Barry’s SAS million point challenge – Airline 6, Virgin Atlantic and Airline 7, Delta

Rob writes: In October, SAS announced the million points challenge – here’s our article. If you can fly 15 of the SkyTeam alliance carriers by the end of 2024, you will receive 1 million bonus SAS EuroBonus points.

It’s not a competition – everyone who hits the target will get the points.

A number of HfP readers took up the challenge. One of them was Barry Collins, who you may have seen discussing the challenge in The Times – click here (paywall, or click here for a non-paywall version).

Barry is sharing his trip with HfP readers. Part 1 and Part 2 looked at ‘why’ and ‘how’ (click to read). Airline 1 was Air Europa. Airline 2 was Air France. Airline 3 was TAROM. Airline 4 was KLM. Airline 5 was SAS.

Today Barry starts the North American leg of his trip. Over to Barry ….

Heathrow to Atlanta, Virgin Atlantic

5.40am. Early, but nothing on last weekends alarms. Once again off to Heathrow, this time to Terminal 3 and the only UK based airline in SkyTeam – Virgin Atlantic – on my way to Atlanta. This will also be my first long haul flight of the challenge.

Despite flying economy, my SkyTeam status got me up the lift into Virgin’s own ‘Upper Class Wing’ check in and security area. I was able to collect my boarding pass and get through security within 15 minutes of parking up. Pretty impressive.

However, despite the SkyTeam website alluding to Virgin Clubhouse access for SkyTeam Elite Plus members, I was unfortunately relegated to the Aspire lounge down the hall …. [Rob’s edit: this is correct, only Delta, Air France and KLM elites in Premium Economy can use the Clubhouse]

Whilst the Aspire lounge itself was perfectly fine, I can’t pretend I wasn’t disappointed. A tiny but decent quality food section served a few hot and cold breakfast items, along with a couple of hot drinks machines.

I was given a voucher to show I was entitled to prosecco at the bar, so I assume this would be chargeable for non-Virgin customers? The lounge was packed, and the queue for those who hadn’t booked was about an hour according to the lady at the desk.

I boarded the plane with those turning left, so had the whole rear section to myself for a few minutes and chatted with the cabin crew. When I told them about challenge, they moved me to a row of my own, and kept me stocked up on drinks and snacks. They even posed for a selfie. This was a lovely touch, and very much appreciated!

Lunch was a passable sausage and mash (piping hot) with some cheese & crackers, and a little chocolate pot for dessert. The flimsy plastic cutlery did leave a lot to be desired – and no plane shaped salt and pepper either! Then I sat back, plugged in to the working USB port, and settled in to watch some films and enjoy my 9 1/2 hour flight across the Atlantic.

Atlanta to Mexico City, Delta Air Lines

Nobody has the ability to make the word ‘sir’ sound quite so aggressive as a passport control officer in America. It doesn’t matter if you haven’t done anything wrong, the unfounded feeling of guilt is immediately there!

After navigating questions about my nationality, occupation and my parents, it was off to find the Delta lounge. With less than two hours between flights, it was always going to be a quick pit stop. Uniquely(?!), the departure board in Atlanta was listed alphabetically rather than time order. Very off putting! 

Another packed lounge, despite being mid-afternoon when I arrived. A large queue had formed by the time I left. The food options were fairly limited with a single hot option of rice, broccoli and chicken. Haute cuisine, this was not!

However the Americans excelled where you’d expect – soft drinks machine serving literally everything; cookies and brownies that were absolutely delicious; and the first lounge on my travels to freely offer paper cups so you can take your coffee with you. In my opinion this is the metric by which all lounges should be measured!

The Delta short haul plane was very reminiscent of the TAROM configuration from last week. 2/2 decent size business class seats at the front of plane, followed by 3/3 leather seats in economy.

However, these had tiny, working (!) screens, and Delta has hidden a fancy universal plug socket and USB down low on the seats. There was even free WiFi on board, something sorely lacking from Virgin Atlantic a few hours before. Complimentary drinks and snacks were the icing on the cake. Excellent stuff.

The plane felt packed and cramped compared to having a row to myself on the much larger transatlantic plane I had just come off. Being objective though, this is clearly a pretty significant step up from European low cost airlines using similar or identical planes. Mexico, here I come. 

Click here for the next article in this series.

The full itinerary

As a reminder, here is Barry’s full itinerary.

Trip 1 – Gatwick to Barcelona (easyjet), Madrid to Gatwick (Air Europa) booked as part of a family holiday

Trip 2 – Heathrow to Paris (Air France) – Paris to Bucharest (TAROM) – Bucharest to Amsterdam (KLM) – Amsterdam to Stockholm (SAS) – Stockholm to Heathrow (SAS) 

Trip 3 – Heathrow to Atlanta (Virgin Atlantic) – Atlanta to Mexico City (Delta) – Mexico City to Paris (Aeromexico) – Paris to Heathrow (Air France) 

Trip 4 – Stansted to Istanbul (Pegasus) – Istanbul to Riyadh (Pegasus) – Riyadh to Jeddah (Saudia) – Jeddah to Jakarta (Saudia) – Jakarta to Singapore (Garuda) – Singapore to Ho Chi Minh (Vietnam) – Ho Chi Minh to Taipei (China Airlines) – Taipei to Xiamen (Xiamen Airlines) – Xiamen to Shanghai (Xiamen Airlines) – Shanghai to Seoul (Korean) – Seoul to Shanghai (China Eastern) – Shanghai to Gatwick (China Eastern)

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