Prior to our flight to London, my family spent an hour in the EuroAirport Skyview Lounge in Basel. This is a very solid Priority Pass Lounge.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Review
Access is granted for Priority Pass members and some premium cabin travelers. It was closed for an extended time (much longer than most lounges) during the pandemic, but thankfully is open again.
We arrived about an hour before our British Airways flight and enjoyed some lunch in the lounge.
As you enter, the ground floor has a seating area with a full bar (including a great manual coffee machine, though it is almost always closed, as it was during our visit) with an outdoor feel including palm tress and a pond with a bridge over it.
Upstairs the floor-to-ceiling windows forming a semi-circle give the lounge a very modern feel.
Food is set out according to the following schedule:
Our stay was from 3:00 pm to 4:00 pm and staff were beginning to set up dinner as we departed. But we just ate salad and soup.
Drinks are self-service, including alcoholic beverages, soft drinks, and coffee.
The kids were amused by the phone rooms and worked quietly there during our stay…
Finally, the lounge has a nice outdoor terrace (intended for smokers, but a great place for fresh air or to planespot).
I am quite thankful for this lounge at my “home” airport in Europe and for the ability to bring my entire family in Priority Pass (via AMEX, Chase, Capital One, or Citi).
My original review, published on January 27, 2020, is below.
How is sole lounge at at Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg Airport (BSL/MLH/EAP)? [yes, the airport has three codes]
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Access + Hours
The EuroAirport Skyview Lounge serves as the business class lounges for a handful of airlines as well as a Priority Pass lounge. It opens daily at 5:00AM. Sunday thru Friday it closes at 8:30PM. On Saturday it closes at 7:30PM. It is just prior to passport control in the airport’s only terminal.
As the only lounge you might expect crowds, poor service, and limited amenities. On the contrary, however, this is one of my favorite Priority Pass lounges.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Ambiance
First, I love this lounge because it is full of natural light and greenery. You’ll find trees–mostly palm trees–throughout the lounge. And the lounge is called “Skyview” for a reason–the roof is glass, filling the lounge with beautiful natural light on sunny days.
Typically, I’m in this lounges before the sun rises, but a couple times I have visited on a hot afternoon. Yes, you do get a bit of greenhouse feel inside…but it’s so much nicer than a dingy, fluorescent-lit lounge.
The lounge spans two floors (with the slowest elevator in the world). The ground floor is smaller and sometimes roped off.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Food + Drink
I wouldn’t call the food in the lounge excellent, but it’s also not bad at all. The eggs are from a box in the morning and fruit is limited, but there’s also fresh baked goods, yogurt, and cold cuts. In the afternoon you can make yourself a very nice salad with a cup of soup.
All drinks are complimentary and self-serve.
On the ground floor, there is a “piazza bar” with a nice coffee machine…I’m sure it makes great espresso. Small problem: I’ve never seen it turned on. Maybe it’s turned on later in the day, but never in the morning. Such a shame. That said, the coffee machines are not bad. Beer, wine, soft drinks, and water are available on both levels as well.
Note there’s a top floor bar that appears permanently closed. I snuck up there once and it’s quite nice, but I’ve never seen it open and there’s always a sign indicating that it is closed.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Restrooms
Restrooms are small, but clean. No showers.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Outdoor Smoking Lounge
An outdoor smoking terrace not only offers a place to smoke, but a great place to watch airplanes land and takeoff.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Newspapers
A rack of newspapers is available on the ground floor.
EuroAirport Skyview Lounge Business Center
Two desktop computers are available for internet browsing and printing. By the way, the lounge has plenty of plugs and you generally won’t need an adapter to plug in your device. No USB plugs, though.
CONCLUSION
This is one of my “home” airports and thus a lounge I visit often. Over the years, it has really grown on me. I appreciate how it is rarely crowded and especially the natural light. With the growth of budget carriers at Basel, it is also a nice place to wait before a flight on EasyJet or WizzAir.
This lounge always reminds me of the good old days when Crossair had its famous eurocross hub in Basel. That was an awesome airline with paneuropean connections from Basel and a high quality onboard product onboard Saab 340/2000 and Jumbolino aircraft. Crossair is now Swiss Airlines and has unfortunately dropped Basel from its network.
I remember even a few years ago my in-laws taking SWISS to Ibiza and other places. Very sad to see LX abandon BSL.
With the transition to Swiss Intl. Airlines the eurocross concept was abandoned in 2002. Swiss continued to have some operations and maintenance at the airport, including flights Nice, Hamburg, Prague, Barcelona and London. Not before 2015 Swiss terminated all their flights from Basel. Nowadays the airport has more or less successfully reinvented itself as trinational low-cost hub. The skyview lounge and the huge Swiss office building are remnants of the old glory days.
Swiss doesn’t have much of a presence outside of Zurich and Geneva in Switzerland. Outside of those 2 airports, they only offer seasonal service between Sion Airport and Heathrow. They used to have flights between Zurich and Lugano but that was ended recently.
The eggs comes from a box? Huh?
Powdered.
Ok, Matthew, I rarely play grammar police but this post is killing my Type A, obsessive compulsive personality:
“Monday through Friday is closes at 8:45 P.M.” – should be “it closes”.
“On Saturday is closes at 8:30 P.M.” – ditto.
“It is just prior to passport control in the airports only terminal.” – “airport’s” should be possessive.
“First, I love this lounge because it full…” – “it’s” not “it”.
“flouorcent” – correct spelling is “fluorescent”.
“The egg are from…” – should be “eggs are from”.
“A rack of newspapers is available no the ground floor.” – should be “on”.
BTW, I’m happy to be your proofreader for a fee…:)
Did you say for free? 😉
This lounge has a 1990s minimalist feel, something I do like.
@Matthew, how do you guest your whole family into Priority Pass lounges? Does your wife use her own PP card? Do you just pay the guest fee for the 3rd guest when it hits your CC?
This is one of the worst airport lounges that I use. The food offerings are so limited. Today, there is not any cheese or ham on the salad buffet and no croissants or pastries, just bread rules and some bland sponge cake. The drink selection is all no name. The staff on reception are great but those in the food area are generally rude and grumpy.
You have to warm them up. I got a rude initial response by one of the food workers but after trying to be pleasant, he became pleasant (it was a conversation about the fancy coffee machine on the bottom floor always being off).
Back here again today. Still a terrible selection of food. Same soup as always (some form of insipid tomato) and only one unappetising hot option. Fire salad bar. Cheese showing no signs of reappearing ( this is France). The rude staff are simply a minor irritation. No idea why anyone would rate this place. I only use it because I have Priority Pass and there’s no alternative at Euroairport.