After a short night at the Hyatt Place CDG, we arrived at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport for our flight to Los Angeles. That presented a lounge dilemma for my family of four.
Lounge Dilemma: Split Up Family Or Skip Lounge?
I have SkyTeam Elite Plus status, which entitles me to lounge access for myself and one guest when I fly on a SkyTeam international flight, regardless of the cabin.
We were traveling in economy class to LAX, meaning we would not have lounge access on the basis of our class of service. Furthermore, the Priority Pass lounge situation in Paris is rather dismal, with the overcrowded YOTELAIR Lounge being the only choice.
I suppose we could have all gone to the gate and sat. But I certainly wanted to use the sauna ahead of an 11-hour journey and while I would have gladly let my wife use the lounge in my place, I could not…
So my kids played “rock, paper, scissors, shoot” (as they call it…no idea why they add the shoot) and my son won…it was off to the lounge with him after buying coffee for my wife.
We didn’t have long, but did use the sauna for 20 minutes. Augustine and I are becoming regulars in the sauna here!
Augustine also had a little (more) breakfast before it was time to board the flight.
I have to admit, though, that it feels funny to ditch my wife and daughter to use the lounge…even with her genuine blessing.
But is the alternative even worse? Should all four suffer in a sterile and crowded gate area when two can use the lounge? I’m in the camp that says you should use the lounge. Thankfully, my relationship is not so weak as to stir up anger or resentment for doing so. Even so, I prefer the more family-friendly policy in Copenhagen at the SAS Gold Lounge that allows the entire immediate family in…
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Something might need clarification, Matthew:
“I have SkyTeam Elite Plus status, which entitles me to lounge access for myself and one guest when I fly on a SkyTeam international flight, regardless of the cabin.”
You might want to add, “except when flying out of LAX, when it depends on which Delta employees actually know the rules and/or choose to willingly play by them.” 😉
I think the “shoot” at the end of “Rock, Paper, Scissors” is a generational thing. My daughter (almost eight years old) and her friends do the same thing. Maybe it’s a “Bluey” or “Peppa Pig” thing, who knows.
It means they play: One-Two-Three-SHOOT! as opposed to throwing their choice on three.
The necessities of using a sauna in an airport or suffrage in a crowded gate area. That’s a though life.
I don’t think he was attempting to vote in the crowded gate area
Any reasonable lounge agent would just let the two kids in. They’re kids! They eat barely anything, don’t drink, and sit at the same table as the parents. This should be standard up to age 12
Depends how well behaved they are. I suppose on the condition that if they act up, they’re out. Hopefully the same for the boorish adults… !
I agree and if I’m with my 5 and 3 year old, I can’t even get in. And there’s no way to get them status through credit card spend since they are too young.
You have a writer with a German mindset anticipating how a French lounge dragon would enforce rules.
There’s a comedy sketch waiting to be written here
Agustine did the SAS trip with you. It wasn’t enough for him to earn status?
SAS might give out status easily, but not that easily.
Even with 4 flights in business class and one in premium economy, I barely scraped silver!
Well, that sounds a bit wrong, but I don’t have enough details. If we’re talking long haul business class, 4 trips in J on the shortest trips (BOS, EWR/JFK, YYZ) should put you 4000 level points ahead of silver. Other routes yield more level points. Add in one in Plus on long haul you should be at almost 30 000 level points, 10 000 past the silver threshold.
Silver is actually easier to qualify on flights flown as it only requires 10 lol.
I have the same upcoming dilemma, except in my case, it’s access to The Pier First lounge at HKG for two when I have a party of three. No way I’m leaving my wife all by herself, so I guess we’ll all have to slum it at the Pier Business lounge instead. Oh, the humanity.
(Though by that part of the trip, she might be so tired of me and Ashok that she’ll gladly shoo us off and enjoy a few hours of solitary – lol.)
Did the 20 minute sauna help? Also couples need not be joined at the hip. In fact before an eleven hour flight, a little distance can be welcome!
You couldn’t have just paid for the additional two kids? Sheesh…
No. Not for 20 minutes. Sheesh, what an insufferable troll you are.
My frequent flyer goal for the year is to get AA platinum / OWS for both my wife and I this year to solve exactly this problem. Traveling with a family of four that becomes much more valuable than upgrade priority as a solo traveler as a current OWE. Especially in an era of most people buying the upgrades they want.
