This trip was originally built around a segment starting from Zürich back to the United States. During my trip, though, I kicked around dropping my United-ticketed return leg in favor of an American Airlines award. As I had some domestic (yes, domestic) award travel in three-cabin first class on AA already ticketed, it dawned on me that I could add on flights from Zürich to New York for a marginal cost of 30k miles, some taxes, and a helping of British Airways-imposed fuel surcharges.
I’ve never been thrilled by BA’s fuel surcharges, but spending $340 in lieu of an additional 32.5k isn’t a terrible deal. While a similar analysis could be done for making use of my stopover on my United award, UA didn’t have saver award availability on my desired dates of travel (nor did it ever end up opening up).
Meanwhile, as I kicked around rebooking myself, Lufthansa opened up some first class availability to New York from Frankfurt, so I jumped from the United-operated nonstop from Zürich and abandoned my aspirations of flying BA First (for now).
When I arrived at the lounge, the attendants directed me to the Business Class side of the lounge. The Lufthansa Group family of airlines are sticklers for making passengers show their Star Alliance Gold cards to have access to the senator lounges and my experience was no different.
Once inside, I visited the buffet for a light snack.
