Jaunted

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This Week's New Routes Arrive from American, Delta and British Airways

Sometimes it’s hard to stay on top of all the new route announcements that come our way, so we’ve complied a little bit of a rundown below. As long as you can afford the fares, this should definitely help add to your passport stamp collection.

· Delta:
Not too long ago we heard that American Airlines was getting ready to fly down to Brazil, and now it looks like Delta has also applied for the ability to fly some new routes. Delta is awaiting approval to get things moving, but they’d like to add some more flights to their current schedule between São Paulo and spots like New York-JFK and Atlanta. They’re looking to get the necessary stamps and seals lined up as quickly as possible, as they are ready to start flying as soon as this year.

· British Airways:
So this one isn’t exactly a new route, but it is a new airplane on an old route. British Airways is finally prepping to receive their very first Airbus A380, and they’re thinking about where to send it.

It sounds like they’ll use the big bird to do the nonstop thing between Los Angeles and London-Heathrow beginning on October 15. Airbus A380 number two will be deployed out of London over to Hong Kong, and those flights should start doing their thing on November 15. There’s 469 seats across four different cabins, so you better start looking for a seat now.

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Where Could You Fly with One Million Delta SkyMiles?

We often sit back and take a look at the balances on our frequent flyer accounts, all the while dreaming of more miles and more locations. Sometimes our imagination gets the best of us, and we’re thinking about where to go with this many miles or that many miles. At that point we might as well go all in, so we’ve started to think about where to go with one million miles:

We’ve flown with Delta more than we would like to admit, so we’ll start by dreaming up faux flights with them. One million miles will buy you, at the most basic level, 40 round-trip domestic flights in coach—that’s like pretty much one flight for every week of the year with a few leftover to head into the office to confirm your employment. At 40,000 miles per round-trip you can sit up front, but that’s going to limit you to just 25 round-trip flights in and around most of the United States and Canada.

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How KLM is Turning Used Cooking Oil Into Flights Between Amsterdam and New York

"It really isn't smelly!"

That's the assertion given by KLM to press and passengers on Friday, as the first-ever series of biofuel-powered intercontinental flights was inaugurated.

All is normal inside the aircraft, and indeed passengers may have no idea they are flying on a history-making jet, unless they see the proud "we fly on biofuels" statement painted on the side. Outside, two fueling trucks pump the plane's tanks full of a mix of regular kerosene and biofuel manufactured from used cooking oil. According to the AP, the process to make this magic fuel goes a little something like this: "the waste oil from frying up crawfish, cracklins and other Cajun specialties is refined at a Louisiana plant, then trucked to JFK." Sounds simple, huh?

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New Routes on the Docket from Hawaiian, American and Delta

Sometimes it’s hard to stay on top of all the new route announcements that come our way, so we’ve complied a little bit of a rundown below. As long as you can afford the fares, this should definitely help add to your passport stamp collection.

· American Airlines:
They are still waiting on the necessary approvals and paperwork from various government agencies, but when the stamps and seals come through it’ll be good news for American Airlines. They’re thinking about heading down to Brazil, as they look to connect both Los Angeles and Chicago with São Paulo.

If all goes according to plan it’ll be LAX scoring the flights first, as it sounds like they want to get those up and running by the end of this year; however, for fans of Chicago-O’Hare you’ll just have to be patient. Those flights probably won’t hit the skies until later in 2014. At least at that point you’ll probably have the snazzy new livery and logo all over the outside of the plane.

· JetBlue:
For those snowed in over in the Windy City this week it’s probably a good time to start dreaming—or acting upon—a warm weather escape. JetBlue feels your pain, and they’re getting ready to do something about it. Unfortunately the sun and the sand aren’t arriving immediately, but they are working on getting it to you a little later this year.

The plan is for JetBlue to start nonstop flights between Chicago-O’Hare and San Juan beginning on November 20. The flights will head back and forth each and every day of the week, and if Puerto Rico isn’t your final destination that’s not a problem. JetBlue has plenty of connections to other Caribbean spots right out of San Juan—start stocking up on the sunscreen now.

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Can Jet Lag Be Cured by a Scientific Shower?

We thought Delta was hard at work adding plenty of those Economy Comfort seats as well as WiFi on each and every flight, but apparently they also have a little extra time to work on some other projects. They’re actually trying to solve the problem of jet lag, and they just showed off some of their most recent ideas at the Technology, Entertainment and Design—TED—conference out in Long Beach, California.

This stuff might be a little bit above our pay grade when it comes to understanding the science behind things, but basically what Delta has created is some kind of light shower. Photon light rains down upon you, and then like magic you’re cured from any and all jetlag—at least in theory.

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New Routes from American, United, and JetBlue Get You Going

Sometimes it’s hard to stay on top of all the new route announcements that come our way, so we’ve complied a little bit of a rundown below. As long as you can afford the fares, this should definitely help add to your passport stamp collection.

· American Airlines:
Lately it’s all American Airlines all the time when it comes to airline news, after all they are shacking up with US Airways. There’s still plenty of time for new route news, as it sounds like American Airlines has their eyes on San Diego. June 12 will bring nonstop options between Miami and San Diego, and it's some Boeing 737s will do the flying back and forth between the two states and cities. The new routes don’t stop there, as American Eagle is also getting in on the flying fun. Two new spots down in Mexico will be an option out of Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, as there will be nonstop flights to both the airport in Hermosillo—Ignacio Pesqueira Garcia International Airport—as well as Zacatecas and their General Leobardo C. Ruiz International Airport.