Do you throw your rock/paper/scissors (/lizard/spock) on three? or do you tip your choice early. I grew up with the contestants saying “rock, paper, scissors, ….____” (usually “shoot” in the blank). I now live in Hawaii where the chant is Jon-kana-po with presentation on po. Pick your own rules
No thank you. Lounges are a place to sit and relax and maybe grab a little bite. They’re already crowded. Don’t need fewer seats because the agent let in two more people, even if they’re “0nly” kids. Sorry man, no free rides.
May have a similar conundrum as well due to the policy change regarding CC issued United Club day passes. Previously, since there’s my wife, child, and myself, I usually just, er, gave away the 2 passes I had rather than have one of us sit by the gate but now they’re non-transferable.
So… how to deal with this?
My wife and I are from the latchkey generation: We drank from water hoses, were feral until dusk, and rode bicycles without helmets. My wife rode a public bus to school, alone, on her 2nd day of kindergarten.
I may consider letting my daughter sit on her own with her ipad (which she can use to call us) while my wife and I hit the lounge. It’s not illegal in our state. I’d also consider one of us going to the lounge with the daughter while the other suffers at the gate.
I don’t get why people suffer a loss of a benefit such as an upgrade or lounge because they must be “together”. Yes, I “get” it but I don’t. If I’m at a party, I can be off away from my wife for an hour and no idea where she’s at. If she’s on the plane, it’s hardly like she’s in another city.
Luckily both my wife and I are AA Executive Platinum so we can both bring in one of our kids when we travel as a family and our originating flight is international or from another country.
And we are in Japan often so having access to the JAL Sakura First Class Lounge is awesome.
Stick to Star Alliance and no dilemma with your UA Million Miler status offering your spouse your benefits. Though the “sterile” description of the gate area is over the top. This was hardly a dilemma.
My grandpa used to say for situations like this “well, a gentleman would…” and fill in the rest with what you think a gentleman would do in this situation. And i’m pretty sure he would have decided to skip the lounge and stay with the family at the gate just this once.
Agreed. I’m kinda shocked this was even a question. Especially coming from someone who seems like a family man.
What are we supposed to do? All go to Starbucks and pay 7EUR each for crappy coffee and then sit at the gate and look at our phones? We were about to get on an 11-hour flight seated together…
I find it heartening that my marriage and my family are strong enough that we don’t have to be together every waking moment..that we can savor the time together while also not turning down things like upgrades or lounges that bring marginal benefit.
You can bet that if one of us got a business class upgrade, it would go to my wife and yes, we would fly apart. If I could have given her my lounge access, I would have…
Your family is strong indeed.
A father wanting to take his children to war time Syria and Ukraine.
A mother allowing so.
And the children having to witness destruction of war.
Not that it’s relevant, but the AF/KL policy on their own FB Plat holders is that a certain number of kids can come in the AF/KL lounge. Twenty minutes isn’t ten hours.
Although it does remind me of when I was 7, flying with the rents and sibs, and my dad and I got upgraded to first on a domestic 727. My dad asked me repeatedly to go back to economy to get my mom so I could stay back there and fight while she enjoyed the luxury.
And my parents thought I was the stupid one.
OK, Matthew, since you raised the subject…
I’d like to go back to the good, old days when airline lounges were quiet respites from the bedlam in the terminal. In other words, NO KIDS. Now, lounges have become ersatz daycare centers with a rich abundance of spoiled, out-of-control kids and their clueless, “time-out chair” -embracing parents.
It used to be that parents had the sense to realize that when you decide to have kids, there are trade-offs. No more rowdy nights at bars, no more quiet dinners at white-tablecloth restaurants (unless this thing called a babysitter was involved), etc. But, common sense is now on life support, with idiot parents dragging their kids to these and other inappropriate places. And given the prevalence of the aforementioned disastrous “time-out chair,” (just go to any supermarket in any affluent area to witness the failure for yourself) those kids are complete savages.
And I’ll save the “I’d rather take a screaming kid over a drunk” crowd… It’s not a choice between the two.
But my children don’t run around and scream in lounges, even the little one. There is an expectation of decorum, regardless of the guest. Discriminating against children (versus discriminating against loud people small and large) seems to me to be attacking the wrong source.
Perhaps your children are. But it’s a numbers game. When you have 9 “bad apple” parents and one “good apple” parent, the barrel is still spoiled. It also doesn’t negate the fact that there are just some spaces that are best left to adults only.