U.S. Trip - Travel Report

[OnMyWay]

When I was shopping for air tickets, I covered some of this.  Now, with retrospect as my friend, I will go over it.  Another one of my long winded posts that I hope will help someone in the future.

Asiana Airlines, Clark / Inchon / Los Angeles:  

I made a mistake choosing this flight for my family.  Connecting over Seoul made for some really long flight times that were worse than they appear on paper, and hard on the kids.  Next time we will hire the van to Manila and take the PAL non-stop to LAX.  When I was shopping for tickets late last year, the fares were quite a bit higher than Asiana but a few months ago they dropped the prices so that they are only slightly higher.  We would have to leave the house at 3 am to catch a noon PAL flight, but the kids will always sleep in a van.  On the 4 hour flight to Seoul, they didn't sleep much at all even though it was a red-eye.

Between Seoul and LA, I paid $400 extra to secure the center bulkhead 4 seat row for us, (A380 between Seoul and LAX) and we got a bassinet for the baby.  However, baby did not like the bassinet and only slept there for a short time.  The bulkhead seats have extra legroom for me but other than that, not so great.  I found Asiana's economy seat to be hard and uncomfortable, and my puwet was hurting!  I have flown bulkhead seats many times to get the legroom.  It is normal that you can't block the floor space during takeoff and landing, so everything must go up top.  No problems with this on the way to LAX.  On the way home, the staff tells us we can't keep anything there the whole flight, which is BS.  The row access is completely blocked by the bassinet, so their claim that this was a safety rule is illogical.  I'm fairly certain that this was the micro-manager head stew's rule.  My wife needed the baby bag to be near her quite often, so that is why it was a problem.

Overall, I was not very impressed with Asiana cabin staff.  Too staid and business like.  Not all, but maybe 50%.  We didn't really care for the food either.  The Western food choices were very bland attempts for the most part.

Clark Airport:

I love Clark and it was convenient to just drive my car there and park for the entire 32 days.  Cost to park was p90 per day, total 2910.  I unhooked the battery so I had no problems starting when I got back.  It must have rained a lot because the uncovered car was clean!

As usual, no problems out or into Clark.  Friendly staff and everything went well both ways.  Our travel taxes were 1620 X 3, 810 for the 3 year old, 200 for the baby, total 5870 pesos.  Then the departure fees were 600 X 4 = p2400.  Then I had to get my ECC-B at the office next to immigration.  I can't find a receipt but I think it was over p2000.  Memory is bad.  So I paid over p10,000 in fees for my family to leave!

One negative for our Clark outbound flight time (~1 am) was that all the little food kiosks were closed except one that did not have much.  Bring snacks.  That surprised me as there are several flights going out at that time of night.  I have never yet been on the second level and used the jetways from there.  There is a huge smoking area full of Koreans, for the most part. 

Seoul - Inchon Airport:

My mind thinks this is a new airport, but I guess it is 20+ years old now.  There was no Western food in the transit area we were in, except for a MosBurger, which was not bad.  I think a long walk could have gotten us more choices.  I used a credit card for food but you can use USD too.  When I saw my CC bill, the prices were actually quite reasonable for an airport.  In the transit area they have little carts you can use for free and there is free internet. We had an 8 hour layover on the way, so I paid $127 for 6 hours in the transit hotel, inside the transit area.  No customs clearance required.  The room was nice and served it's purpose for us.  I slept on a comforter on the floor with my 3 year old and the 3 others used the queen bed.  It was nice to have a rest and a shower after the red eye from Clark.  On the way back we had a 4 hour layover so we just hung out.

One annoying thing with the hotel is that even though I had a reservation for 6 hours, you can't get a 6 hour rate if you check-in before 07:30 AM.  You would have to pay for 12 hours.  We arrived there at about 0645, so we had to wait until 0730 to go to the room.  Makes no sense.  The hotel hallways had very dirty carpets, probably from guests rolling their bags.  No excuse for not cleaning them more often, especially given the high prices they charge.

LAX Airport:  Sucks!

I worked there for 11 years from 83 to 94, both on the tarmac and in the terminals, so I know it well.  Now it is so overcrowded it is a mess.

