What do we travel with? How do we prefer to travel? What are our travel hacks?
If you are seasoned travel or just getting into that hamster wheel, this is the episode for you. Our thoughts, best practices and hacks on traveling.
Share with us yours on LinkedIn or X.
Our show: Tech DECIPHERED brings you the Entrepreneur and Investor views on Big Tech, VC and Start-up news, opinion pieces and research. We decipher their meaning, and add inside knowledge and context. Being nerds, we also discuss the latest gadgets and pop culture news
Subscribe To Our Podcast
Welcome to Episode 69 of Tech DECIPHERED. Today we’ll go on a slightly softer note and discuss our travel hacks and preferences. Bertrand and I often are asked, “What do you guys travel with? What do you prefer to travel with? What are your travel hacks?” And a few other questions in this world of hamster wheel travelling.
Today we’ll share a bunch of our preferences. We’ll share a lot of the things we travel with, from luggage to electronics to other services and devices. We will share to the best of our knowledge, how to really do it in style, if that’s at all possible, once you’re in that hamster wheel. We’ll share some of our hacks, not only for business travelling, but also for leisure travelling. Interesting stuff. We all have our hacks. We all have our stuff going on.
Airlines, alliances, loyalty programs
Maybe we start with airlines and all the things around that. Bertrand.
Yeah, sure. Don’t get me started on Air France, who cancelled on me a huge quantity of miles without alerting me, without notice, just a few weeks before I was supposed to take a flight. I will try my best to never use them again.
It was that bad. Air France is out, so that’s the beginning. Let’s maybe talk about the guys who are in. I’ll give you my top airlines around the world. Obviously this depends. Depends if you have to travel through that region or if you’re travelling to that region. My favourites, I think maybe not sure if it’s in full order, but I would say Emirates, obviously, Qatar Airways. If you’re hubbing through Middle East or if you’re going to the Middle East, two amazing airlines, probably two of the best in the world.
I would say maybe Emirates is my favourite now. I have to be thoughtful in how I put that forward. Qatar is also exceptional, obviously if you’re hubbing through Doha. Incredible airline as well. The Asian ones in general, we’ll leave the Chinese for a second because that’s a different ballgame all together. Let’s not say all Asian ones and obviously different ones are great.
I’d say Singapore Airlines continues being systematically an exceptional airline. They’ve become very expensive, but an exceptional airline. A little bit SOP driven, only airline in the world, true story, that I complained not once or twice, but three times on the same incident, and I actually never got a response from them on an incident which is interesting. In general, service is exceptional. Their facilities at Changi Airport are exceptional. The planes are really well-kept, the food is great, very attentious, and really like them.
Cathay, I haven’t flown with them in a while. They went through a bit of a slump at some point. They were my favourite for a long time. Then they went through a bit of a slump in terms of product in particular, in terms of the quality of the product, in terms of the quality of the seats, service on board, et cetera. I’ve heard positive things recently, so maybe worthwhile putting them back on my Top 5 list around the world.
Then the Korean Airlines in general are pretty strong on service. Depends a little bit on the plane. I’ve had always better experiences with Korean Air than with Asiana. Maybe Korean Air gets that last Top 5 thing.
Talking about the negative ones for me that I try to avoid. I try to avoid as much as possible some of the European ones. TAP Air Portugal, the Portuguese one, is actually pretty decent by European standards. British Airways depends on the format of the plane. I find their business class service and product not to be as compelling as other airlines right now. I always found the service on British Airways, you only get great service on reshares if you’re in first class. On long haul, even in business, it’s a little bit matron. It’s like, “Sit down and just stay put, and we’ll serve you, but we won’t really be particularly paying attention to you.” In some ways, TAP Air Portugal, I think they’re a little bit more thoughtful and nicer.
Lufthansa is similar to British Airways. I’ve had very mixed experiences, but in general not great. The service, they got a lot of bad rap on their first class stuff. In Europe, I’m not sure there’s anyone that I’m excited about. I haven’t flown with Air France a long time. Apparently I shouldn’t. Iberia I’ve flown with and it’s okay-ish. I don’t remember any airline in Europe that I’m particularly fond of. Maybe I’m missing someone. SAS is okay, I guess in the Nordics, but not a great deal of amazing airlines in there.
Then negative Chinese. Most of the Chinese airlines, I haven’t flown with them in a long time, so I obviously have to be careful in not pushing it forward. Not a huge fan of JAL and ANA in Japan. When in doubt, I would go ANA. Then in Taiwan, also not particularly excited about any of the Taiwanese airlines, but they’re not bad either, so it’s okay kind of thing. Then on the American Airlines, which I’m sure people are excited to know about, I’m really not a fan of United. Sadly, they’re on Star Alliance
Do you remember this video on United? There was this guy being dragged out of the plane, bloodied and everything.
