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My wife (Barbara Cepinko) and I (Stephen Grande) used Princess EZair to book our round-trip flights from Los Angeles (LAX) to Sydney, Australia (SYD). I had searched on my own for round-trip flights on other airlines, including using points that we have with United Airlines, but could not find any with a price as low as that offered by Princess EZair. United Airlines wanted so many points for the round-trip that it made more sense to book through Princess EZair than to use up so many points.
Princess EZair gave us a number of choices of flights to pick with various number and location of connecting plane changes and prices. We picked a non-stop overnight flight from LAX to SYD on Virgin Australia and a return flight from SYD to LAX with a change of planes in San Francisco (SFO). The flight from Sydney to San Francisco would be on Qantas and the flight from San Francisco to Los Angeles would be on American Airlines.
We were instructed to check-in for our Virgin Australia flight at Terminal 3 at LAX. It is a Delta Terminal but had a couple of signs out front also for Virgin Australia. We checked in our luggage at the Virgin Australia ticket counter but were then instructed to go outside Terminal 3 and walk to the next terminal, the Bradley International Terminal, to go through security and to get to our gate.
It is a short walk from Terminal 3 to the Bradley International Terminal. Usually the International Terminal at LAX is pure chaos with huge lines of people waiting to go through security. But this time was totally different. The terminal was not crowded at all and we were able to zip right through the security process. Virgin Australia does not have arrangements with TSA Pre-check so we weren't even able to use that express process. But even going though the full security screening went quite fast. This is all because so many people have cancelled their travel plans due to the worry over covid-19.
We usually go to one of the airport lounges that we used to be able to use. However, it seems almost all of the airport lounges have changed there policies and for the most part only allow lounge club members into their lounges when they also have a boarding pass specifically for the airline that owns the lounge. Through various credit cards and mileage programs we belong to 3 different lounge programs. That used to give us quite a few options of what lounges we could use at almost every airport. But we usually are never flying on the airline that owns the lounges that we have access to. Almost all the airlines have now changed their rules and will not let you into their lounge unless you are flying on their airline. We still have access to the American Express Platinum lounges but there are none of those in the LAX Bradley International Terminal. American Express Platinum does have an arrangement with the Korean Airlines Lounge (KAL), but only between 5:30 AM and 11:30 AM. We were flying at night so that didn't help.
Click on each photo below for a larger image.
Since we didn't have access to any lounge we decided to spend our wait at Vino Volo. We ordered flights of wine and some munchies to go with the wine.
At boarding time we went to our gate which was fairly close to the Vino Volo. There was almost no wait to board the plane. There were so few people on the plane that most of the passengers had a row of 3 seats to themselves and were able to stretch out and lay down across the 3 seats to sleep. Barbara and I had our row of 3 seats to ourselves also.
Barbara and I both watched the 2-1/2 hour movie "Ford vs. Farrari" during the flight but spent most of the rest of the 14 hour flight sleeping. Dinner was served with free beverages including wine and beer shortly after take-off. After dinner we asked for a refill of our wine. They gave a much bigger pour for the refill and it was still free. Early in the morning they served a snack and a bit later they served a hot breakfast.
We arrived into Sydney at about 9 AM on Thursday, March 5, 2020. Since we had crossed the international dateline, Wednesday, March 4, 2020, had totally vanished. We figured out a simple system to calculate the time in the Pacific Time Zone in the United States: it is 5 hours later than our time in Sydney, but a day earlier!
After arriving into Sydney we whisked through Immigration / Customs. We didn't have to wait in line at all. The luggage showed up pretty fast at baggage claim. We walked out the exit of the airport and were able to get a taxi immediately. There was no wait for a taxi either. For most of the drive to our hotel the traffic was pretty light.
Click on each photo above for a larger image.
If in this report you see any typos, misspellings, factual errors or other types of errors, please let me know.
Please include the web address (URL) of the report in which you found the error. Thank you! Send your email to:
