughts on the American Airlines Admirals Club DFW Terminal “C”:
The Admirals Club offered a quick stop for us prior to our early morning flight. The most impressive part of the lounge was the hardware and the spacious seating area. The food was reasonable, although if I was a regular visitor, I think the offerings would get old pretty quickly.
If you travel through Dallas Fort Worth, do you visit the impressive space in the American Airlines Admirals Club ?
We had a nine hour layover at the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport and stayed at the nearby Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott for our layover. We used the complimentary shuttle bus to travel to the newly renovated property. Airport hotels vary tremendously in quality and experience. How would our airport stay measure up in terms of a convenient Dallas Fort Worth airport hotel experience?
This post is one chapter on our trip during the pandemic to Curaçao in the Southern Caribbean. This trip was enhanced through Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status and Hertz Gold Plus Rewards. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.
If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.
Read more from this trip:
- Introduction: The Caribbean Coves of Curaçao via American Airlines First Class
- American Airlines Business Class: Vancouver – Dallas Fort Worth
- Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott, Texas, USA
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge – Dallas Fort Worth C Gates
- American Airlines First Class: Dallas Fort Worth – Miami
- American Express Centurion Lounge Miami
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge Airlines – Miami Gate D30
- American Airlines Business Class: Miami – Curaçao
- Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort, Curaçao
- Cas Abo Beach
- Grote Knip Beach
- Klein Curaçao Island
- Crossing the Queen Emma Bridge into Willemstad, Curaçao
- VIP Lounge Curaçao – Hato International Airport, Curaçao
- American Airlines Business Class: Curaçao – Miami
- JW Marriott Miami, Florida, USA
- Turkish Airlines Business Lounge, Miami, USA
- American Airlines First Class: Miami – Los Angeles
- American Airlines Business Class: Los Angeles – Vancouver
Review: Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott, Dallas Fort Worth, Texas, United States of America.
“An Airport Hotel Conveniently Located Next Door to DFW Airport, that was anything but convenient”
Booking the Dallas Forth Worth Airport Marriott:
During our stay, the “in airport” Grand Hyatt DFW was commanding prices of over $300 USD per night. As a result, we ended up looking off property for a place to stay near the airport.
I picked this particular property as it was the closest off – airport Marriott property near the Dallas Fort Worth Airport. It turns out that the airport properties aren’t all that close to the DFW terminal, and it’s a bit of a drive to get to the airport row hotels.
As with many Marriott airport hotels, it’s usually a good value on Marriott Bonvoy points. A standard night during our stay was valued at 28,000 Marriott Bonvoy points. If you value Marriott Bonvoy points at 0.005 cents per point, you would come out ahead if your room rate was above $140 USD.
Despite this, there was a double elite qualifying night Marriott Bonvoy promotion on during our stay. Accordingly, we opted for a paid cash rate. I searched around and the best one that I could find was the American Auto Mobile Association (AAA rate) for $151 USD for a base level Guest Room – One King.
As Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level members, we would also be entitled to the best available room, including select suites, access to the Marriott M Club Lounge, and a welcome amenity including breakfast, additional Marriott Bonvoy points or a local welcome gift.
Getting to the DFW Airport Marriott:
We arrived to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport off American Airlines Business Class Vancouver – Dallas Fort Worth. We would end up arriving in Terminal “A”.
Per the hotels instructions on the welcome email, we called the local number for the shuttle pick up. The hotel is located immediately off the main airport grounds in a bank of hotels in neighbouring Irving, Texas.
The phone number provided for the shuttle was for the general hotel line. While there was no direct shuttle pickup number, I dialled zero and got the main airport switchboard. The operator took my name and gave me directions to basement Lower Level Pink Columns for the hotel shuttle. I was quoted 15 – 20 minutes for arrival of the shuttle.
The shuttle arrived after 26 minutes. There was a little confusion as there were several Marriott’s in the area and the driver indicated he was taking people to 8440 Freeport. This meant nothing to travellers so it was smart phones out by everyone travelling to verify addresses; adding to delays.
Eventually underway on the shuttle bus, it was announced we would be heading to the 4 other terminals prior to heading off to the airport. Each terminal had a stop at each end of the terminal so it was 8 stops anticipated. Fortunately, after the 4th stop, the bus was totally full with about 20 passengers, and we headed over to the hotel.
There were a few travellers on the bus whom I had overheard had called the hotel switchboard and never got an answer.
The bus ride itself took about 15 minutes from the airport. It was about 48 minutes from the time of our call to the switchboard prior to us getting off at the hotel so it was not exactly a super quick experience.
If you’re planning on a quick transfer over to the hotel, in our experience it took almost an hour’s worth of time to get there; cutting into a short ten hour layover time. It certainly wasn’t something that I would call “easy and convenient”.
Checking into the Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott Hotel:
Getting off the shuttle bus, we arrived to the Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott hotel.
The first impressions of the lobby were great. The lobby was recently resigned to be a more modern and contemporary space. The Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott very much had the feel of a newer property consistent with it’s top to bottom renovation.
We queued for check in. There was no elite area for check ins. We ended up in a line of 4 passengers from the same shuttle bus with only 2 staff manning the desk.
The check in was handled professionally and promptly. We were thanked for being a Marriott Titanium Member and assigned room 1824. We were also offered two bottles of water to take with us to the room, which I easily accepted and appreciated. I also checked to re-confirm the shuttle schedule back to the Dallas Fort Worth airport and was provided a thirty minute departure frequency from the hotel to the airport.
In advance of check in, I happened to look up in the Marriott App and saw that we had been proactively upgraded to a suite courtesy of Marriott Bonvoy Titanium status. I didn’t discuss it at the front desk, but things seemed to be in order when we had a high floor room assignment.
When we got to the room #1824, I discovered that it was actually a basic level room.
I checked back in the App which showed still suite so I went back down to the front desk. The front desk immediately re-assigned us to #334 a suite, with some kind apologies.
The First Room:
Guest Room – One King
The standard level base room of #1824 was pretty compact. There wasn’t anything wrong with the room but it was just another hotel room.
Along with other areas of the renovation, the room was nicely appointed with modern grey colours. Like most basic rooms, it was on the compact size and a little small for two travelling together.
There was a long countertop desk, which was perfect for storing of bags, purses and smart devices.
The bathroom was also completely renovated, and featured a single vanity sink along with the usual stand up shower found in most business hotels.
The toiletries were by the usual “this works” by Marriott.
The Second Room:
One Bedroom Suite, King Sofa Bed
After I returned to the front desk and showed them the Suite notation in the app, my keys were swapped out. We were later provided a small food and beverage credit as a good will gesture.
Our room assignment was now on the third floor to room #334.
Our impressions on entering the suite were of a great large space that was appointed with everything that you’d expect from a suite in an older hotel. There was lots of room and space to stretch out.
The suite was much more comfortable than the basic level room, with a proper living area, a separate bedroom and a dining table in the space surrounding the windows.
It’s always nice to have the option of dining in suite with a dining room table, as it’s great to be able to take a meal while being able to spread out and work.
There was a coffee maker and teas available with the room. This was located in the dining area.
In between the space of the outer windows and the hallway was the bedroom. The bedroom was medium sized and featured it’s own television and side table spaces.
Just off the bedroom, there was a passageway to a double vanity bathroom. The bathroom was galley styled and a little compact to maneuver in with two travellers.
Off the galley bathroom was a combination shower and toilet combination that was all one room.
The floor layout of the hotel was pretty straight forward, with what appeared to be one suite available per floor.
We had some challenges getting connected to the wifi in the room, although it worked after I restarted the phone.
In terms of sleep quality, the hotel room was very quiet, and we didn’t get interrupted by airport noise or any other noise during our stay here.
Around the Hotel Property:
The M Club Lounge:
Along with most Marriott Hotels, the property offered an M Club Lounge. The M Club Lounge is available for those that have purchased Executive Club Level rooms of have Marriott Bonvoy Platinum status or higher which allow for complimentary access.
The M Club Lounge was located on the ground floor of the hotel and was situated slightly off the lobby area. The timings were listed on the door outside.
During our visit, the timing were as follows:
- Breakfast: 6:30 AM – 10 AM
- Hors’ D’Oeuvres / Dinner: 5:30 PM – 7:30 PM
- Snacks 11:00 AM – 5:30 PM
Along with the other areas of the hotel, the lounge was a nicely appointed space in modern colors. The lounge was mostly deserted when I passed through, although admittedly, I was travelling at odd hours.
There was seating for about forty people comfortably, included a few areas in the back that would also seat additional people.
In terms of food presentation, my stay didn’t align with any of the meal timings. The usual bottled beverages were available and it was appreciated to be able to get some additional bottled water at odd hours.
The M Club was nicely appointed, although there wasn’t a lot of food out during our visit. My stay didn’t align with any of the meal timings. There were the usual tinned sodas, bottled water and some Tropicana Fruit Juices. It was appreciated to be able to get some additional bottled water at odd hours.
Convenience Sundries Store:
The Dallas Fort Wort Airpot Marriott hotel offered a Convenience Sundries Store. The store was well stocked with sandwiches and even had single portion alcohol available for purchase. It was one of the better stocks sundries stores I had seen in a hotel in quite some time.
This was terrifically convenient and we took dinner from the sundries as opposed to ordering and waiting for room service delivery.
We ended up picking up a Turkey Swiss Sandwich each for $13 USD. When we took them to the front desk, the host that originally checked us in apologized for the room mix up and comped us the sandwiches. This was a much appreciated gesture. He also took the time to apologize about the suite mix up and was very apologetic about the whole thing.
Health Club and Pool:
There was a small health club and pool available on the property of the Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott. There was no appointment needed for the pandemic and access was available through a key card. The pool area looked a little dated in comparison to the rest of the modern looking hotel.
The pool was of the indoor / outdoor variety and had a wet pass through that you could swim out to. There was also a courtyard area that was surrounded by buildings. This likely lessened the wind, but didn’t allow for much sunshine into this particular zone.
The Health Club area also featured a large sized gym, which was on the bigger size than I was expected for an airport hotel property.
Departing the Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott:
We aimed to leave the next morning on the shuttle. We allowed ourselves 1 hour to get back to the DFW airport. At check in, we were advised of the bus leaving at :00 and :30 past every hour during our visit. We had a 6:15 AM departing flight on American Airlines, so unfortunately, we had an early morning wake up.
At about 2:20 AM, we arrived to the lobby to complete checkout procedures. When I asked about getting the shuttle, the sole person at the front desk indicated that the driver had called in sick, and that there was no shuttle available until 4 AM. There was no alternative or voucher provided in lieu of the shuttle.
I asked about taxis’ and he quoted me $40 USD for a ride back to the airport. For a hotel that advertises a twenty four hour shuttle service, this was a bit of a service let down. I can appreciate that the hotel can’t anticipate when staff are going to be sick, but it’s always helpful and hospitable to provide an alternative.
We ended up calling for an Uber Black which took 15 minutes to arrive. It was another fifteen minutes and $30.71 USD + tip back to the airport. This negated a lot of the cost savings of staying off site at the DFW Marriott.
The next day after my stay, I received a mass email from the General Manager of the Dallas Forth Worth Marriott. The message was carbon copied “African style” to three employees all with @marriott.com email addresses.
The message was standard variety describing how important our stay was as Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Level members and that if our stay was less than perfect, please let us know. We were also encouraged to follow their social media channels and that we might get a survey in the coming days ahead.
I took the opportunity to “reply all” to let them know that the lack of a shuttle despite it being guaranteed had us stuck at the hotel and had put us out an additional $30 USD. I sent it off but I never got a reply back from the General Manager, or 3 of his associates.
I didn’t pursue it any further, although it was probably a lost opportunity for the hotel to resolve the circumstance with some goodwill Marriott Bonvoy points. I recognize that there are greater problems in the world than bus driver’s that call in sick. However, if a hotel offers a certain feature that’s integral to the operation of a stay such as an airport shuttle, in my view, it should provide that with some certainty.
The Bottom Line: Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott
This was a pretty simple and straightforward stay; an airport layover of nine hours with a simple shuttle ride as an Elite frequent traveler in the hotel’s loyalty program.
Despite this, the hotel mixed up the room assignment by either never processing the upgrade or assigning the wrong room. They offered a sincere apology and provided us some goodwill sandwiches, but then let us down again when no shuttle was available. When I brought it to their attention, no one bothered to answer. Admittedly, these are first world problems.
Would I stay here again? I probably would, but only if my layover was at least 12 hours. I probably wouldn’t bother with the bus if I had to do another 9 hour layover as the transfer over gobbled up a lot of extra time.
While you don’t expect a stay to be perfect, it seemed that there were a lot of minor service issues that included the room assignment mix up and the non existent shuttle. Whether you have the time and patience in your travelling schedule to deal with these types of issues will probably dictate whether you should stay at such a property.
What is the most inconvenient airport hotel that you’ve stayed at ?
American Airlines feeds traffic from Vancouver into its American Airlines hub at Dallas Fort Worth, allowing connections throughout the United States and Internationally onto British Airways and Qantas. Our experience with American Airlines Business Class today would have us testing out their new next generation seat on their Boeing 737 series aircraft, along with their improved catering. How would the experience measure up?
This post is one chapter on our trip during the pandemic to Curaçao in the Southern Caribbean. This trip was enhanced through Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status and Hertz Gold Plus Rewards. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.
If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.
Read more from this trip:
- Introduction: The Caribbean Coves of Curaçao via American Airlines First Class
- American Airlines Business Class: Vancouver – Dallas Fort Worth
- Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott, Texas, USA
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge – Dallas Fort Worth C Gates
- American Airlines First Class: Dallas Fort Worth – Miami
- American Express Centurion Lounge Miami
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge Airlines – Miami Gate D30
- American Airlines Business Class: Miami – Curaçao
- Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort, Curaçao
- Cas Abo Beach
- Grote Knip Beach
- Klein Curaçao Island
- Crossing the Queen Emma Bridge into Willemstad, Curaçao
- VIP Lounge Curaçao – Hato International Airport, Curaçao
- American Airlines Business Class: Curaçao – Miami
- JW Marriott Miami, Florida, USA
- Turkish Airlines Business Lounge, Miami, USA
- American Airlines First Class: Miami – Los Angeles
- American Airlines Business Class: Los Angeles – Vancouver
Review: American Airlines Business Class B737-8, Vancouver International Airport – Dallas Fort Worth International Airport
Our flight process started the day before with an Antigen Test courtesy of Switch Health through a tele-health mechanism. At the time of our travels, there was a Center for Disease Control requirement that all air travellers into the United States had to take an antigen rapid test with a negative result, no more than one day before travel.
We then proceeded through American Airlines check in processes the afternoon before through the new partnership with the Veri-Fly App. On receiving the check in notice, we were encouraged to review all travel requirements and upload vaccine certificates, proof of vaccination for international visitors to the United States and complete Curaçao Landing Cards and Passenger Location Forms. There was a lot of additional work and it took about three hours for us to complete the testing processes, along with me navigating through all the proof of vaccinations and relevant uploads. I was still unable to complete the online check in with American Airlines and had to present myself to an AAgent “approximately three hours before your international fight”.
Checking Into American Airlines Business Class:
We drove from the house today and parked the Land Rover in Vancouver Long Term Economy Lot Parking. It was one of the only parking lots open at the time of our travels.
We hopped the free Skytrain over to the US Transborders Departures area. It was a quiet check in today without any line in the Priority Check In area. We were promptly attended to by a junior but enthusiastic check in staff ground attendant.
We had our vaccination cards and negative rapid test results verified. We were also able to get our bags short checked to Dallas Fort Worth to mitigate leaving the bags in the secure area overnight during our connection prior to our American Airlines First Class Dallas – Miami and American Airlines Business Class Miami – Curaçao flights that we would be continuing on during the next day.
We wandered through minimal security using Global Entry / Nexus “front of the line” service. Thanks to our mid day flight times and the tail end of the pandemic two years in, there were still minimal delays at the CATSA security screening. Flights that depart Vancouver, like all other Canadian Cities, offer US Customs Pre-Clearance. This meant that you cleared US Customs in Vancouver and conveniently arrive to a domestic terminal on arrival in the United States of America.
There is no available lounge for American Airlines or One World Customers on the US Pre-Clearance Secure Side of the Vancouver International Airport. The usual Plaza Premium US Transborder Lounge Vancouver that is accessible via the American Express Platinum Card was shuttered as a result of planned expansion on todays’ visit. There was a construction permit sign outside indicating that the lounge would be expanding from 58 seats to a much needed 132 seats.
We wandered down to Gate E80 which was situated right at the end of the departures hall. Boarding started promptly at 12:45 PM with Concierge Key, followed by Group 1 and Military all at the same time. We boarded with Group 1.
American Airlines
AA 1415 – Business Class
YVR – DFW (Vancouver International Airport – Dallas Fort Worth International Airport)
March 28, 2022
1:15 PM – 7:25 PM
Booked: Boeing 737-800
Flown: Boeing 737-800
On Board American Airlines Business Class:
American Airlines Business Class on the Boeing 737-800 is set up in a 2 – 2 configuration with 4 rows of business class. This is also known as American Airlines First Class if you’re flying this equipment type on a domestic United States flight.
Our seats today were in Row 3 A and 3 C. There was lots of leg room in the slim line seats. The seats themselves have a modern contemporary look being a pleasant grey color. Settling into our seats, there was also plenty of room in the overhead compartments for rolling suitcases.
The seat back did not feature a monitor. Instead, the seat featured a tablet / phone holder that allowed for storage.
The seats offered a reasonable amount of leg room for a four hour flight.
The seat recline feature was through a simple lever located within the centre console.
There was a holder for laptops and other devices in the center console between the seats. There was also in seat power at this location.
The table at our seat also comfortable held a 13 inch MacBook Pro computer, with a little extra room on the side to work.
The seat itself also featured individual air nozzles in the overhead area. I personally really enjoy having the overhead air nozzles as it allows for a bit more comfort when travelling when you can select and adjust your air flow.
Pre Departure Services:
Our pre-departure services started with an offer of a sterile wipe. This has been pretty customary during these pandemic times and is more of a pleasant gesture rather than something that I fund myself actually using.
While were were waiting to get underway, the lunch and pre-lunch drink orders were taken on the ground. Today’s choices were beef in a mushroom sauce with farrafelle pasta or risotto with butter nut squash.
The pre-departure beverage was surprisingly absent and likely another victim of pandemic cost cutting.
Departing Vancouver:
We had a bit of a delayed push back today from the gate with wheels up from Vancouver at 1:40 PM, or approximately 25 minutes after scheduled take off time.
We had a departure on Runway 26L meaning we had an overwater view of the Georgia Straight followed by a left turn back to the United States.
As we climbed to altitude, we had a towel service. It was a nice touch and something we don’t ever get on our short haul trans-border flights with Alaska Airlines. The tower was a bit nuked by the microwave and it wasn’t a very opulent or elegant towel.
A towel service is better than no towel service so I have to applaud American Airlines for going through this trouble.
The Meal: A Three Course Express Lunch
The drink menu for both economy and business class / first class was printed on menu cards. It didn’t feature too many aspirational products and there as no wine listing that we occasionally see on our Alaska Airlines flights.
After arriving to cruising altitude the pre-lunch drinks were served. Today’s Gin and Tonic was Aviation American Gin served with Canada Dry Tonic Water and warmed nuts. We had apologies for the low rent plastic cup for the mixed nuts as they forgot to load the proper serve ware.
Lunch was served. The lunch was the beef with mushroom sauce over farafelle pasta. The main was served with a mini charcuterie tray of artichoke hearts, European salami, feta cheese and hard cheddar. There was also a choice of warmed ciabatta or French Bread, along with a green salad with feta, cucumber, red onion and Kalamata olives.
MrsWT73 had the vegetarian risotto with butternut squash.
There were frequent drink refills from a pleasant staff.
The food itself was tasty and flavourful. Even the jade MrsWT73 was impressed with the food product having regularly travelled this route for the past ten years on her work circuit.
Overall, the catering on American Airlines has improved substantially. If this is the new American, United Airlines’s food and beverage department has something substantial to worry about.
In Flight Entertainment:
After the lunch, I took a look at the entertainment system. The design of the next generation seats on the American Airlines Boeing 737-8 offers a great device holder in the seat in front.
While there were no i-Pad’s passed out like Alaska Airlines, I was able to access the entertainment through the American Airlines in flight wifi and app.
Arriving into Dallas Fort Worth:
After our flight, we descended into Dallas Fort Worth in the state of Texas, United States of America. The landscape in Dallas is so different than from my home in the Pacific Northwest and it’s a startling contrast every time I arrive.
We arriving into the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport and parked next to an American Airlines Boeing 737 as the sun was setting.
We de-planed and found our way over to the Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott for our layover before continuing on with American Airlines First Class Dallas – Miami and American Airlines Business Class Miami – Curaçao.
My Thoughts on American Airlines Transborder First Class:
What stood out for me most of all on this American Airlines Transborder flight between Vancouver – Dallas Fort Worth was the improved catering and food. The food was much better than expected and we also received some amenities like a towel service that you’d expect on a longer flight. The seat itself was reasonably comfortable and a much more modern and functional version of what Alaska Airlines and Air Canada offer on the same transborder routes.
If you travel between American Airlines and Alaska Airlines, which one do you prefer ?
The Beach Coves of Curaçao are among the most interesting bays throughout the Caribbean. The island of Curaçao forms part of the ABC Islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao in the Southern Caribbean. The Southern Caribbean had previously escaped my travels in the years up to now. With a yearning to explore, we safely booked ourselves on a week long get away to Curaçao to explore the coves of this Caribbean Island.
This post is one chapter on our trip during the pandemic to Curaçao in the Southern Caribbean. This trip was enhanced through Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status and Hertz Gold Plus Rewards. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.
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Read more from this trip:
- Introduction: The Caribbean Coves of Curaçao via American Airlines First Class
- American Airlines Business Class: Vancouver – Dallas Fort Worth
- Dallas Fort Worth Airport Marriott, Texas, USA
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge – Dallas Fort Worth C Gates
- American Airlines First Class: Dallas Fort Worth – Miami
- American Express Centurion Lounge Miami
- American Airlines Admirals Club Lounge Airlines – Miami Gate D30
- American Airlines Business Class: Miami – Curaçao
- Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort, Curaçao
- Cas Abo Beach
- Grote Knip Beach
- Klein Curaçao Island
- Crossing the Queen Emma Bridge into Willemstad, Curaçao
- VIP Lounge Curaçao – Hato International Airport, Curaçao
- American Airlines Business Class: Curaçao – Miami
- JW Marriott Miami, Florida, USA
- Turkish Airlines Business Lounge, Miami, USA
- American Airlines First Class: Miami – Los Angeles
- American Airlines Business Class: Los Angeles – Vancouver
Trip Introduction: The Caribbean Beach Coves of Curaçao via American Airlines First Class
Planning the Trip:
With the travelling future uncertain as a result of the pandemic, we didn’t really have a crystal ball in order to tell what the future of travel looked like. As a result of our successful during the pandemic trip to Oahu, Hawaii, United States of America in the fall, we decided that we would proactively plan for a trip in spring of 2022.
The availability of business class reward seats were never more dismal than during the pandemic. With a general lack of seats and frequencies of international flights, we turned our mind to revenue flights within the North American region.
With no particular destination in mind, and our will to use up our annual Marriott Bonvoy American Express Free Night Award Certificates, I ended up throwing at dart out at Google Flights and located some reasonably well priced First Class flights from Vancouver to Curaçao in the Dutch Caribbean. Having never seriously travelled through the Caribbean, aside from some quick trips to the Bahamas and a few Cruise Ship Stops in the Northern Caribbean, we booked ourselves to Curaçao.