· United:
There’s still plenty of winter left where we call home, but United already has the warmer months on the brain. The carrier is busy moving planes around to here and there, as they’re looking to launch a new seasonal route this summer. They’ll be flying nonstop between Newark and Traverse City—that’s in Michigan—beginning on June 29. The plan is to fly these flights back and forth through the end of August, and there should be three flights doing their thing each and every week. Don’t expect too much in-flight comfort here, as Embraer ERJ145s will be doing the flying. However, we can’t really complain when we get to where we need to be.

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In-Flight Comfort / Business Class Travel / Delta / Airlines / → All Tags

Delta's Westin In-Flight Bed Collab and Other Dream Airline Partnerships

It's already a done deal that Delta is hopping into bed with Starwood's group of hotels for shared points and rewards, but yesterday we also learned that Starwood is doing their part to likewise get under the covers with Delta's flyers.

Starting June 2013, Delta will offer Westin Heavenly In-Flight bedding, designed and manufactured exclusively for the airline, in the BusinessElite cabins on international flights and BusinessElite flights between New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport and Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle and between Atlanta and Honolulu. If the flight is under 12 hours, that means a Westin pillow and comforter. For flights over 12 hours, add a lumbar pillow to the mix.

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Better Wine, Better Coffee, Better Service Coming to Delta's TransCon Flights

If you’re thinking of taking a transcontinental flight this summer you might want to check out Delta’s fares before selecting your carrier. We know they already have some stuff to make the ride a little bit better, like pretty much guaranteed WiFi, and there’s even a little more room—if you’re willing to pay for it—thanks to their Economy Comfort seating options. Now they’re kicking things up a notch, by boosting their offerings on some of their longest domestic flights down in the lower 48.

Flights between New York-JFK and spots like Los Angeles, Seattle, and San Francisco are all getting the service upgrades. A lot of the stuff is for those flyersin the BusinessElite cabin, but there’s still enough good stuff leftover for those stuck in the back. Up front there’s going to be sparkling wine to get the party started, and the flight attendants will be passing out copies of The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today.

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Jaunted Originals: Inside Three Airport Arrival Lounges

What's that saying? Ah yes, "the best camera is the one you have on you." Since we're never without a camera and hardly ever not traveling, we've managed to capture a serious collection of travel photos in our numerous Photo Galleries.

To start the week off right, let's venture behind the tight doors of the Arrival Lounges of three airlines: Lufthansa at Frankfurt Airport, Cathay Pacific at Hong Kong Airport and Delta at London-Heathrow. We say "tight doors" because typically entrance to these lounges—lounges which sit outside security on the Arrivals level—only admit international travelers coming off their flights, holding tickets for Business or First Class.

The spaces may be small, but the comfort of Arrivals lounges are large. You can count on a private shower, breakfast, cozy chairs, free WiFi, and a quiet corner to read the day's paper before heading into the city for a meeting or while awaiting your ride.

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It's United, Turkish Airlines and Ethiopian Leading This Week's New Route News

Sometimes it’s hard to stay on top of all the new route announcements that come our way, so we’ve complied a little bit of a rundown below. As long as you can afford the fares, this should definitely help add to your passport stamp collection.

· United:
At this point you’re probably well aware of some of the issues that the Boeing 787 has been experiencing. As a result, new flights, new routes, and other in-flight improvements have been delayed. Now it looks like United is grounding its planes to at least June, but there’s one route that is suffering a little bit less.

Assuming they fix those pesky batteries sooner rather than later, it sounds like the nonstop option between Denver and Tokyo will takeoff on May 12. Initially it was scheduled to start doing its thing at the end of March, but we’ll keep our fingers crossed that May is when it finally hits the skies.

· Delta:
For travelers looking to hit in big during North Dakota’s oil boom, Delta has you covered as they’re getting ready to boost their service over to the Roughrider State. Tickets are scheduled to go on sale tomorrow. Delta is planning to fly nonstop between Minneapolis-St. Paul and Dickinson.

The flights will begin on June 10, and they’ll do their thing two times per day. Sure there’s money to be made in western North Dakota, but just don’t expect anything too comfortable on these flights. The back and forth flying will be done thanks to SkyWest and some less than comfy commuter jets.

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Man Slaps Crying Toddler on Delta Flight, Gets Slapped with Assault Charges

For some reason there are a lot of travel politics stories floating around today, not a few of them about the tourism industry. But as much as we'd like to spend a few paragraphs unpacking the recent industry-related discoveries made in Yemen and India and Bangkok—that persistent crime and open violence tend to dampen tourism revenue—we've got to talk about this moron who allegedly slapped a crying toddler as the Delta plane they were aboard was descending into Atlanta. Not his toddler, incidentally.

The facts as reported are pretty straightforward. Joe Rickey Hundley was on a Delta flight from Minneapolis to Atlanta. He was sharing a row with Jessica Bennett and her 2-year-old toddler. As the plane dropped altitude Bennett's toddler started crying and wouldn't stop. Heated words were exchanged—Bennett claims Hundley used a racial slur, a charge he denies but that a witness confirms—and eventually Hundley slapped the kid.

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The First and Only Place with One Million Foursquare Check-ins is...

No surprise here: the world's busiest/worst airport is now also the world's busiest Foursquare location. That's right—according to the Foursquare Blog, trusty, dusty Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International just became the first venue in the entire world to reach the milestone of 1,000,000 check-ins.

One million. Dang. it seems like only yesterday ATL was inching up on 500,000 checkin-ins; oh wait, that was in November 2011 when we measured the most popular airports on Foursquare, when LAX was in the lead. These days, LAX is still doing well and should break the million mark before spring is over (they're at 918,000 now), but it's clearly no Atlanta.

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