Review of Lufthansa flight from Milan to Frankfurt in Business

weekend in italy

For the return trip, I was originally booked on a Lufthansa business class routing MXP-MUC-IAD for 75k UA miles.  There was first class available on that route (only saw on United for some reason) a few days before the trip, but not on Aeroplan or LifeMiles.  Instead, an earlier flight with MXP-FRA-IAD popped up on LifeMiles.  With an 15% Amex transfer bonus, this turned into 75k Amex points redemption for LH F on the Queen.  Schedule-wise the MUC routing would have been better, but I wasn't willing to pay nearly 35k+ more miles for it.  In any case, always happy to fly F on the Queen.

milan malpensa airport (MXP)

I got to MXP about a little over an hour before departure.  It actually took me a while to find the Lufthansa check-in, but once I found it, they processed me quickly and I was on my way to fast track.

I came across this little stand right after security.  Anyone know what this is for?

lufthansa lounge (mxp)

I went to the Lufthansa lounge to rest for a bit before my flight, which can be found in Terminal 1.

The Lounge is a long, L-shaped room.  There are some tables to your left immediately after check-in, with lockers and the bathroom to the right.

Further into the lounge there are some interesting booth seats along the side.

There was a beverage station in the main room and a visually pleasant bookshelf wall.

A small, but reasonable spread of beverages and food stations:

WiFi in the lounge was okay.  In any case, I didn't stay very long in the lounge–just a glass of water and a quick bathroom break.

lh247

My flight to Frankfurt would be on D-AILE, a 26 years-old A319-100.  This is definitely one of the older plane that I've flown on recently.

Boarding began at 8:34am CET (on-time) and was complete by 8:54am.

As you can see, we had 4 rows of J on this flight, though it wasn't full.

Not much to say about European J seats–bulkhead would have been nice, but wasn't available when I booked.

I was originally in 2F, but was asked by the gentleman in 2D if I could switch with his wife in 2A.  Turns out there was no one in 2C so I lucked out with a row to myself.

WiFi on this flight was 30 minutes of free messaging, 3€ for the whole flight.  Alternatively, 5€ for 600 KB/s or 10€ for 15 mb/s.

Just as an aside, I found this amusing onboard sale offering for a bar stand made from a recycled A320.

We pushed back at 9:01am, 4 minutes early, taking off 9 minutes later.

Pretty soon we were flying across the Swiss Alps.  Here's the sight of beautiful Lake Maggiore:

Service began 10 minutes after takeoff with a drink service.  The meal was prosciutto, cheese, and some yogurt (but I did not partake).

Chocolates were passed around with about 20-25 minutes left in-flight.  Coppeneur was unfamiliar to me, but pretty good.

We landed at 10:09 and arrived at Gate A34 (to my disappointment) 8 minutes later.  I would have loved for a remote gate arrival so I could get picked up as a connecting first class passenger.