Planning Flights:
Flights from Canada to Curaçao
Our flights would take us down on a milk run down on American Airlines Business Class Vancouver to Dallas Fort Worth, with an overnight stop. This was followed by a continuing American Airlines First Class Dallas – Miami then onwards American Airlines Business Class Miami to Curaçao.
For the return flight, we would travel American Airlines Business Class Curaçao – Miami. We had an overnight in Miami with a comfortable 17 hour layover. I had found us a routing on American Airlines Flagship Business Class on their Boeing 777-200 product across Miami to Los Angele with a full flat seat.
Unfortunately, with all things travel pandemic related, American Airlines would cancel our later connection from Los Angeles to Vancouver when they reduced service from Los Angeles – Vancouver down to once daily as opposed to twice daily. We were pro-actively re-booked us onto an Airbus 321neo. Although it was a plane I had yet to fly, we’d loose out on our wide body full flat seats in favour of a regular recliner seat. Our long layover in Miami would also shrink down to 11 hrs from a wonderful 17 hours.
All in, the flights were a very reasonable $1,401 CAD ($1,102 USD) per passenger. I booked directly with American Airlines and paid for these flights using the American Express Marriott Bonvoy Business Card. We earned three Marriott Bonvoy points per dollar for the travel related purchase.
We would credit these flights to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan and earn 150% elite qualifying miles and 150% Redeemable Miles eventually earning 13,022 Redeemable Qualifying Miles.
In the end, the routing ended up looking like this:
YVR-DFW-MIA-CUR (paid)
CUR-LAX-YVR (paid)
Planning Hotels:
As a result of terrible connection times, we required overnight in Dallas Fort Worth on the way down. I initially checked the well reported Grand Hyatt DFW in Dallas Fort Worth Airport. Unfortunately, the rates were well over $275 USD during our stay which would only have us at the property for 8 hours.
I ended up booking us at the Dallas / Fort Worth Airport Marriott. The Dallas / Fort Worth Airport Marriott was located a short drive away. We paid $151 USD for the room. We also received a Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Room Upgrade to a Suite and received double elite qualifying nights for this year’s status, thanks to the Spring Marriott Bonvoy promotion. It’s not much, but every qualifying night counts.
For our time in Curaçao, we had 7 nights at the Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort. We picked this resort as it was a Marriott Bonvoy Category 5 property; one of the few in the Caribbean. The Marriott Bonvoy Category 5 property meant that we could use our annual Free Night Certificates that came with the American Express Marriott Bonvoy credit cards.
We would use 3 nights for free at this resort and we’d pay cash for the remaining 4 nights. Our rate was $181 USD for the remaining nights. We would be upgraded from the Partial Ocean View Room to a full Ocean View room courtesy of Marriott Bonvoy Titanium status. We would received double elite qualifying nights on the paid 4, and receive the regular single elite qualifying nights on the reward nights.
To get around Curaçao, we rented a car with Hertz. While I had thought about going without a car, I have found that the island stays frequently are easier with a vehicle. It would also allow us to escape off resort and avoid the resort food. I had also read that the taxi’s fees would generally add up quick with a rate of $25 USD on average to / from the airport or to town.
On our return trip, we had an overnight layover in Miami. Miami happens to have one of the better Marriott Bonvoy values in the Marriott system and we redeemed an American Express Marriott Bonvoy free night award at the JW Marriott Miami. The JW Marriott Miami is another Marriot Bonvoy category 5 property and is a city hotel in an area where everyone would prefer to be near to the beach. The paid rate here was over $420 USD a night during our redemption so we managed to get some outsized value out of this particular free certificate. We would end up using a Hertz Gold Plus Rewards points to redeem against a 24 hr rental at Hertz at the Miami International Airport. The paid car rental rates were over $100 USD during our weekday stay, making a Hertz Gold Rewards 750 point redemption a much better value.
Our points and miles redemption summary:
In summary, we earned and redeemed:
- Redemption: 3 Free Night Awards Certificates – Curacao Marriott Beach Resort
- Redemption: 1 Free Night Award Certificate – JW Marriott Miami
- Redemption: 750 Hertz Gold Plus Awards Points – 1 free rental day
- Earned: 2,695 Points (1,540 Base + 1,155 Elite + 0 Extra) at Marriott Bonvoy points at Dallas / Forth Worth Marriott Airport
- Earned: 18,564 Points (10,608 Base + 7,956 Elite + 0 Extra) Marriott Bonvoy points at Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort
It would end up being my first trip to the South Caribbean and my seventy third country visited. I would also end up passing a milestone one million lifetime miles flown on this trip; certainly, an achievement that I never imagined I would ever cross growing up. We would end up with 4 free nights courtesy of our credit cards between the Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort and the JW Marriott Miami valued at $963 USD; a great use of rewards.
I hope you’ll join us on second overseas trip while the pandemic was coming to an end.
If you have flown to the Carribiean, what tips do you use to add value to the trip ?
I recently crossed one million lifetime miles flown. It’s a substantial achievement. Over the years, my First Class Travel has included wonderful stand up bars, first class lounges and elegant meals. How would I end up celebrating this significant milestone? It turns out, not exactly as I would have thought.
I Just Crossed One Million Flown Lifetime Miles
When I started out flying for personal and business travel, I never anticipated that I would ever cross one million miles. I had about 450,000 miles under my belt by the age of thirty, before I started getting serious at this frequent flier reward collecting hobby.
Most of this travel was from family trips to Asia and Europe in economy class on relic airplanes such as the Boeing 747-200 and the Lockheed Tri-Star L1-1011 on Cathay Pacific.
As my career developed, I started travelling more and more through 2007 and up to today. I averaged about 55,000 miles a year on both personal and business travel.
My Travel Patterns to Date:
Up to this point, it has been a mostly routing experience. My travels have taken me far and wide, and across the globe and Canada / United States for work.
- Total Airports: 173
- Total Airlines: 69
- Total Aircraft Types: 56
- Total Routes: 423
- Total Number of Flights: 683
- Total Countries Flown Into: 62
Booking Classes:
- Economy 473
- Economy Plus / Premium Economy: 13
- Business: 156
- First Class: 33
Types of Travel:
- Personal Flights: 560
- Business Flights: 123 (this already feels like way too many)
- Marriott Lifetime Nights: 632
More recently, in my forties, have been craving more time at home and less keen to get on the road. It could be that this has been timed with the evolution (or dilution) of most frequent travel reward plans.
Dreaming of One Million Miles:
I knew that the one million mark was coming up. It’s a fairly substantial travelling milestone. I’d even say that it’s in the back of most hard core travellers minds.
I somehow imagined myself crossing that milestone in some fancy executive suite. Would it be something fancy like Emirates, Cathay Pacific or Lufthansa First Class drinking elegant champagne?
I’ve been very fortunate enough to enjoy some of the finer elements of elevated travel. From wonderful champagnes, to elegant caviar settings, to comfortable suites.
Unfortunately, the pandemic changed all that. For two years, like everyone else, the business and personal travel took a major cut and my miles flown fell to almost zero. As we all suffered travel withdrawal, we sat around dreaming of when the next six country multi stop around the world trip would spring back to life.
The Cold Reality:
As it turned out, my one millionth mile flown wasn’t in a fancy suite with a bed champagne and caviar, it happened to be on a short regional haul regional flight on an American Airlines Airbus 321 in First Class.
It was a pretty mainstream experience accessible to almost anyone on a short 2 hour flight between Dallas and Miami, USA.
The flight happened to leave at 5:18 AM from the Mountain Time Zone. Instead of a wonderful glass of vintage champagne, given the early hour, I celebrated on board with a glass of tap water.
At least it was served with ice in a proper glass (laughing).
How did Crossing One Million Miles Feel?
It turns out it didn’t feel any different.
It felt much life a birthday; one year older but you still felt the same the day before and the day afterwards.
While it was a substantial milestone, there were still lots of places to explore. By my count, having visited only 73 countries, that left another 120+ to be explored. Hopefully, you’ll all be along with me for that journey.
While it wasn’t all that I expected, at the very least that it was on a personal trip and not on a business trip off to a windowless boardroom.
My Thoughts on Passing One Million Miles:
While we all have dreams and aspirations, the pandemic and the changing health landscape shuttled my dreams of being ensconced in a beautiful suite.
Unfortunately, with the pressures of the pandemic, that didn’t happen and I ended up on a regional flight for this particular milestone.
While it wasn’t how I envisioned it, it was nice to actually be travelling again.
If you have crossed a major travel milestone, how did you celebrate it?
On my regular work circuit, I had the opportunity to stay at the Ambassador Hotel Oklahoma City. The hotel was recommended by business colleagues as the place to stay while in Oklahoma City. My two night business stay would end up being a pleasant one. How did the Ambassador Hotel Oklahoma measure up?
Review: The Ambassador Hotel Oklahoma City, Autograph Collection, Oklahoma, United States of America
“The Ambassador Hotel surprised with a stylish quiet upscale hotel, alongside great breakfasts and dinners in Café Cuvée”
Booking The Ambassador Hotel:
On a recent business trip to Oklahoma, I needed a place to stay near the city. This particular property was recommended by our hosts as the place to stay in Oklahoma City in the state of Oklahoma, United States of American.
The room rate was around $230 USD when I was travelling midweek in April. The best available rate I was able to locate was under the “American Automobile Association” which offered about $20 USD off the regular rates of $250 USD.
I booked this stay via the Marriott website direct. As I booked with Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Elite level status, I was promised an upgrade to the best available room (including suites), lounge access (where available), and a guaranteed late check out to 4 PM.
Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Awards:
The hotel offers a few rooms in the Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Award pool. Marriott Suite Night Awards are awards give to Marriott Bonvoy Platinum, Titanium and Ambassador level members for passing certain stay thresholds. The Suite Night Awards confirm the guest into an elevated room category; typically 5 days in advance of any stay.
The Ambassador Oklahoma City Hotel by Autograph Collection didn’t really have an impressive inventory in the Suite Night Award pool. The only rooms available in the Suite Night Award Pool were larger rooms that consisted of larger guest rooms. The hotel doesn’t have any suites available for sale. As a result, a larger room is the best option for travellers in this category.
The hotel participates in the Marriott Bonvoy rewards program. The rates under their new variable pricing ranged around 35,000 points to 39,000 points for a standard room redemption. If you value Marriott Bonvoy points at 0.005 cents per point, you’d have to have a paid room rate of more than $195 USD to come out ahead redeeming Marriott Bonvoy points versus paying cash.
Getting to The Ambassador Oklahoma Hotel:
I arrived off an Alaska Airlines flight from Seattle – Oklahoma City. I got to the hotel using a Hertz rental car from the Will Rogers Oklahoma International Airport. It was less than thirty minutes drive from the airport to Oklahoma City. There was a little traffic on the route between the city and the airport during the peak time period but there wasn’t any significant delays to report.
The weather during my visit was particularly stormy and rainy. As a result, I didn’t get an opportunity to fully explore the neighbourhood surrounding the hotel. There were a lot of restaurants within the immediate walking area of the hotel.
As a solo female traveller, I didn’t have many security worries about staying at this property. While I didn’t wander around the neighbourhood at night, I had no issues crossing the street for restaurants in the nearby area.
Checking into the Ambassador Hotel:
When I arrived to the hotel, I immediately self parked the car. There was a self parking garage located at the rear of the hotel accessed off the alley. I unloaded the vehicle and wandered into the hotel through the back door.
I went over to the front desk where my check in was processed.
The lobby was very welcoming and trendy. I had a great first impression and the public spaces were nicer than I was anticipating. The lobby and hotel overall were also very clean, which is something I appreciate when staying at any business hotel.
There was no line at reception. I was immediately attended to by two reception hosts. While there was no acknowledgement of my Marriott Bonvoy Titanium status (or offer of a Marriott Bonvoy Elite welcome amenity), my check in was processed quickly with everything ready to go. I ended up getting 1,000 Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Welcome Bonus that posted at the end of my stay to my Marriott Bonvoy account.
While there was no mention of an upgrade from my base level room, I ended up getting an upgrade to the nicest available room category. I was assigned a Larger Guest Room – 1 – King. This was the highest level of room available at the hotel, received courtesy of my Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level status.
