Trip Preview: A Poker Night in Macau

With one of my high school friends with whom I used to play poker a lot being in Asia, we could not skip a quick visit to Macau. And, of course, if I was to be making my way from Japan all the way to Macau, I could not skip planning the itinerary in a way that would allow me to try some airlines and lounges I haven’t tried before.

Trip Preview: A Poker Night in Macau

Booking the Flights

Once my friend let me know about the dates he would be in Hong Kong, I started looking for my flights – both paid ones as well as award tickets for miles. Since the any interesting paid flights were expensive, I decided to go for the latter.

While I considered spending some of my ANA miles, in the end, I decided to go for a combination of Aegean miles that I bought a while back and British Airways’ Avios.

For my flight to Hong Kong, I had the option of booking a non-stop flight from Tokyo, but – for the sake of new reviews and enjoying a longer flight – I decided to book the following in business class:

  • Tokyo Narita – Singapore on an ANA 787-9
  • Singapore to Hong Kong on a Singapore Airlines 777-200ER

ANA Business Class

That would allow me to fly on Singapore Airlines for the first time (although on their old regional product only) and review the Singapore Airlines as well as Thai Airways lounges in Singapore during my transit.

It also gave me a chance to fly on the evening flight from Tokyo to Singapore that I reviewed before once again. I won’t be writing a review of the flight this time, but I will hopefully be posting a video review on YouTube.

For my flight back, I was hoping to fly Cathay Pacific or JAL premium economy. Using Avios, only an economy class flight from Hong Kong to Narita was available, though, so I went with that. I won’t be reviewing the flight since I already reviewed a similar one before.

If nothing else, it gave me a chance to review the excellent Qantas lounge as well as Cathay Pacific’s The Bridge business class lounge at Hong Kong airport.

Qantas Lounge Hong Kong

Spending Time in Macau

With the flights booked, it was time to book the accommodation. After looking at a number of options, eventually we settled for Holiday Inn Macau for about 115 dollars.

While I won’t be reviewing the hotel, if you are planning to visit Macau – especially to play poker, I can recommend it. The rooms are nice, and it’s within walking distance of the Wynn casino.

As for getting from Hong Kong to Macau and back, I had a chance not only to take the ferry which is the most common way of traveling between the two cities on my way back, but also to try the bus which uses the new Hong Kong – Zhuhai – Macao Bridge. I will be writing a detailed article on what the better way to get between the two cities was later on.

Macau

Stay Tuned!

To sum it up, the articles you can expect from this trip are reviews of the Singapore Airlines flight, as well as of a few Singapore and Hong Kong airport lounges. I will also try to publish a video review of the two business class flights on YouTube, and will write about the best way to get between Hong Kong and Macau.

I’ll be posting all of those over the next few weeks, so if any of the topics is of interest to you, make sure to stay tuned!

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