Tier Point Run to Hawaii in Dec 2022: Day 5 – Los Angeles (LAX) to New York (JFK)

By Nige on December 19, 2022 at 12:41 pm
Type: Post
Story: Tier Point Run to Hawaii in Dec 2022 Category: Travel
Tags: American Airlines | JFK | LAX | Los Angeles | New York | Trips | USA

As I registered in the the AA Flagship Lounge, the attendants recognised me: “weren’t you in yesterday?”. It wasn’t quite yesterday, but it’s really nice when you get some personal interaction with the lounge team.

After dropping my bag, I scooted off to Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT) where the queue for Starbucks wasn’t too long for a change. After 15 mins I had my caffeine in my hand and I was walking back to the lounge.

My flight back to JFK was due to leave from Gate 41. I think this was the first time I would have ever boarded from that gate. Last year, Gate 41 was used as a pre-clearance processing area for passengers travelling to Hawaii – getting a wristband allowed you to avoid document checks on arrival in Hawaii. I had to do this on my trip to Hawaii in Nov 2021.

Boarding started promptly and I was first on into seat 01F. These First Class seats are effectively the equivalent of BA’s new Club World suite. However, you can tell they are getting on a little, but this seat is better than the seat I had on the outward leg (JFK-LAX) which felt like it might break at any point.

There was no offer of a pre-flight drink and to follow that, the captain advised that the WIFI wasn’t working. When I further checked with the attendant assigned to First Class (who did a great job by the way), he confirmed the maintenance guys had tried restarting the WIFI service; even tried a cold reboot of the entire system, but alas they couldn’t get it to work. At least that saved me $29 (which is pretty expensive for WIFI on a 4.5 hour flight). You’d think that AA might offer First Class passengers WIFI access free of charge!

I was offered a menu and they had an interesting option of some sort of toast, which sounded like it was a Mexican version of a cold beef bruschetta! I decided I needed to try it anyway.

We pushed back a little early – I love that about AA – they are always focused on getting there on time, so pushing back a few mins early might just make the difference. The flight was only going to take about 4.5 hours.

Breakfast was quite tasty; the fruit selection was refreshing and the Mexican toast was really nice, if perhaps a tad unusual. I’d have it again though! That must be the highest compliment you can give.

I watched Top Gun – Maverick (again) – it was the only film I could find that I was half interested in. I don’t know whether it’s been a poor selection of films this month, or I have just been extra picky. Anyway, the selection of films has not quite been what I have been looking for on this trip.

I grabbed about 90 mins of kip. The flat bed was fairly comfy. The mechanism does sound a bit ropey, but it did successfully go flat and go back to a sitting position, so I can’t ask for any more than that!

We arrived into Gate 35 at T8. It’s a good walk to the lounges, but at least I don’t need to leave T8 and head to T7 via the AirTrain anymore! That’s a huge bonus. Today it only took me about 5 mins from deplaning to arriving at the lounge, ahead of my flight back to Heathrow. That’s where the real fun began…

Tier Point Run to Hawaii in Dec 2022