Through the pleasant spaces in the lobby, I noticed that the lobby contained an internet computer and printer, which would have been handy for printing off boarding passes or those last minute work materials.
I self navigated up to the room. The elevator landings on each floor even really had impressive decor, something that added a bit of personality to the hotel.
The Room: Larger Guest Room – 1 King, City view, Corner room
After checking in, I made my way up to room #405. The hallways were dim, although the decor was pleasant throughout the property.
My room #405 was located at the end of the hallway a short distance away from the elevator.
Immediately upon entering the room, there was a small foyer. Immediately ahead was the bathroom. To the left of the entry was the bedroom.
The bedroom was large and very spacious. Being a corner room, there were lots of windows making it a very bight space. It also made the room a loud room with the rain pelting against the side of the windows.
There were two occasional chairs in the corner of the room. I don’t sit on hotel chairs so I didn’t test out how comfortable they were. There would have been a view of the television from one of the chairs.
Under the television in the living room, there was a small minibar that only contained three items in it. There was no alcohol in the fridge. The fridge contained a Sprite, a Pepsi and a San Pellingrino that was chargeable at $4 USD per drink.
There were also snacks available in room that were available for purchase. There was also bottled water that was replenished daily on a complimentary basis.
The bathroom was very spacious and bright. The fact that there was a make up mirror was an added bonus. The shower was medium to high pressure with a large shower head. I also appreciated that there were robes and large format towels.
The bathroom also offered a bathtub, which was a nice feature but not something that I would have typically expected for a business stay.
The toiletries were Gilcrest and Soames branded toiletries. I used the body lotion but I didn’t use the shampoo or conditioner. It was convenient having additional Q-Tips available as spares if needed.
The room had a view of the street in front of the hotel. It was pretty quiet and there wasn’t a lot of traffic noise.
The sleep quality in the room was very good. The bed was very comfortable and the hotel was quiet. I was really pleased with the hotel as the decor was much more pleasant than the Sheraton’s, Westin’s and Marriotts I usually frequent for business travel.
Around the Property:
Outdoor Pool:
The Ambassador Hotel has an outdoor pool and patio. The area also offers access to the parking garage. The back door of the hotel has towel available.
The pool is a small format pool, that was under torrential rain shower while I visited.
The patio space was pleasant. Unfortunately, the thunder shower weather on my visit prevented me from really using it.
Food and Beverage:
Café Cuvée:
Marriott Bonvoy Platinum Breakfast:
The Café Cuvée is the all day hotel dining restaurant and the only restaurant on the property. While it is an all day restaurant, the restaurant does take a small break between 2 PM – 5:30 PM when it is not open.
The restaurant is french oriented. I stopped by for a morning coffee. During my visit, the place was pretty empty.
I enjoyed a hamburger with blue cheese and arugula at Café Cuvée. It was well prepared and presented exactly to order.
Departing The Ambassador Oklahoma:
When it came time to depart the Ambassador Hotel, a printed copy of my bill was left under my room door in an old school kind of touch. The bill was accurate and my points posted to Marriott Bonvoy within 72 hours.
The Ambassador Hotel Oklahoma City Bottom Line:
My stay at the Ambassador Hotel Oklahoma City was pleasant and comfortable. The rooms were comfortable with nice furnishings. I couldn’t have asked for anything more during this stay. It will be my new first choice of hotels the next time I return to Oklahoma.
If you have stayed at Oklahoma City, which hotel do you prefer ?
In one of my most unusual hotel stays, I stayed at the Toronto Marriott City Centre Hotel in Toronto, Ontario Canada. This hotel is situated inside the Rogers Arena Baseball Stadium in the surrounding area around the upper part of the stadium. Aside from the novelty of staying a home run away from a baseball diamond, what would staying in a stadium be like for a three night stay? Read on to find out.
Review: Toronto Marriott City Centre Hotel, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
“Don’t let the Marriott City Centre name fool you: this Marriott is found inside a baseball stadium. It contains everything you’d expect about staying within a concrete stadium”
Booking the Toronto Marriott City Centre:
On a recent business trip to Toronto, I needed a place to stay around the Union Station area near the financial district of Toronto. I ended up with the cheapest Marriott Property available in the neighbourhood I needed to be in; this represented the Toronto Marriott City Centre Hotel.
The Toronto Marriott City Centre is among the most unique Marriott’s that I’ve ever had the opportunity to stay in. While most Marriott’s are particularly forgettable, this one has a feature that is unlike any other Marriott in the world. The Toronto Marriott City Centre happens to be located inside a regular functioning baseball stadium.
The Toronto Marriott City Centre started life in 1986 as the Canadian Pacific Hotels and Resorts Skydome Hotel. It exclusively offered the features of select rooms being able to watch Toronto Blue Jays Baseball games inside the stadium itself. The hotel changes flags several times passing through the Renaissance and eventually now operates under the Marriott franchise flag. When it passed through the various name changes, it dropped its reference to being attached to a stadium.
The room rate was soft but not at rock bottom when I was travelling during mid week in May. I was able to locate a rate of $199 CAD for my three day stay. I had more typically seen rates between the $350 – $550 CAD mark which seems to be pretty constant for this hotel. During game nights, the prices tended to creep higher.
One of the more unique features of this property is tht the Toronto Marriott City Centre hotel offers certain rooms with a direct view into the stadium grounds. These are priced at a premium and particularly so when an event is underway at the stadium.
These must be so popular that there is even a disclaimer on the reservation landing of the web page that indicates that the views are only guaranteed during game nights.
I booked this stay via the Marriott website direct. As I booked with Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Elite level status, I was promised an upgrade to the best available room (including suites), lounge access, and a guaranteed late check out to 4 PM.
Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Awards:
The hotel offers a few rooms in the Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Award pool. Marriott Suite Night Awards are awards give to Marriott Bonvoy Platinum, Titanium and Ambassador level members for passing certain stay thresholds. The Suite Night Awards confirm the guest into an elevated room category; typically 5 days in advance of any stay.
The Toronto Marriott City Centre offered two versions of suites in it’s Suite Night Award pool; a One Bedroom Suite with either a King Size Bed or a Two Double Bed, along with a Larger Studio with One King.
It is worth noting that the property does not typically upgrade into the Baseball View rooms as a matter of course. As a result, these rooms aren’t typically in the Suite Night Award pool or available for upgrade under the Marriott Bonvoy program.
The hotel participates in the Marriott Bonvoy rewards program. The rates under their new variable pricing ranged around 35,000 points to 39,000 points for a standard room redemption. If you value Marriott Bonvoy points at 0.005 cents per point, you’d have to have a paid room rate of more than $195 USD to come out ahead redeeming Marriott Bonvoy points versus paying cash.
Getting to the Toronto Marriott City Centre:
I arrived off an Air Canada Vancouver – Toronto High Density configuration flight. I took the Union Pearson Express airport express train from Toronto Pearson International Airport to Union Station downtown. While very convenient, the trip on a Sunday evening took about one hour which was broken up into 35 minutes of ticket purchase and waiting, and about 25 minutes train ride.
On arrival the Union Station, I took the elevated walkway off the train platform. The elevated walkway led me on a twelve minute walk to the hotel.
The outdoor walkway took me underneath the CN Tower and the concrete grounds surrounding the tower. It was dusk when I arrived, but I also photographed it during the day time for general interests sake.
The surrounding area around the hotel is the stadium concourse. In a world of concrete, it has all the personality of a concrete dystopian land. Walking from the Union Station Express train eventually leads you to the hotel lobby.
While the outdoor walkway was fine in fair summer weather, I can’t say I’d be too thrilled in walking to the hotel in the middle of the harsh winters that Toronto, Ontario has to offer. After a ten minute walk, I eventually arrived to the front door of the hotel and found my way inside.
The hotel is situated as part of the Rogers Center Stadium. Given that it is part of the stadium, there isn’t much in the way immediately surrounding the stadium itself that I would call a neighbourhood.
In addition to being part of a stadium, the hotel has a commuter and long distance rail network running almost immediately underneath the hotel. In fact, the car unloading area for the hotel happens to be on a concrete bridge over top of the train tracks. It’s fair to say that this lessened it’s neighbourhood charm somewhat.
Despite this, the hotel is reasonably close and within ten minutes walk of the southern part of the Toronto financial district. The area is physically walled off from the main part of downtown Toronto as a result of the train tracks that divide and dissect the area in two.
Checking into the Toronto Marriott City Centre Hotel:
There was only one person in line ahead of me when I arrived to the hotel. When it became my turn, a friendly host welcomed me to the hotel.
Consistent with its concrete stadium space, the lobby itself is a pretty institutional space being part of a stadium. It had no giant glass windows, water features or any other aspirational qualities that are found within hotel lobbies. Instead, it was a concrete space that had been dressed up a little bit with flat screen televisions. While every lobby doesn’t have to have elegant spaces, it’s worth mentioning that this one is pretty similar to a bus station and what you might expect of a lobby inside a concrete stadium.
I had checked the Marriott App in advance and saw that I had been upgraded from base level Guest Room 1 King City View, to a similar Concierge Level 1 King Guest Room City View. I also happened to see that quite a few suites were available.
While my credit cards were being processed, I asked politely at the front counter about the possibility of a Marriott Titanium level suite upgrade. Without any hesitation, a check on the computer was completed and I was given an upgrade to a 1 bedroom Suite, 1 King – Sofa Bed City View.
It’s probably worth noting that I had to pro-actively ask for this and it wasn’t automatically volunteered. Despite staying for three nights, it was really appreciated to be able to have the extra space. I offer my hats off to the property for complying with the Marriott Bonvoy program without a fight.
I was assigned room #392. I took the elevator up to the suite. They elevators were key card controlled as might be expected in a hotel located in a stadium that night have patrons visiting at all hours.
The suite was located quite a ways from the elevator. It’s not to much to imagine, when you think that the room is actually following the curve of the stadium.
It was so far, I actually used the Runkeeper distance checker and learned that it was exactly 1.13 miles walk from the elevator.
I eventually made it to my room, which was on the left of a “V” split in the hallway.
The Room: 1 Bedroom Suite, 1 King, Sofa Bed, City View
The 1 bedroom suite was a large and spacious suite with a separate living and sleeping area.
Immediately on entering the suite, there was an open closet clothing storage area. The room offered a coffee maker, which was positioned at this end of the room.
To the left of the entry way was the bathroom. The bathroom featured a stand up shower and a double vanity. It was pretty spacious for an inner city bathroom.
Heading toward the living area, the living area space was quite large. It had two separate sofabeds in the living area. It was accented by a coffee table.
The workspace for the room featured the usual rail desk, accompanied with a mini fridge and two bottles of water. While the desk was large, it was not as large as some of the rooms that involve longer desks. I often found that spreading out my work stuff across the desk filled up the whole space.
The living room space offered a stadium type view over the CN Tower Concourse Area. While it qualified as being a city view, it wasn’t a particularly green pleasant one.
Between the entry way and the living space of the room was the bedroom. The bedroom was in an open walkway between the two spaces. The open space was not ideal for those parents putting young children on the sofa beds as it allowed noise to travel between the two spaces.
The bedroom offered a comfortable Marriott bed. The bedroom was a dark space with it’s own television.
Surprisingly, for a hotel located immediately adjacent to an active railway of 8 tracks, it was surprisingly quiet in the hotel room. The sleep was quiet and without noise when there was no event on at Rogers Arena.
However, with a Toronto Blue Jay’s Baseball game on during one night of my three night stay, it did get pretty loud on the surrounding concourse. The street entertainment (a live busking band in my case) continued on well past 11:30 PM when I went to bed. If a deep undisturbed sleep is important to you, I’d recommend checking with the front desk for a quieter room assignment on a high floor.
Around the Property:
Marriott Concierge Lounge:
The hotel offers a Marriott Concierge Lounge located on the 6th floor. The lounge, like the rest of the hotel, curves around the side of the stadium. As a result, it’s sort of a long and thin lounge that a strange feng shui feel to it.
After you get off the elevator, you pass into the lounge and keep going until the lounge ends. On my visit, the place was pretty empty with lots of different spots to sit in.
Despite having lots of places to actually sit in, the space sort of had a strange feel to it, following the curve of the stadium building.
Evening appetizer food was being offered between 5:30 PM – 10 PM during my visit. This was the only food offering with no breakfast available in the lounge at the time of my visit.
There were some light appetizers in the form of evening snacks, but there wasn’t really anything all to exciting here.
The lounge offered an honour bar of some limited alcohol. There were also some light bites available in the lounge.
While the Marriott Concierge Lounge was a nice amenity to have, I didn’t really end up spending much time there as a result of it’s slightly inconvenient location and it’s strange layout.
The Health Club, Gym and Indoor Pool:
The hotel offered a surprisingly large gym. Again, being in a stadium, the gym had a sort of an odd shape to it with a lot of extra space in certain corners.
The hotel also offered a swimming pool that was one level below the gym. It was accessible through elevators from within the gym itself.
The workout room had a whole series of treadmills and workout space that any business traveller would be happy with.
Around the Neighbourhood:
The hotel was not near any major restaurants. This was actually one of the major dis-advantages of the hotel in that it was about a ten minute walk from the nearest food and beverage. Similar to being in a stadium district, there isn’t much immediately surrounding the hotel in terms of independent restaurants .
There is also no liquor stores conveniently located near the hotel; the nearest LCBO outlet was about a 600 m walk away.
Food and Beverage:
Sportsnet Grill:
The sole restaurant in the Toronto Marriott City Centre hotel is the Sportsnet Center restaurant. It’s a sports bar type restaurant that offers a view of the inside of the Rogers Centre.
It was pretty unique to sit in the restaurant having a view of a baseball diamond.
Tables are able to be booked for the duration of a base ball game with an advance reservation. At the time of my visit, a minimum spend of $50 CAD was required for each person. This was actually pretty reasonable.
Marriott Bonvoy Platinum Breakfast:
As the Marriott Concierge Lounge was not serving breakfast during my visit, the hotel was offering a full buffet breakfast in the Sportsnet Centre. The breakfast hours were 7 AM to 10 AM.
The breakfast buffet was a light one, but it offered hashbrowns, scrambled eggs and an assortment of meats in the form of bacons and sausages.
There were also an assortment of fruits and yoghurts available for those looking for a continental option.
Departing the Toronto Marriott City Centre:
When it came time to depart the Toronto Marriott City Centre, my bill was prepared without any issue. It was completely accurate and my Marriott Bonvoy points posted within 48 hours.
The service was professional. I couldn’t have asked for competent stay and it was everything a business traveller would have needed.
The Toronto Marriott City Centre Bottom Line:
My stay at the Toronto Marriott City Centre was pretty straightforward and about what I expect from a Marriott stay. I really appreciated the hotel honouring a Marriott Bonvoy Suite Upgrade at check in; something that is becoming rarer and rarer these days. While the stay was occasionally loud on game night, the property was close to where I needed to be for meetings. If I were looking for another entertaining stay, or had an event at the stadium I wanted to attend to, this place would be first on my list.
If you have stayed at the Toronto Marriott City Centre, did you find that the stadium neighbourhood took away from the enjoyment of your stay ?
There are a whole host of Marriott properties in the greater Toronto area. This particular trip would take us to the northern business area of Toronto in the Vaughn / Markham region. During this trip, I would get the opportunity to check out the new Toronto Marriott Markham hotel in the up and coming area of Downtown Markham. How would Marriott’s newest Toronto offering measure up for this business traveller?
Review: Toronto Marriott Markham Hotel, Markham, Ontario, Canada.
“A brand new Marriott Property in Markham’s Tech District that will really appeal to business travellers, but isn’t located near any good dining options”
Booking the Toronto Marriott Markham Marriott:
A business trip took me to the Markham, Ontario area for a first ever “live” conference after the Coronavirus pandemic started to ease. As the hosting conference hotel wasn’t all to appealing, I ended up staying nearby at the almost brand new Toronto Marriott Markham hotel located just a short drive away.
I booked this stay via the Marriott website direct. As I booked with Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Elite level status, I was promised an upgrade to the best available room (including suites), lounge access, and a guaranteed late check out to 4 PM.
The room rate was soft but not at rock bottom when I was travelling during mid week in February. My rate at the time was under $200 CAD ($156 USD), which appeared to be on the low side for this property. I had more typically seen rates between the $290 – $320 CAD mark, which seems to be pretty constant for this hotel.
Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Awards:
The hotel offers a few rooms in the Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Award pool. Marriott Suite Night Awards are awards give to Marriott Bonvoy Platinum, Titanium and Ambassador level members for passing certain stay thresholds. The Suite Night Awards confirm the guest into an elevated room category; typically 5 days in advance of any stay.
The Toronto Marriot Markham offered two categories of suites in it’s Suite Night Award pool; a Large Suite Executive Suite and a standard Suite.
The hotel participates in the Marriott Bonvoy rewards program. The rates under their new variable pricing ranged from 20,000 points for a standard room redemption to 32,500 for a M Club Lounge access room. If you value Marriott Bonvoy points at 0.005 cents per point, you’d have to have a paid room rate of more than $100 – 162 USD to come out ahead redeeming Marriott Bonvoy points versus paying cash.
Getting to the Toronto Marriott Markham:
After a visit to MrsWT73’s brother and a stay at the Delta London Armouries, we drove our rental car from London to Markham, Ontario to the Toronto Marriott Markham hotel. The hotel is located off the Toll Route 407 highway, which is exceptionally inconvenient for those using rental cars on a business expense reconciliation basis, since the toll payment and rental car services administration charges makes for a headache in billing. As a result, I avoided the toll routes using back highways, which took us slightly longer to get to the property.
The Toronto Marriott Markham hotel is situated in a new mid rise apartment tower development complex in the neighbourhood known as Downtown Markham. There were approximately 12 – 15 mid rise towers going up in this neighbourhood with almost all towers being new construction.
Like with many new properties, the hotel operates in a hybrid concept. The hotel operates on the lower floors of the building, with residential apartments located above the sixth floor of the property in residential units that feature balconies.
The neighbourhood is an up and coming neighbourhood. I got the sense that there were many international or overseas residents in this area and that many of the apartments may have been empty.
Along with an empty apartment neighbourhood, I would later learn that there weren’t many restaurants within the immediate hotel area, thanks to the developing nature of this particular up and coming neighbourhood.
Checking into the Toronto Markham Marriott:
I parked out front of the Toronto Markham Marriott. Consistent with being an almost new property, the arrival was very urban and contemporary. There was a large concrete courtyard underneath towers that allowed for unloading of the vehicle.
Strangely absent from my usual Marriott arrivals was the usual Marriott doorman. I entered inside the property and started the check in process for a three night stay. The lobby had a great first impression, with views in to the high ceiling Draco Restaurant and Bar immediately off the lobby.
Heading up to the front desk, I was greeted and welcomed to the property. There was an efficient check in and I was acknowledged immediately as soon as I stepped into the reception area.
My Marriott Bonvoy Titanum Elite status was recognized. I took the Marriott Bonvoy Elite Welcome Amenity of 1,000 bonus points. In a nice tough, I also received apologies from the reception about not being able to be accomodated with a suite upgrade. However, the hotel was able to soft upgrade me to an M Club Floor level with convenient same level access to lounge.
While I was offered a guaranteed Marriott Bonvoy Titanium late check out of 4 PM, I didn’t need it and as a result, didn’t accept their offer.
After getting some advice from the front desk, I unloaded the car at the lobby loading zone. I self parked the car ($20 CAD daily) with self parking located in an adjacent tower on above ground levels P3 to P5. Unfortunately, there was no bridge pass over to the hotel, meaning that after parking your car, you had to take the elevator down five levels, cross over to the hotel outside on foot (and in the inclement weather) and then back up to your room once inside the Marriot. Accordingly, it’s much easier to unload your vehicle at the main level, than within the parkade instead of having to navigate through all these elevators and corridors.
The Room: M Club King Bed
I led myself up to room #444. The interior corridors of the Toronto Marriott Markham hotel are modern and quiet for the most part. I found my way to room #444, which looked inwards towards the arrival concrete courtyard.
Being a newer hotel, the room sizes at the Toronto Marriott Markham hotel are on the smaller size at about 300 square feet. While that’s perfectly fine for a single business traveller that this hotel caters to, it can get a little compact when travelling with a partner. Thankfully, the room is well designed to maximize the available space, so I didn’t notice the tight configuration as much as I would have expected.
The room is decorated in various shades of dark greys. Immediately upon entering the room, you’ll find yourself passing the bathroom and headed to the main sleeping space. The M Club Lounge room offered a King Size Bed.
The Toronto Marriott Markham M Club Lounge Room featured a King Size bed. The bed was up to the usual standards of Marriott comfort with crisp and unmarked linens.
While a hotel room usually has an occasional chair in the form of a sofa or an easy chair, this room featured a cosy corner couch. MrsWT73 appreciated this space, as she was able to flip onto it to handle some remote work calls, instead of being seated at a formal desk.
Despite the corner couch being highly functional, it wasn’t all too soft in terms of comfort level. It was more built for institutional use, and the softness met the usual sofa bed firmness that you’d expect from sitting on a less than comfortable area. As a result, I didn’t tend to spend much time sitting here.
The room featured a long horizontal desk that ran the length of the room. This was probably the best feature of the space, as it allowed for storage of everything on counter space, with baggage storage underneath the counter tops. I was able to set up charging of multiple computers, smart phones and devices in this area without cords running into each other.
Instead of a closet at the front door, there was an open horizontal bar that allowed for hanging of work clothes. By incorporating the rack in open space, the hotel was able to allow for more space than a tiny closet in order to hang work clothes.
The Toronto Marriott Markham offered bottled water in the room, in addition to proper glassware. Proper glassware is something I always appreciate, as it makes the stay just that much more comfortable.
The hotel room also offered in room drip coffee maker, with Higgins and Burke Coffee.
The bathroom was of standard variety. It offered a single sink vanity, and a stand up shower.
The toiletries were the common “thisworks” Marriott branded toiletries.
The room faced the property courtyard, which appeared to be an upgraded view, although it was not green in any way and was mostly a concrete jungle type of environment. The courtyard was quieter than facing onto a city street.
In terms of sleep quality, it was pretty good with not a lot of noise in the room or in the surrounding area. We did have some construction noise in the morning from nearby skyscrapers. However, the noise didn’t interfere with our stay.
Around the Property:
M Lounge (Executive Lounge),
The property offers an M Lounge located just off the elevator landing on the fourth floor. During our visit, it was open and accessible for those staying on a Concierge Level Floor and on a complimentary basis for Marriott Bonvoy Platinum, Titanium and Ambassador Bonvoy Elite members per the terms of the Marriott Bonvoy program.
The timings of the M Club Louge were as follows
- Breakfast 6:30 AM – 10:30 AM
- Appetizer 5:30 PM – 10:30 PM
During our visit, a host regularly took our room number on every attendance, and they were quite pro-active in verifying lounge access.
Entering the M Club, you are immediately led into a hallway that offered a comfortable seating area next to some televisions. It is also next to the food service area.
Continuing down the hallway past the food service zone, you’ll find yourself next to a long artificial fireplace. Despite what you think about artificial fireplaces, I found that it actually added some personality to the place, even if it wouldn’t be a feature I’d want in my own home.
The M Club Lounge wraps itself around he artificial fireplace, and offered a variety of spots to sit. The seating offered a combination of bar, tables and chairs and the occasional couch space at the end of the lounge.
The lounge was frequently empty during my travels through, and I never had any issue finding a place to sit or work. The bar seating had USB charging ports from within the counter top space, which was exceptionally functional in design
M Club Lounge Breakfast:
The M Club Lounge offered breakfast between the hours of 06:30 AM and 10:30 AM. The breakfast offered continental breakfast items, in addition to an egg item and a meat item.