Actually our inbound went quite well at Tom Bradley terminal.  Immigration is now down at computerized kiosks.  For people who have not used them before, they could be quite daunting, so they have a lot of staff to help.  I wasn't quite sure what line to get into with the family, so after I asked a civilian "guide", I went to the wrong place and the tall (6'8"+) muscular black officer gave me a hard time, jokingly.  "Who sent you over here!?, point him out!"  So I did and he kept saying he couldn't see him, so I knew he was just messing with me a bit.  To the rescue, along came a floater officer who happened to be Filipino.  And guess what?  He was from Olongapo!  He took us to a computer (no line) and the lady there did all the passport work for us.  Then we went back to the big black guy and he did our final check.  We had a nice chat and he said they have a lot of Filipinos working there, so he knows a lot about the Philippines.  No problems getting our baggage and my sister was waiting outside for us.

It was our return flight via LAX that was terrible.  Our flight was at 1210 on Sunday morning.  We had a bit of a logistics problem because my sis and BIL were also leaving that morning on a camping trip and we needed to give them a borrowed car seat, but we needed the car seat to go to the airport.  They decided they could go with us to the airport and leave for their trip from there.  I loaded the rental mini-van up with our luggage (4 checked large bags, 3 checked heavy boxes, 3 carry ons, 1 stroller and 1 car seat!) and my wife and baby rode with them in their mini-van  My sister said we should leave at  0815 and we were ready, but she was not, so we left about 0850.

The departure level traffic into the airport was terribly backed up and we didn't get to the curb at Tom Bradley terminal until after 0945.  $5 if you want to use a luggage cart!  What a rip-off!  We got one and needed three.  Luckily my sister went and found a porter with a large cart, who took our stuff inside and found us some "free" $5 carts.  $10 tip for him.  Meanwhile, I had to go back to the rental car return.  That went quickly at Avis and they had me back to the airport at 1010.  I thought we were in good shape.

There was no line at Asiana economy.  At 2 hours before flight time, I guess we were late and everyone had already been processed.  Check-in didn't take long.  Off to security upstairs and here is the problem.  With a stroller, we were able to go in a special line for wheelchairs etc.  It still took a long, long time.  Hundreds of people in lines.  Watching old people in wheelchairs having to take off their shoes and belts was not fun.  Watching a nursing mother being patted down in all body areas, in full public view, was not fun.  They found a small blade in her bag so I guess she was a suspect at that point.  She was not wearing clothes that facilitate hiding something, so I saw no reason for an intimate pat down, and certainly not in public.  I thought they had booths for that, but not here.  So our baby bag had a lot of water and milk in it, which is allowed.  The problem was, after we were through security, that bag sat in queue of 3 or 4 bags and it took forever before they looked at it.  Then they had to take the bottles to another spot to put them in a machine to have them checked.  The people working here were absolutely lethargic with no sense of urgency.  Say no more.

We were finally done and I did not realize how much time had passed.  We heard last call for our flight and had to jog over to the gate.  On board 10 minutes before departure.

Avis Rental Car:

We were very happy with our mini-van from Avis, a Chrysler Pacifica.  Dodge / Chrysler phased out the Caravan / Town & Country, and replaced it with the Pacifica, and even the base model I believe we had was loaded with a lot of features.  Backup cam, bluetooth, USB plus the other standard stuff like cruise control and power everything.  We averaged over 27 mpg for 4066 miles driven.  Eastbound I was getting 31-33 mpg on the hwy due to lower speed limits.  Westbound it came down to 27-29 with a 75 mph speed limit.   The 2nd and 3rd row seats fold completely into the floor and you can have a huge space big enough to hold 4 X 8 sheets of plywood.  I know that because my neighbor across the street has an older town & country he uses for his wood working business.  If Chrysler had a larger presence in the Philippines I would consider one for our next family car.  Chrysler long term quality is still a bit suspect though.

The base cost for the 30 day rental was about $40 a day and I bought liability insurance for $14 a day, 2 million coverage.  Avis had much better rates for liability than the others, one of the reasons for choosing them.

 

[jpbago]

1 hour ago, OnMyWay said:

 We didn't really care for the food either.  The Western food choices were very bland attempts for the most part.

After too many flights, I now order special food requests. I like the Oriental vegetarian as it is a little spicy and fresh but there again it is noodles, tofu, and vegetables or rice, tofu, and vegetables. I get served first so I noticed in our row of 10, I was the only one that ate vegetables, the others, Filipinos, did not even open the salad dish nor touch their vegetables, just ate the pork and rice.

[earthdome]

Thanks for the detailed report.  From your other reports it sounds like you and the family overall had a great time on the trip.

[Jeeperz]

very detailed report.