The Cheapskate does Kota Kinabulu – CX, KA, MI, SQ & HH

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froggerADL

froggerADL

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I wasn’t going to bother with a TR for this trip as it will be quite boring in the AFF scheme of things. However, I was sprung by Steady, so here it is.

I will start by adding a little context for those that haven’t read my previous trip reports.

I am a self-confessed cheapskate, which means that I like to live the good life while shelling out as little cash as possible.

I have developed a neurological condition which means my brain and legs don’t communicate very well. This causes me to stumble around like a drunk and fall over quite regularly. The symptoms get a little worse as I add alcohol!

I make the most of this condition by getting people to wheel me though airports and picking me up when I fall over.
 
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So you keep falling over (because you're unsteady) and got sprung by Steady......:lol:

Looking forward to the TR.
 
A Geography Lesson

For those of you that don’t know, Kota Kinabulu (KK) is the capital city of Sabah, which is the North-Western part of the island of Borneo.

Sabah is one of the two Malaysian states on Borneo, which is to the east of mainland Malaysia.

The other Malaysian state on Borneo is Sarawak, which is the South-Western part of Borneo.

Borneo is shared between Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei.

The airport code for KK is BKI. A direct flight between KUL and BKI takes around 2.5 hours.

Here endeth the geography lesson. If I got any of this wrong please feel free to correct me.
 
The Hotel

I decided to visit Kota Kinabulu because a new Hilton was opening. It is a Hilton Honors category 2 which means that it is only 10,000 HH points per night or five nights for 40,000 points. The hotel was due to open on 31 January and I booked from mid-February to give them a couple of weeks to sort out any teething problems. I booked for ten nights for 80,000 HH points plus $0 cash.

This gets a value of at least two cents per HH point which makes this cheapskate very happy.

As I have HH Diamond status I get executive lounge access which gives me free breakfast each morning and two hours of booze and food every evening.
 
The Flights

I like to take daytime flights wherever possible in order to make the most of the business class service. I also try to avoid overnight connections to save on accommodation costs. As I live in Adelaide the best option is to fly Cathay Pacific (CX) and Cathay Dragon (KA) on the outbound flights and Silk Air (MI) and Singapore Air (SQ) on the return. Unfortunately, there are no daytime options from SE Asia to ADL.

I booked the flights in early December and managed to find availability for the flights I wanted as long as I departed on a Wednesday. No problem.

The outbound flights were CX174 to HKG which departs ADL at 07:45 followed by KA67 departing at 16:10 and arriving into BKI at 19:15. This connection allows about two hours at HKG for a visit to The Wing F lounge (and yes, apparently I’m one of the few people who prefers The Wing F over The Pier F).

Total cost was 78,000 QFF points and $155.

The return flights are MI391 BKI-SIN which departs at 11:45 and SQ279 SIN-ADL departing at 23:35 with an eight hour transit at SIN.

Total cost was 46,750 KrisFlyer miles and MYR 925 (A$290 at the time of booking). The KrisFlyer miles actually began their life as 63,112 Virgin Velocity points. Given that I have committed to never again set foot on a VA flight following what VA did to me on my return from AFF 10 in Perth last November, I thought this was an excellent use of those points.
 
This is going to be another great TR. Looking forward to coming along for the ride :)
 
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Buzzard said:
What VA did to you in November??
Now that's an excuse to catch up for a drink now that (well soon) I'm unemployed.
Click to expand...


Unemployed or retired Buzz? To be unemployed you need to be looking for work :).
 
The ADL Experience

The day of departure had arrived. My son had once again agreed to drive me to the airport which is only a twelve minute trip from home at that time of the day.

I told him that we needed to leave home at 06:10. When I woke him he said “yep, no worries” which was a much better response than I got six months ago when he told me to bugger off and I had to get a taxi :shock:. I think the difference this time was that he didn’t stay up until 3am getting pissed with his mates the night before!

Another thing in my favour was that he has a new girlfriend so he was probably very keen to get rid of me for ten days :p. He dropped me off at the terminal and I staggered off to check in.

As is my way, I had done my research about which are the best J seats, in this case on the CX A330-300. I took David Flynn’s (AusBT) advice and pre-selected 19A. This seat is in the J mini cabin immediately behind door 2L which has only three rows of seats. On the morning of departure I could see that I was the only pax in the mini cabin while the main J cabin had only two or three seats available. Sweet :cool:.

I checked in at the Cathay desk and asked for wheelchair assistance. I was told that as I needed assistance I had been moved to 11A, the first row of the main cabin, as that would be easier for me. I said that I’d prefer to stay in 19A and she had to make a phone call to get my seat back.

It was obvious to me that they really just wanted to have everyone in the main J cabin and I was proven right when I saw that the aerobridge was at 2L! Unfortunately for them, I wanted the mini cabin to myself.

The lady that checked me in then went and got the wheelchair herself and wheeled me to the QF lounge. That surprised me!

When we got to security I got out of the wheelchair to stumble through the scanner and put my walking stick on the belt. The delightful gentleman told me to take off my shoes, which were just sneekers/sandshoes. I said “that is about the most difficult thing that you could ask me to do”. He told me not to worry about it and I wobbled through the scanner without issue. I love airport security :evil:.

I was wheeled into the QF lounge and deposited at the very high table designed especially for disabled people :mad:. I had an orange juice and was collected 15 minutes later. From that point on I didn’t get out of the wheelchair until I arrived at the aircraft door.

At International security everyone was being put through the nude-o-scope scanner. Not me though!

My assistant even scanned my passport for me. It's a tough life!

As usual, I was the first pax onto the plane. When I arrived at the door the FA said that they had moved me to 11A to make it easier for me. How kind. They really didn’t want just one person in the mini cabin but I said I would rather stay in 19A. I won!
 
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