There were enough items to keep a traveller engaged on a multi day stay, and it was a good set up for those on the business travel circuit that were looking to get something quickly and go.
M Club Lounge Appetizer Snacks:
The M Club Lounge offered evening appetizer snacks between the hours of 5:30 PM and 10:30 PM. The appetizers offered hot and cold items. During our visit, there was a soup offering, a pasta offering and mini quiches. There was also a small salad bar.
The lounge also offered wine and beer for purchase. In an advanced touch, the lounge offered a wine thermador to allow for a better quality of wine. The wine prices were quite reasonable and cheaper than in a restaurant. Despite this, i didn’t see many guests taking advantage of this.
The M Club Lounge was quite convenient as a place to spend time in and allowed some additional room to work.
The Indoor Pool.
The Toronto Marriott Markham property featured a medium sized indoor pool and hot tub zone. The pool had tasteful decorative art in it. Along with many pools in Ontario, the outdoor season is so short, so it makes sense to offer an indoor pool space that can better take advantage of the colder weather seasons.
Hotel Gym:
The Toronto Marriott Markham also featured a nicely sized indoor gym. The gym was often in use during the after work period. There was also a small weight area located within the gym.
The workout room had a whole series of treadmills and workout space.
Food and Beverage:
The Toronto Marriott Markham hotel is located within an up and coming neighbourhood. While we frequented a Milestones casual dining restaurant nearby in the area, there weren’t too many appealing restaurants.
The Toronto Marriott Markham features two restaurants in the building. There is a Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse, and the “in hotel” Draco restaurant. While even the Ruth’s Chris steakhouse was beyond my company’s expense account, we did spend one night dining at the Draco restaurant.
Draco Restaurant:
For one night during our stay, we dined at Draco restaurant. In a point maximization exercise, I was able to book via Open table for an easy additional 100 Open Table points.
The Draco restaurant offered a pleasant atmosphere although it was a little hotel like in feel. There were business travellers swishing the night away with whiskies at the bar and a group of well dressed dentist convention attendees sitting at a table for twenty laughing quietly into the night.
During my meal, I enjoyed the seared pickerel. The seared pickerel was served with sautéed quinoa, braised broccolini and lemon beurre blanc. The pickerel was tasty although it was a little overcooked for my Pacific Rim tastes.
MrsWT73 enjoyed a flat bread with arugula, cherry tomatoes and feta cheese. It received high marks on the casual dining front.
While the food at Draco’s was enjoyable, it wasn’t a place that I would find worthy enough to return to for a second meal.
There aren’t a lot of great restaurants in this neighbourhood. Much of the surrounding area has not completed construction and there are many vacant lots. One evening, we dined off property at the nearby Milestones restaurant. On another evening, I drove the ten minutes up the road to the Joey’s Markham attached to the CF Markville retail mall. Even though the neighbourhood restaurants aren’t within the hotel’s immediate control, I found the lack of options the main drawback about staying at this particular property.
Departing the Toronto Marriott Markham:
When it came time to depart the Toronto Marriott Markham, our bill was prepared without any issue. It was completely accurate and our Marriott Bonvoy points posted without any issue. We were thanked for our stay and welcomed back anytime.
The service was pleasant and professional. I couldn’t have asked for a more polite stay.
The Toronto Marriott Markham Bottom Line:
I enjoyed our stay at the Toronto Marriott Markham. The property offered everything that a business traveller would need, including convenient M Club Lounge access. While the property was a full featured property that included a pool gym and restaurants, I found that the largest disadvantage was the lack of appealing restaurants in the immediate area. While this isn’t within the hotels immediate control, it’s a factor to consider when picking any hotel when a longer business traveller stay is considered.
If you have stayed at the Toronto Marriott Markham, where did you end up dining during your stay ?
Our travels on a family visit to London, Ontario, Canada led us to needing a hotel to stay for several nights while in town. The hotel inventory in London, Ontario is fairly slim, without a lot of exciting properties to stay at. As Marriott Bonvoy travellers, we ended up at the Delta Hotels by Marriott London Armouries. The Delta Hotel London Armouries would end up being a stay highlighted by excellent Marriott Bonvoy recognition and a fantastic suite upgrade.
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Review: Delta Hotels by Marriott London Armouries, London Ontario, Canada
“A Delta Hotel property that occupies a historic armoury with outstanding Marriott Bonvoy Elite Treatment and recently renovated historic building suites”
I had a business trip planned that would take me from my hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia across the country to Toronto, Ontario, Canada. MrsWT73’s brother happens to reside in London, Ontario; a short two hour and fifteen minute drive away from Toronto, Ontario. Thanks to advances in global technology, she was able to remote work for the week; all while taking in a weekend trip to visit her brother in London.
Booking the Delta London Armouries:
We had grown out of the era of staying immediately on the family house sofa bed and opted to stay at a more comfortable a local hotel in London, Ontario. As Marriott Bonvoy loyalists, we had a choice between three Marriott Bonvoy options: the Courtyard London, the Residence Inn London and the Delta London Armouries. The Delta London Armouries looked to be the best full service hotel choice.
I booked this stay via the Marriott website direct. As I booked with Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level status, I was promised an upgrade to the best available room (including suites), lounge access, and a guaranteed late check out to 4 PM.
The room rate was pretty soft given I was travelling in February; far from the peak summer season of travel when many visitors come to town. My rate at the time was under $200 CAD ($156 USD), which seems to be pretty constant for this hotel- whether it’s summer or winter.
Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Awards:
The hotel offers a few rooms in the Marriott Bonvoy Suite Night Award pool. Marriott Suite Night Awards are awards give to Marriott Bonvoy Platinum, Titanium and Ambassador level members for passing certain stay thresholds. The Suite Night Awards confirm the guest into an elevated room category; typically 5 days in advance of any stay. As an older hotel, it offers a number of configurations available. Unfortunately, it seems that the hotel does not offer the largest or best suites available under the Suite Night Award Inventory.
The hotel is presently a Marriott Bonvoy Category 4, and is floating around 20,000 points under the variable pricing scheme for a one night redemption. If you value Marriott Bonvoy points around $0.005 per point, you’re probably better off redeeming points on a 20,000 point room if the room rate is higher than $100 USD per night.
Planning and Getting There:
We arrived into Toronto Pearson International Airport on an Air Canada flight. I’ve reviewed these flights several times before, including Air Canada Signature Business Class Vancouver – Toronto so I don’t have a different experience to report at this time.
We picked up a Hertz car rental and were lucky with getting an Infiniti Q50s in the President’s Circle Ultimate Choice aisle. While I’ve certainly had worse cars from this location, it’s was handy to be able to chose such a car and go.
We packed up the car and headed on the two hour drive south of Toronto on Highway 401, eventually arriving to the Delta London Armouries.
The Delta Hotels London Armouries was initially built in 1909. It served as an Armoury Depot for the British Regiment for a number of years in the period of time after Canada’ confederation in 1867, but before Canada was recognized as an independent country from the United Kingdom in 1982. The London Armoury served the city for decades as a training facility and weapons storage for reserve and regular army units. It comprised of mess halls, sleeping quarters, parade spaces, and a shooting gallery. The London armoury was converted to a hotel in 1986 which saw a medium rise tower built over top of the historic Armoury building.
The property was converted to a Sheraton branded property in 1989 and it was eventually re-flagged to a Delta Hotels property in 1992. The Delta Hotels brand was absorbed by the Marriott Hotel family in 2015; bringing us to the hotels’ current franchise affiliation today.
The hotel is well located within central London, Ontario with many central business district downtown destinations that can be walked immediately from the hotel.
Checking In:
We arrived by car and parked out front of the historic London Armouries building. After entering, we had a small queue to check in, as there was a small queue of families checking in as a result of a hockey tournament that appeared to be converging on the hotel at the time.
Our friendly check in host Rachel took us through the features of the property. As a Marriott Titanium Member, we received a complimentary upgrade from a base level that we had booked into a Suite. We would later discover that we had been upgraded into the Royal Suite; likely the best room on the property.
We also had no challenges with a Marriott Bonvoy Titanium Level 4 PM late check out, despite being assigned an elevated suite upgrade.
After check in, I self parked the car and headed up to room. The parking at the hotel is on a pay basis at $25 CAD. There is a limited space secured underground option that is connected to the hotel by elevators. There is also an overflow exterior option that requires a lengthy walk around to the front door. Both parking options are available on a first come first serve basis.
The Room: The Royal Suite
Our assigned Room # 240 was in the historic armoury part of the hotel. Typically, I associate older historic rooms as being tiny. However, we were blown away by the suite.
The Delta London Armouries invested $2 million dollar in renovating 15 suites in the historic building in 2018. All the rooms renovated were on the second floor in the historic building. The renovation was aimed to attract VIP guests that were staying or performing at the nearby Budweiser Gardens, along with their enroutages.
The suite entry led into a foyer space that was complete with a small wet bar. There was a mini refrigerator in this space, along with a small coffee maker and microwave oven.
Proceeding past the foyer space, we found ourselves in a massive corner room with twenty foot ceilings. The room was exceptionally impressive with a renovation that was from floor to ceiling in nature.
The living space featured a dining table, a separate sofa and occasional chair. The room itself was exceptionally spacious and allowed for lots of room to navigate around the furniture.
The living space area offered a television that was slightly off set from the sitting area. It offered a combination desk area, that had a number of power drop points for device charging, in addition to the room hotel telephone.
The comprehensive nature of the renovation allowed the designers to use the space in the Armoury Turrets in the corner. They used this space by making an elevated seating area that allowed for a commanding view across the room. A few steps up, and we found ourselves in a quaint seating area with an over arching view of the room.
There was such a sweeping view, that there was an elevated view over to the king size bed. The king size bed was tucked into a corner of the spacious suite. Although it wasn’t in a separate space, the room was certainly large enough to feel as though it was a different sleeping area.
A flat screen television was also mounted on the wall, so that you could watch television in bed. Despite this, the views over to the other half of the room were more interesting with our “in the corner” bed position.
In terms of sleep quality, the room was very quiet, despite facing the street. There was some through the night noise of sirens given the urban area and the proximity to the street. In addition, the heating ventilation offered some clanking through the night with a heat port limited to the entry way of the room, making the sleeping area in our room a little cool.
The room featured a single bathroom. The bathroom was spacious and fully renovated along with the rest of the room. It offered a single vanity, along with a large stand up shower.
The toiletries were of the standard Delta Hotels variety and featured argan oil shampoo, conditioner and body wash and body lotion.
The floor layout of the Delta London Armouries surrounded the newer tower portion of the hotel in the historic wing. Our room was in the bottom turret of the hotel.
Around the Hotel Property:
Swimming Pool:
The Delta Hotel London Armouries offered an indoor pool. The pool was located on the other side of the atrium opposite from the Armouries Grill. The pool was quite popular among the family travellers and it seemed to get quite a bit of use.
Hotel Gym:
A few steps down from the pool was the hotel health center. The health center appeared to be squished into what was, at one time, two squash courts. One squash court contained a series of exercise equipment, where as the other squash court remained as a squash court space for multi use purposes.
I didn’t see anyone actually using the gym space during my stay but it is always nice to have access to this facility.
Armoury History:
Given the London Armouries long history, on the second floor stretching the length of the London Amouries building, were select history showcases outlining some historical items of the buildling. If you have interests in history, you’ll find this space to be quiet engaging.
The showcases feature meal ration discs, service medals and Volunteer Medals from World War Two, Knitting Instructions for Service items, World War One Service Medals
I find these pieces of history to be quite interesting as it ties the building to a space in time, adding some insight into your stay.
Delta Signature Club Lounge:
The Delta London Armouries offered a Delta Club Lounge. The Delta Club Lounge is typically accessed by purchasing a Club Floor room, or can be accessed through elite benefits courtesy of Marriott Bonvoy Platinum / Titanium / Ambassador level benefits.
The Delta Signature Club Lounge was located in the towers portion of the building on a high floor. Unfortunately, it was closed during my visit as a result of the pandemic. As a result, I didn’t get the opportunity to test it out.
