SAS Expands on West Coast to SFO

Starting April 8th, 2013, SAS will offer direct flights from San Francisco to Copenhagen, creating a new option for Scandinavian travel from the West Coast. SAS is expecting more than 125,000 passengers on the new route and will fly their largest plane, the Airbus A340 (pictured here), six days a week. The flight will depart at 5:35pm and get into CPH at 1:15pm everyday except Tuesday.

Sadly, SAS pulled out of their SEA-CPH route awhile ago, but this will provide some additional attractive options for getting to Scandinavia next year.

You can read the full news release here

Courtesy of SAS

Flight Report: Challenging Copenhagen Connection Complications

Flying back from Sweden gave me a chance to experience something new: A fully missed connection with no later flights to my final destination. In the past, a delay has meant a couple of extra hours and maybe a rebooking to a red eye, but this time around the flight I missed was the last one of the day and the flight that was delayed by three hours was the last one out of Copenhagen to the US. In other words, I’m not getting home today. Here's what happened...

The first plane of the day

The day started out well enough: One of my friends gave me a ride to the airport in exchange for a Starbucks mug with “Stockholm” on it, and the first flight of the day was a quick hop to Copenhagen: A true bread and butter flight on a trusty 737. It was a wet start from Stockholm and we were quickly on top of a steady blanket of clouds which would be the scenery for the flight. On the approach the cloud cover gave way and revealed a bit of the countryside of southern Sweden, and the landing itself was in some pretty gusty cross winds. Once on the ground and in the airport, this is where the fun started…

After the break, the full story, lessons learned, and another example of a Kosher meal in flight, this time on SAS.

Flight Report: The start of a Trans-Siberian Journey started on SAS (ARN-LED)

This is actually the first of a story arch. Between June 22nd and July 9th, I traveled across Russia along the Trans-Siberian Railroad, eventually ending in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Oh, and fellow traveler on this journey was my mother.

Yes. My mother. It was actually her idea, even if I suggested that we actually do it. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, I've heard about Siberia and the untold riches and fortunes that will be made there. Anyone who asks why gets about the same story: Untapped resources, a changing climate that will open up shipping routes along the north of Russia, and the ensuing trade. She decided to visit me in Sweden this June, so I asked if she wanted to go to Siberia. A lot of planning later and soon we found ourselves backpacks and all headed to Arlanda, both thinking, "Wait... In two hours we'll be in Russia?!".

Additionally, I was thinking, "SeattleFlyerGuy is SeattleFlyerGuy. I'm going to spend nearly a week on a train?! What was I thinking!?" (Fortunately, it all went better than expected, but more on that later).

The trip, as I said, starts at Arlanda, just as most of them do with a final look at Sweden. June 22nd is the height of summer, and I always seem to manage to leave Sweden right when the festivities start up. These pictures taken from our SAS 737 show the islands of the archipelago just outside of Stockholm. A few months ago, they would have been griped in ice, but now they're home to supremely comfortable camping sites and endless nooks and crannies for harboring boats. About 1 in 7 Swedes own a boat. It's about as Swedish as wild strawberries, cardamon, and Pantone 301C along side 116C (in other words, this).

 

What's it like when we land? Find out after the break.

ARN-SEA Flight Report: Update 2: ARN-ORD on SK and ORD layover

With a little luck, I managed to get on the flight and ended up in an aisle seat, to my great surprise. I was the last one to board the plane and soon we were on our way. ARN-ORD is a route that I very rarely, in fact the last time that I flew it either way was nearly 20 years ago!

The flight was perfectly fine. The movie selection wasn't fantastic, but there was at least Salt, one more random movie, and then I started watching a bollywood comedy called 3 Idiots. Unfortunately we landed about 3/4 of the way through the movie, which leaves me to look forward to seeing the rest later. This is the third time that there has been an excellent bollywood or Japanese movie on my transatlantic flights and I hope that they will continue offering these.

The meal was pretty good, but unfortunately my camera battery was dead and I was unable to snag photos. Because of the unplanned reschedule, I did not get my kosher meal, but the SK meal was a curry chicken with lightly seasoned rice and a tasty chocolate/caramel dessert. Overall, pretty nice. The other option was some sort of fish, but I don't trust that.

Arriving in Chicago, I had no idea what was going to happen from there. Through the boarder control (a guy that had lived in Stockholm, and was wondered if I had been to the SpyBar), and off to the UA desk to plead my case. They looked at my ticket, shook their heads and a few minutes later they put me on a seat to SEA at 3:50pm. I would end up getting home 5 hours early!