It sounds about right, I think.
I think it’s just before COVID or at the beginning of COVID. I forgot. It was bad. It was so bad.
My favourite was only domestic flights with Virgin America. By the way, Virgin Atlantic, I’m going to fly again with them in a couple of months and I remember them fondly. Their upper class product was really cool back in the day. Their lounge was really cool at Heathrow. This was many years ago. Looking forward to experimenting with it again. Virgin America was really strong and then obviously they merged with Alaska. Alaska is okay. It’s good. I feel it still has a little bit of the Continental and Virgin America ethos, which is pretty good.
I’d say of the big ones in the US, the only one that I think has improved quite a bit in terms of service has been Delta Air Lines, although their hub is Atlanta, which as I call it, is where you get lost in space in general. It’s a black hole, I guess. We’ll come back to airports later. American is okay-ish, but I’ve had some really bad experiences as well in American. United is the bottom for me. Southwest, I haven’t flown in a while. They’re quite expensive now, Southwest, actually.
I think they have changed dramatically, Southwest, from what I read in terms of what you get, what is included, not included, how they work. It’s not the same.
Top 5 guys that I would make an effort to fly with: Qatar Airways, Emirates. Emirates obviously doesn’t really belong to any of the alliances, which makes it a little bit more cumbersome for points gathering and all that stuff, but I think they’re really top end. I think Singapore Airlines belongs in that group. Then just below for me, Korean Air Lines and Cathay and then the rest.
There’s preferences. I have preferences as I said. If I have a chance, I’ll go Delta rather than American or United. If it’s to Europe, then I prefer a European airline to American and to United. To Asia, the same thing. I prefer an Asian airline to American and United. Delta, it depends a little bit on the plane and all that stuff. That’s my rough preferences. I’ve had my worst experiences with United. My worst experience I think probably were all with United, delayed flights issues and all that stuff, bad service.
If I have to fly to Europe, I used to try to use Air France, but two issues again, they take away your miles. That was during COVID. Two, you run the risk to have a strike in France. That’s obviously the risk. Now I’m probably more trying to fly Delta if I go to Europe. Asia, I will try to stay away from Air China, that’s for sure. I got some memorable experience when they were so scared away I would bring down a plane by using my tablet. It was just as crazy. I would say the Taiwanese airlines, I have overall positive experience. Not great, not bad, I would say.
Which is your favourite of the two?
Let me be careful. It’s China Airways, China Air. There is a new one, actually, a third one that started recently. I cannot say I have a big preference, a clear-cut preference between the Taiwanese airlines. Taipei Airport is quite convenient to branch from in Asia.
It’s EVA Air or EVA Air and China Airlines?
Yeah, EVA Air is one of them, China Airlines, and there is a third one now that just launched.
STARLUX, is that the one? STARLUX Airlines?
Maybe. Yes. In the US, living in Seattle, this is a hub for Alaska. We use Alaska quite a bit. I will use Delta as well, and United if no other choice.
And American? Do you have a perspective on American?
I have never used them, actually.
Really? It’s American Airlines.
Same for the other one we talk about, Southwest. I’ve rarely, rarely use it. I’m sure I use it once or twice, but I’m doing my best not to choose that. I feel already having three airlines to manage on points and stuff is enough.
There’s these guys, JetSuite, JSX, which I do use once in a while. They’re pretty good for domestic flights. Obviously they don’t fly to all airports and they fly to some funky airports. The experience is almost a private jet kind of experience. Shout out to those guys because those guys are still delivering a really nice experience for pretty good prices.
Are you using them for LA to SF, for instance? I’ve heard they are quite good.
Correct. I think they have LAX as well. I don’t know where LAX flies to, but it’s either Burbank or SNA, which is John Wayne, Orange County. I’ve used them in Burbank. Burbank right now is not very good for where I live. Then Burbank flies, I think it’s to Oakland and maybe Fremont, if I’m not mistaken. They have some funky airports in the Bay Area, so it’s like Oakland, Fremont and then one in Napa that they give you access to. Oakland is fine. If you’re going to San Francisco in particular, you fly to Oakland. As an airport, it’s actually pretty easy.
You have to cross the bridge, so I guess it depends on traffic.
It’s just you have to organise so that you’re not getting into heavy traffic. If you fly in the morning, that’s a pain in the neck, if you need to get to SF, but if you fly in the afternoon or evening, it’s normally less of a problem. If you come back in the morning, then it’s not a problem either. The experience is really, really good. I’ve flown Burbank to Oakland a couple times and it’s really a nice experience. They’re expanding all the time, so they’re in a bunch of other places around the country. I think they just expanded to New York, if I’m not mistaken, so that should be cool. I’m not sure which airports in New York, but pretty, pretty cool.
Do you fly window or aisle?
I’m an aisle kind of guy. I was window at the beginning. I’d like to be at the window and whatever. For two reasons I like to be aisle. I think the first reason we’re all intense people. I like to get out of the plane as fast as I can, and normally the aisle in your row is the first person that goes out, so just getting out, getting the bag, putting it on the floor, getting ready to go.
I’m not the guy that rushes through the cabin just to be clear. I think there’s a term for it now, but I am definitely the guy who gets ready quickly so that I can leave. If I’m flying in economy or premium economy, I’ll try to fly as much to the front of those classes as possible. If I’m flying in business class, then I would be the first seat if possible, certainly on domestic flights. Obviously on international flights, if I’m flying in premium economy or business, sometimes there’s a first class, so they are obviously the first guys to get out. I’ll fly obviously in the first row for my class.
The second reason is I’m on ketogenic diet, so I need to go to the restroom very often. If it’s a 15-hour flight or a 12-hour flight or whatever, being on the aisle is obviously easier because if there’s people around you that need to jump to or whatever, they can. You jumping over people like several times during the flights is a pain in the neck for everyone involved. I pay attention to those details and I prefer just to be on the aisle, so I can just go and come back and there’s no problem. I don’t need to bother anyone or everyone on my row
For me, it really depends on, is it a long flight or short flight, is it business or premium economy? If it’s a long flight in premium economy, I will usually pick window. I don’t want to be disturbed by someone trying to cross me, waking me up and stuff. That would be where I would be careful. If it’s business, it’s usually not an issue, so it’s different. If it’s a short flight, I don’t mind window, I don’t need to go out. If it’s a longer flight but not too long, not sleeping, then aisle usually I would take. It really depends for me. As you, I will try to go in the first rows as you can for your given class. I don’t like to stay in the back and to wait.
We’re impatient people. We want to get out quickly and people are like, “What difference does it make?” Getting in, it doesn’t make a huge difference, but it could. It depends how much space is there available for you to put your bags on if you’re carrying a bunch of bags or not. We’ll talk about bags in a bit and later on, what our preferences are on that. Getting in, it depends. Depends on how much you’re carrying with yourself.
Getting out, it matters because it could be a difference of 5, 10 minutes to get out on planes. If you’re all the way at the back versus you’re at the front, it could be material, in particular, if you don’t have bags that you’ve checked in, that you need to go into the conveyor belt to get in terms of baggage claim.
In terms of loyalty programs, what’s your preference? Who would you run with for the different ones? For Star Alliance, for SkyTeam, who do you run with? What are the airlines that you have?
I have a few depending on where I need to go. Star Alliance for sure.
Star Alliance here with who? With Air France?
So SkyTeam, Air Delta and United for the other one. That’s the two main I would use usually.
I did a stupid thing. Air France was my SkyTeam team, British Airways was my oneworld and Lufthansa with Miles & More was my Star Alliance. I’ve now switched all of them to American ones. Delta is my SkyTeam one, United now with MilesPlus is my Star Alliance one and then American Airlines is my oneworld one.
I found with the American Airlines it’s easier to have the loyalty card with them because you get the upgrade lists and all that stuff. For domestic flights, all that stuff is done automatically, so it’s easier to fly with them. Normally you get the status as well. In most cases, faster than some of the European airlines. Similar alignment on oneworld tiers and Star Alliance tiers and SkyTeam tiers. Then some of them are very, very bad. You mentioned Air France. I had the same issue as you did, which is all of a sudden my miles disappeared at Air France because they obviously don’t keep your miles for very, very long. They take away your miles, which is like robbery in my opinion.
It’s robbery, and especially during the time around COVID, it was really disgusting to do that. The fact they do it without any notice, any warning, nothing, it’s just plain disgusting.
It was exactly the experience I had, so very, very nasty kind of stuff. At a certain point in time, I was top end, I think on the three. I was still based in Asia, but I was top tier on oneworld, Star Alliance and SkyTeam for a period of time. Honestly, it matters a lot if you have to do a lot of travel between classes like economy, premium economy, business, et cetera. If you can fly a bit more in business or if you don’t care, it matters a little bit less to have tierage with all these. I don’t optimise as much on tierage anymore, to be honest, for the different airlines. If I did, I’d probably have to do a lot more Star Alliance. Recently I’ve been doing a lot of American, a lot of oneworld, so something for me to think about, I guess.
On this topic, I still remember a long time ago, someone who will stay unnamed, who would keep flying around late December to make sure he has enough miles and keeping his miles. So on purpose, not taking a direct flight, but flying through second, third airport to make sure that he would build enough miles, sustain the right tier. I just couldn’t believe that level of optimisation. Maybe it makes sense. The guy was smart, so no question. There was some logic behind it, but I was certainly not willing to do the trade-off to spend 10 more hours or more than necessary just to keep the right levels.