I was able to take a peek inside the lounge and it seemed to be a reasonable space for an executive lounge. The lounge offered some windows, which would have had a terrific view of east London, Ontario.
The view from the Delta Signature Lounge at London Delta Armouries was pretty good, considering it’s high floor location in a tower in London, Ontario.
Hopefully, the lounge will get up and running again soon, as the lounge is a pretty comfortable spot to be when travelling for business.
Food and Beverage:
Armouries Grille
Marriott Bonvoy Platinum Breakfast
The Delta London Armouries in hotel restaurant was the Armouries Grill. It was located off the lobby in an atrium between the historic armoury building and the newer tower building. While the Armouries Grille had sort of a dated look between the old and new, it was a perfectly pleasant atmosphere.
The space offered tiered stairways up to the hotel’s Cantata Lounge, which was located up on the top atrium level.
During our stay, we happened to be enjoying Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level elite membership in the hotel’s loyalty program. As a result, we were able to select a breakfast option as an elite welcome gift.
The Delta Armouries Breakfast menu was a popular place with lots of goodies on the menu. The hotel breakfast options were much greater than I was expecting, and better than some of my usual hotel stays that offer the same five usual breakfast options. With the theme of the hotel being a past Armoury, the menu items were all military themed by name.
We presented our Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level breakfast vouchers. We were invited to order anything on the menu, including Steak and Eggs. This was a great move on the park of the Delta London Armouries as some hotels try to up charge for every little offering. I was happy to report that we were really treated well at the property.
MrsWT73 enjoyed an Officer’s Triple Choice Omelette with ham, cheese and rye bread. This was received with strong favourable reports.
I tried the Captian’s Eggs Benedict with sliced black forest ham, served with crispy potato patties. While it wasn’t the lightest tasting eggs benedict that I had tasted, it hit the spot.
On my last day, I enjoyed a Poutine Bowl with sausage, bacon potatoes scallions and hollandaise sauce. It was very filling and I enjoyed it – consistent with the winter season.
I enjoyed a bit of a food coma after that one. The Delta Armouries Grill was a popular spot for breakfast, and it was frequently a fast paced operation.
The setting of the Armouries Grill and the food and beverage zones at night have a little opulent flair to it with nice lighting.
The Delta Hotels London Armouries Bottom Line:
The Delta Hotels by Marriott London Armouries was everything that we could have expected from a stay in London, Ontario, Canada. Without a whole lot of hotels to chose from, the Delta Hotels London Armouries was our best choice. We received an outstanding upgrade as a Marriott Bonvoy Titanium level member, and were treated like royalty throughout our stay, courtesy of our Elite Status. While I tend to shy away from historic hotels, our room was fully renovated and clean in every way possible. I would look forward to returning to this property on our next family visit to London.
If you have stayed at the Delta London Armouries, did you appreciate the history of this hotel location ?
Air Canada offers a substantial fleet of international wide body carriers. I recently had the pleasure of experiencing their Boeing 777-300 ER High Density aircraft in economy class, which permits the carrier to transport 448 passengers in wide body economies of scale. How was my first experience as a tall business traveller cramped in to the back of their economy seat?
Is it Worth Avoiding Economy Class in the Air Canada Boeing 777-300ER High Density Configuration ?
I recently had the pleasure of travelling on my usual route on Air Canada between Vancouver and Toronto.
I travel this route quite regularly. Usually I’m pretty diligent about making sure what aircraft I’m booked on. However, today’s flight I was not paying my usual attention to my travel reservations and inadvertently booked myself on the Air Canada Boeing 777-300ER “High Density” Aircraft.
The Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density:
Air Canada currently offers a variety of wide body aircraft. Currently, Air Canada has in its fleet the Boeing 777-200, Boeing 777-300 ER, Boeing 787-8 / Boeing 787-9, the odd Boeing 767-300 ER in addition to an Airbus 330-300 model.
The Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER is Air Canada’s largest capacity aircraft. There are two versions of this aircraft. The most dense version seats a staggering 396 in economy class, 24 in premium economy and 28 flat bed seats in business class. This totals 448 passengers.
Air Canada’s next largest aircraft is the other version of the Boeing 777-300ER offers 336 economy class seats, 24 premium economy seats and 40 business class seats for a total of 400 total passengers. While it is somewhat similar, the lighter version has 48 less economy class seats.
The Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density features an economy class configuration of 10 across in the back. This is split into a 3 – 4 – 3 configuration as seen on the diagram featured on the left.
By contrast on the right, it is an Air Canada Boeing 767-300 ER which features a more comfortable passenger oriented 2 – 3 – 2 configuration. Despite it’s older reliability, it’s a passenger plane since almost 85% of the plane has either a window or aisle seat.
It’s worth noting that some other carriers such as British Airways and Cathay Pacific offer a 3 -3 -3 across economy class configuration on their Boeing 777-300 ER aircraft. If you are able to do a little research it may allow for a much more comfortable flight.
Booking my Flight:
Usually, I am pretty good at paying attention to my bookings. However, as a result of less travel due to the pandemic, perhaps I am out of practice.
When booking a flight on Air Canada through their website, it’s not always easy to tell what aircraft you are on, unless you do a little investigative digging. In my case, I was booking through a work travel portal that linked into Concour. I typically check the air Canada website, book on the company portal, although admittedly, I didn’t bother to check this flight booking in advance.
The Air Canada website displays flights as follows, with a tiny “details” hyperlink that will lead you to a pop up window that will provide information about your flight.
If you’re diligent enough to click on the details section of your flight, you’ll see the Boeing 777-300 ER flight. If comfort is important to you, you’ll likely want to take note of what aircraft you happen to be flying on.
Flying the Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density:
I had flown the Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER several times in business class, including recently on Air Canada Signature Business Class Vancouver – Toronto. When it came time for my flight on the Air Canada Boeing 777-300ER in economy, it would be my first time riding in the back of this particular high density aircraft configuration.
I boarded with Boarding Group Two courtesy of Air Canada Aeroplan elite status. The plane was pretty empty in economy class since all the business travellers were boarding with Group 1, and there were very few headed to the back of the plane for economy class.
After boarding, I passed through the Air Canada Premium Economy section. The Air Canada Premium Economy Section is set up in a 2 -4 -2 configuration. Even this seemed a little tight.
I eventually located my economy class seat in row 33A. Settling into the seat itself, as my first time in the Air Canada economy class section on the high density, it felt pretty compact within moments of arriving on the plane. I didn’t even have any other passengers around me and I was already noticing how compact it was.
Settling into the seat row itself, it was tight in leg room but also in seat room. As a six foot 2 inch traveller, I certainly found it snug within seconds of sitting down.
As wedged my tail into Seat 33A, I was a bit cramped up against the window. While I had a view on the way to Toronto, I painted myself into a bit of a corner without the ability to get out to stretch my legs.
I didn’t really relish sitting in this seat for four hours and fifteen minutes while on the way to Toronto. I couldn’t hardly imagine it flying on a longer journey like Vancouver – London or Vancouver – Hong Kong.
There wasn’t a lot of leg room while I was seated in the seat. While there was some aspirational photographs of Toronto as my destination, it certainly wasn’t enough to take my mind away from my seating arrangements.
There was in seat power between seats A and B. The position was a little awkward and really inconvenient if you were planning on charging a device while you were getting out of your seat.
I was able to slightly distract myself from this uncomfortable plight that I found myself in by watching some of the free entertainment on demand. At the very least, as a long haul aircraft, there were a lot of options to keep you distracted.
Ultimately, I couldn’t wait for this flight to be over.
I found this configuration to be way too tight and compact for my liking. Without any real ability to move your legs around and stretch them out, this seat configuration is a real cramped one for sure. Even a movie wasn’t able to keep me engaged…
I made myself a note that the Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density in economy was a “once and done” type of aircraft. For a tall traveller like myself, the configuration was just too tight on my seat and knees for any degree of reasonable comfort.
On the chance that you find yourself stuck taking this aircraft, my best mitigation recommendation would be to get yourself an aisle seat. At the very least, you’ll be able to get up and walk around.
My Thoughts on the Air Canada B777-300 ER High Density:
I accidentally found myself travelling on the Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density. This was a miserable aircraft to travel on and the available seating room was far to limited to be comfortable or enjoyable. Despite me only travelling a short distance between Vancouver and Toronto, these four hours was unpleasant enough that I couldn’t imagine taking a longer journey on this aircraft while seated in economy. If you’re a tall traveller, I would recommend avoiding the Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density at all costs.
If you’ve flown on the Air Canada Boeing 777-300 ER High Density, did you find it uncomfortable in the back ?
After my car was rear ended in a car accident coming home after a weekend of skiing, it came time to find a new car. It wasn’t as easy as I expected buying a car in today’s environment for a whole host of modern day reasons that included a messed up supply chain, a global climate change wet weather flood and lack of vehicles in the market place today. How did I getting my car across the country and back home to Vancouver on the West Coast? Read on to find out…
This post is one chapter on our trip during the pandemic to Toronto, Ontario, Canada to Buy a Car. This trip was enhanced through Air Canada Aeroplan Elite Status and Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.
If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.
Read more from this trip:
- Introduction: Travelling 4,300km to Buy a Car
- Air Canada Signature Business Class Pandemic Edition: Vancouver – Toronto
- Toronto Airport Marriott Hotel, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- The Process of Buying an Audi on the Internet, Ontario, Canada
- Plaza Premium Toronto Concept Pop Up Lounge – Terminal 1, Toronto, Canada
- Air Canada Signature Business Class Pandemic Edition: Toronto – Vancouver
- My Experience Shipping a Car Across Canada
Activity: Shipping an Audi Across North America
After successfully locating a rare car on the other side of the country, a trip out to inspect and facilitate a purchase, it came time to deliver the car home. While most people buy from a dealership located in their immediate neighbourhood, my journey led me to a car dealer in Toronto for an Audi A6 Wagon.
Considering my options:
My newly purchased car happened to be located some 4,300 kilometres away from my home town in Vancouver, Canada. With Canada being one of the largest countries in the world, there were some distances to be covered in returning the vehicle to my home garage.
It seemed appropriate to consider my return options.
Driving:
While I could have enjoyed a six to eight day drive across Canada, my time and life schedule got the better of me.
In addition to my limited time, the cost of gas was pricing well over $2.20. With a 73 litre fuel tank, and a range of about 700 kilometres per tank, a trip directly across Canada would have likely cost me $986 CAD in gas alone.
While it may have been cheaper to travel across the United States thanks to cheaper gas prices, at the time of the trip, Canadian Residents required a PCR Covid Test if they were out of Canada for more than 72 hours. I would have to add another $200 CAD and time and efforts to find a testing location if I were to take this route..
Further adding to the expense, if I were to add another six nights of hotel on the trip, it would have likely resulted in another $1000 in expenses. By driving, I would add another 4,300 kilometres on to the odometer. As a result, driving certainly wasn’t my first choice. I wasn’t too keen on driving back.
Freight Train:
Based on the above math alone, I decided that shipping the car by train was the better and more economical option.
I ended up using Hansens Freight Forwarding in order to ship the car across Canada by rail. I had used Hansens before to ship a 2001 BMW 540i Touring from Montreal to Vancouver.
I also had some comfort that Audi Durham was familiar with Hansen’s and had some history with them; having used them in the past. Having read some on line reviews of vehicle relocation companies, going for the most economical providers wasn’t necessarily the best option when you’re shipping one of your most prized assets.
Hansens used freight train cars and flat deck trucks at each end, which provided some comfort and security in the shipping process.
Most intriguingly, Hanses offered daily vehicle tracking feature, which allowed customers to see where their vehicle was once a day.
Booking the Train:
I went to the Hansens website on line and prepared a quote. The quote was handled reasonably quickly, and it cost me a quoted $2,000 CAD to ship the car. Hansens quoted an expected arrival date of approximately 21 days from the date of finalizing the order. This was longer than expected, but I hoped that the car would arrive sooner than that.
