After many cancellations and with the latest crunch on Eurobonus award seats to the US this trip was close to not being possible at all. But as luck would have it Austrian had some availability in business class on one of their shorter long haul routes to Montreal. I had not heard much about this airline’s business class service so my expectations were not very high, but I was happy to find they were greatly surpassed!

Most of far east asia is unfortunately still closed (Taiwan, Japan, China). However, South Korea is open, and fairly easy to visit now. Before your trip, make sure you apply for your K-ETA online. As of August 2022, you also need a pre-departure COVID test (PCR max 2 days before, or Antigen max 1 day before your flight). You’ll also want to apply for a Q-code online (so that you don’t have to fill out the health declaration by hand). At this time, you also have to take an arrival PCR test. Be sure to make a reservation in advance (read more about that below).

Singapore Airlines (SQ) is a great airline and serves as a major hub in Asia, serving North America, Europe, and Oceania. Finding award redemptions has always been tricky, but since the start of the COVID pandemic, redeeming award flights on Singapore Airlines through partner programs has become even more difficult and with many restrictions.

After a long break during the COVID-19 pandemic, THAI First Class redemptions are finally back to an increasing number of routes. The first route to receive First Class was the London route, back in April of 2022. Now, Tokyo is also available, and Osaka is coming in September 2022.

Some exciting news from EVA Air, who have announced they will be launching a brand new route connecting Taipei and Munich. The Milano route is now also officially resuming after being delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

在 AwardFares 網站上，你可以輕鬆查詢和追蹤哩程艙位，以下是AwardFares 提供的服務：

We’re glad to finally release a couple of new features that we’ve been working on for quite a while! Today we’re releasing three brand new features:

EVA Air award redemptions are quirky. I recently made my first award redemption using their frequent flyer program, and the process was not easy, especially since I was booking a flight for two people, myself and a travel companion.

不得不說，長榮航空的哩程兌換方式是有點特殊。我最近才剛有機會用長榮的飛行常客計劃（哩程獎勵計劃）兌換哩程，流程不是很簡單，尤其是這次我還需要用哩程幫我自己和同行夥伴訂兩張機票，過程更是複雜。

On April 1, 2022 Malaysia completely opened their border to foreign travelers, without any quarantine for those who are fully vaccinated. The process was however much easier said than done. The main requirements are:

馬來西亞在2022年4月1日起重開邊境，解除所有針對外國人的入境管制，旅客只要完整接種過疫苗就不用再進行入境隔離。不過整個大馬入境過程用說的可能比做的容易，旅客需要準備以下事項：

For a recent trip in between Vancouver (YVR) and San Francisco (SFO) in March of 2022, I chose to fly with Air Canada in Business on their 737 MAX 8. I wasn’t really sure what to expect for this short Business flight, however my expectations were definitely exceeded.