Starting the Transport:
After about 5 days of advance notice scheduling over the weekend, Hansens’ attended the Audi Durham dealership to collect the vehicle. The vehicle was signed off with photos taken.
The vehicle was loaded into a train yard in Toronto. It’s journey was underway. It took several days for the vehicle to actually get loaded onto the train after it was collected from the dealership. Whether this was a capacity issue or a lack of available space on trains, I’ll never exactly know. It seemed that the supply chain issues were not immune to this trip.
Once the car was loaded on to the train, the car had the experience of visiting heaps of out of the ordinary places. I would religiously check daily on the progress of the car which would yield a postal code near a train yard located somewhere nowhere near anywhere.
It was intriguing to follow this precious cargo as it crossed on it’s journey across Canada.
The car eventually arrived in Vancouver at its final train off load destination. Much like the departure of the vehicle, the car actually spend 3-4 days at the train yard waiting to get sorted out prior to being towed to it’s final destination.
Arrival Day:
One afternoon, I received a call I was most anticipating. The Hansens’ dispatch called to arrange a morning delivery time. I was pretty exstactic when I saw the flat deck arriving in the neighborhood with a beautiful wagon on the back of it.
It was surprisingly clean for a long train journey across Canada. The truck driver promptly unloaded her and after a few pleasentries, he was on his way.
Local Inspections:
The next day, I took care of a few local provincial safety inspections that were required in order to finalize vehicle licensing. I plated the car with the Ontario Plates that were supplied and had it inspected at the local Canadian Tire discount tire store. This was an insurance requirement in the Province of British Columbia that all out of province vehicles needed to be safety inspected.
After some bureaucratic inspections, the Audi A6 was on the road in British Columbia. The whole process took about six weeks end to end from the time I located the car, flew out to purchase it, and had it shopped right to the house.
My Thoughts on Shipping a Car:
While it wasn’t the easiest process buying a car and having it freighted, I was really happy I waited for something that I really wanted. I wasn’t keen on settling for a car that was only “just okay”. While I had forgotten how time consuming it was to research and purchase a vehicle, I was ultimately happy with the end result. To date, I’ve really been happy with the car and it’s provided the extra room that I’ve needed while scooting around the Vancouver area.
If you have recently shipped a car, do you have any tips with the whole process ?
Air Canada offers a variety of business class cabins and aircraft to cross Canada on a trans continental trip. With Toronto being a major business centre for Air Canada, it’s part of Air Canadas’ business strategy to offer a flagship Air Canada Signature Business Class Cabin when departing Canada’s largest city. Air Canada Signature Class offers an end to end experience which offers a fully flat bed in an executive pod. While we’ve taken this trip several times, it would be among our first times travelling this route during the pandemic. What would the service changes be under this new health environment?
This post is one chapter on our trip during the pandemic to Toronto, Ontario, Canada to Buy a Car. This trip was enhanced through Air Canada Aeroplan Elite Status and Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction here. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.
If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.
Read more from this trip:
- Introduction: Travelling 4,300km to Buy a Car
- Air Canada Signature Business Class Pandemic Edition: Vancouver – Toronto
- Toronto Airport Marriott Hotel, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
- The Process of Buying an Audi on the Internet, Ontario, Canada
- Plaza Premium Toronto Concept Pop Up Lounge – Terminal 1, Toronto, Canada
- Air Canada Signature Business Class Pandemic Edition: Toronto – Vancouver
- My Experience Shipping a Car Across Canada
Review: Air Canada Signature Business Class – Pandemic Edition B777-300ER, Vancouver International Airport – Toronto Pearson International Airport – Terminal One.
I purchased a regular economy class ticket in the Flex category. I was able to upgrade into the Air Canada Signature Business Class cabin as a result of e-upgrades courtesy of the Air Canada Aeroplan Elite status. For more on the upgrade process, please see the trip introduction.
Getting to Toronto Pearson International Airport:
I checked into this flight on line. After departing the Toronto Airport Marriott Hotel and returning my Hertz Rental Car, I wandered into the terminal and eventually walked down to the Air Canada Business Class Check In Area located at the far end in row one.
Air Canada keeps an exclusive walled check in area near the South end of the Terminal. It’s a great impression and serves a function when the terminal can tend to be crowded and filled with people at peak travel times.
After an initial visit to the temporary Plaza Premium Concept Pop Up Lounge Toronto Terminal One, I wandered upstairs to Level 4 to the Air Canada Maple Leaf Toronto Domestic Lounge. Access to the Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge Toronto Domestic was included on a complimentary basis with my Air Canada Signature Business Class ticket. I’ve reviewed this lounge before so there wasn’t any real need to review it again. Please see our earlier review for details on the Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge Experience.
After enjoying the lounge, I left the Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge Toronto Domestic and walked down to Gate D43. The snow was starting to come down. Per the weather forecast, it was expected for Toronto to get 10 – 15 cm of snow accumulation overnight starting at about 4 PM. Since my flight was departing at 7 PM, I was hoping to miss this weather system and not get stuck in Toronto overnight.
The Toronto Pearson International Airport flight board was already showing about 7 domestic cancellations out of about 30 flights that had been listed. Most of them were local prop planes or narrow bodies from eastern Canada and the Eastern United States of America.
Thankfully, there was a plane at the gate when I arrived. Our Boeing 787-9 was parked at the gate awaiting boarding.
Boarding got underway reasonably quickly. The Toronto Concourse doesn’t offer a lot of physical space so it got crowded with Zone 1 very quickly. We had many travellers fighting for left over space at the counter; either from cancelled flights or upgrades. We had single jet bridge boarding today with boarding through Door 1L.
Air Canada
AC 125 – Signature Business Class (R)
YYZ – YVR (Toronto Pearson International Airport – Vancouver International Airport)
February 17, 2022
7:00 PM – 8:58 PM
Booked: Boeing 787-9
Flown: Boeing 787-9
On Board Air Canada Signature Business Class:
Air Canada calls its domestic Business Class “Signature Class” if you are flying in an executive pod. If you happen to find yourself flying transcontinental in a regular business class seat, it’s just called Air Canada Business Class.
Stepping on board Air Canada Signature Business Class, I found my way to my seat 6A. The Air Canada Signature Business Class on the Boeing 787-9 is set up like on the Boeing 777-300 in a 1 – 2 – 1 configuration. My reverse herringbone seat on the aisle faced outwards towards the fuselage.
The seat has several convenient seat storage options, that include space to store and charge a laptop and other devices during flight.
The seats also offer electronic controls for relax, recline and lighting features. The call buttons are also integrated into the handy touch screen, which was easy and intuitive to use.
The seat configuration in Air Canada Signature Class remains among my favourite business class configurations for both working, resting and relaxing. With the counter space surrounding the suite, it’s easy to remain productive while you travel. The suite also offers a small partition which allows a bit of privacy from the aisle.
On the seat a bottle of Naya Water was waiting for me, in addition to an individually wrapped pillow, blanket and mattress pad. There were also a pair of Air Canada noise cancelling headphones.
Pre Departure Services:
There was no offer of a pre departure beverage today. Instead, we had a purser introduction to each passenger with a reminder to relax and enjoy your flight.
Given the bad snowy weather conditions, the captain announced we would head for de-icing with an announcement of “who knows how long that will take…”. It ended up taking about 50 minutes.
We taxied to the runway and were on the runway when an aircraft “got stuck” at the end 1 mile down due to accumulating snow. We had to wait for a tow off.
I was getting pretty worried as the snow was coming in quite considerably at these times and I was hoping we would not time out with the icing melt. We finally got underway at about 80 minutes past schedule with the engines spooling up cutting through the snow.
The Entertainment: Advanced Video on Demand
Air Canada offers an advanced video on demand system. The system offers a touch screen and is easily navigated through either touching the screen or using a wired remote.
Like many other carriers, Air Canada has offered aspiration photographs of the destination that cycle through the monitor.
The entertainment system features several movies consistent with the long haul nature of a Boeing 787-9 being a long distance international carrier. There were approximately 40 movies and about 20 television series available from the entertainment system. The headphones of the noise cancelling variety were provided along with the ability to plug into a triple prong plug.
The entertainment system also provided the flight track map. Today’s planned flight track would have us travelling along the Canada – United States border towards our destination of Vancouver.
Amenity Kits:
The Amenity Kit that was previously presented on this route has gone the way of the do – do bird and was completely absent for this route; a victim of the pandemic. It seemed like this has been cut as a result of cost savings.
The truth be told, I didn’t really miss it. Anything that was essential was provided in the Air Canada Care+ Package provided earlier in the flight.
The Meal: A Full 3 Course Dinner
“served shortly after take off”
Once we were in the air, we had a pre-meal almond and a beverage service. I had red wine of Zuccardi Los Olivos Cabernet Sauvingon, Mendoza, Argentina to go with it. The wine were not of super high end quality, but otherwise a little under reasonable. While the nuts were previously served in a cocktail dish, they were presented within the package for the passenger to open on their own.
I tucked into the James Bond movie “No Time to Die” in order to pass the time.
While service had gotten underway, the menu’s had been distributed. The Air Canada Signature Class printed menu is a nice feature that you don’t always get on a long haul trans-continental flight in North America.
An Air Canada Signature Class Wine List was also provided. I don’t find the wines on Air Canada to be all to exciting, but there is more than enough there between the wines and the hard spirits to keep you engaged with something on the list that is to your liking.
The first courses included a tasty and upscale smoked salmon, hard boiled egg, capers, guacamole cream, honey mustard vinaigrette and mixed greens that was featured as a John Park signature dish. The dish was more exotic than I was expecting for Air Canada. The smoked salmon set the tone for a nice meal.
The main course was veal osso buco, asparagus risotto and gremolata. It was again a tasty dish, although not to heavy on the flavour. It was nice to have something different tasting on a plane than the usual chicken, beef or vegetarian options.
Despite the wonderful taste, the appearance of it wasn’t too appealing. Upon looking at the photograph, MrsWT73 stated that it looked like someone had thrown up on the plate; yikes… Take that Gordon Ramsey.
The dessert was a choice between a Nanaimo Bar “John Park Signature Dish”, a cheese plate or a fruit plate. I ended up with the Nanaimo Bar. Although it was a John Ark Signature Dish, it didn’t taste all that different than a regular Nanaimo Bar.
After dinner, we were just passing Fort Frances and only about 1/3 of the way in our flight. Our one hour and twenty minute delay was posting as a 40 minute delayed arrival time in Vancouver per the flight map.
I watched the balance of the No Time to Die movie, which was long enough at 2 hrs 36 minutes running time to keep you entertained on what was supposed to be a 5 hour and two minute flight.
In terms of service adjustments as result of the pandemic, the flight crews pretty much disappeared for the flight. The usual offers of regular water or beverage refills that were around pre-pandemic were pretty much gone.
I took a nap as a result. The Air Canada Signature Class Executive Pod was reasonably wide, and the fully flat sleep allowed me to get a reasonable rest as a result of a quick turn around trip. Although the Boeing 787-9 is still noisy, it wasn’t a truly quiet rest and it was more of a light nap given the short distance of the flight.
The Second Service:
The second service consisted of a similar wrapped plastic bag containing a bag of chips and a chocolate bar. Since it wasn’t too engaging, I ended up passing on the extra calories.
Landing in Vancouver:
After departing all the bad Toronto weather, we landed into Vancouver. We pulled up to gate D52, about sixty minutes behind schedule.
With one hour and twenty minute delay departing Toronto, we made up approximately twenty minutes of this time. Our Air Canada Boeing 787-9 was continuing onto New Delhi after our flight, a long 14 hour proposition.
My Thoughts on Air Canada Signature Class:
In a world where most of the trans-continental flights are on less exciting narrow body jets, the ability to easily fly on a wide body aircraft Boeing 787-9 that happens to be well aligned with your schedule is an asset to air Canada. The Air Canada Boeing 787-9 is my favourite Air Canada flight experience, thanks to it’s smaller capacity, it’s improved air quality and an overall newer flight experience. Air Canada Signature Class remains the most comfortable way to cross Canada.
World Traveller 73 
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