To finalise maybe on the airline side, two things. One, I optimise for the time of the flight. I normally don’t like to hub, to do stops. I prefer to go one flight somewhere and willing to pay a little bit more and fly maybe in premium economy if it’s a very long flight. Obviously if it’s like a 16-hour flight to Dubai from San Francisco or LA, obviously better to do so in premium economy than in economy. Economy is obviously a killer for these flights.
If you have to sleep, yes.
If there’s prices that are compatible and there’s a lot of ways to hack pricing around business class travelling, it may be worthwhile. I always optimise for direct flights if I can. The big hack, and I think I’m going to regret this because a lot of people actually don’t know this, this is a hack I learned with one of my former partners in my first VC firm, this is back 2011, 2012, maybe even before that, is Round The World tickets. If you guys have never heard about this, those listening to us, you need to look into this stuff. It’s magical.
It has a bunch of rules to them, but you can get Round The World tickets with oneworld and Star Alliance. SkyTeam, I’ve never done it. I don’t know if it’s possible or not. With oneworld and Star Alliance you can for sure, and you book them. Look for oneworld Round The World ticket or Star Alliance Round The World ticket. It has a minimum number of sections that you need to do. You need to go in one direction only. Think of it as you have to cross the two oceans kind of thing. You have to go Atlantic on one side and then Pacific on the other side. You can’t go back on your trip.
For example, if you originate in, let’s say San Francisco, you start your trip in San Francisco and you said, “I want to go to Europe first.” Then you can go to a bunch of places, US, Europe, whatever, but then you need to move to another place, Asia, Middle East or whatever to go through the Pacific Ocean to get back to the US. You need to end in the same place that you start because it is around the world. You need to end at San Francisco, start in San Francisco.
You have 12 months to do all the trips. I think it’s up to 15 flights if I’m not mistaken. I’ve never been able to optimise much beyond. I think 11 is my record, maybe. There are some people who do all sorts of funky optimisations like back and forth. They have two tickets running at the same time. I’ve never figured out how to do it. I’m sure there are people smarter than me.
These tickets are actually super, super value for money. With taxes and stuff, they might go a little bit beyond that, but it’s in the 10K, 11K range for business class travelling around the world. If you get in seven flights in, if you’re going through a bunch of different countries… For example, if you’re roadshowing, if you’re going to a bunch of different funky places, it’s more than worthwhile because if you just did one trips around, that alone would be over 10K if you’re flying in business, and it’s done.
Now, obviously 10K for business class is still quite expensive. It might be that you want to fly in premium economy or economy, there’s also tickets available for that. A huge hack that I found over the years. You can fly in economy, premium economy, business or first class. You get the ticket, the ticket issuer becomes the first airline that does the first flight effectively. The systems are a bit clunky, in particular the Star Alliance one. I remember super clunky, but their customer service is really good. It’s used to dealing with issues. You can change stuff, you can change flights last minute as well if you need to, et cetera. It’s really, really a great experience.
That’s so good to know. I don’t think I ever used it, but I knew about it.
You can also use it for leisure, or a mix. You can do like oh, it’s part business, part leisure or just fully for leisure or fully for business. As I said, it’s a really great package opportunity. I don’t know if SkyTeam actually need to look into it, but definitely you can do it for oneworld and Star Alliance.
Let’s move on quickly to airports. My top airports in the world versus my top hated ones. I would say top loved, probably, I think Dubai DXB, Qatar, the Diu Airport’s wonderful as well. Anything else that I would highlight, Incheon, I’ve had pretty good experiences there. It’s just very far from Seoul, so if you’re not hubbing through it, if you’re actually going into town, it’s very far. That makes it a little bit more painful. What else? I would say Haneda in Japan is a wonderful airport. Narita is very far from Tokyo, so it’s a bit of a pain in the neck and not as nice as an airport as Haneda is.
Yes. I like Haneda. It had some food options that I really like there.
Maybe the last one I would highlight. I used to like Hong Kong International Airport a lot. It’s a bit mixed now, it’s become really big. Changi in Singapore is probably one of my favourite airport in the world, I would say. I did have great experiences.
Yeah. Changi is great. I like the Hong Kong one. I think it’s quite good. I have used the Taipei one quite a few times. It’s quite efficient as a hub, but it’s not to the level of Hong Kong or Singapore. If you take in Europe, I’m not sure I would have a big one I would recommend.
Let me say, I mean, Lisbon, I have to say, this has become a mess, like a tragedy. An airport that’s been 50 years, a discussion to build another airport, and nobody can come to a conclusion. Fifty years, right? Now it’s a mess, because obviously there’s too much traffic into Lisbon, and out of Lisbon.
I’m not a fan of Heathrow. Even Terminal 5, it’s sort of messy-ish. I mean, they’ve done a decent job now, but it’s still a bit messy. It used to be worse, so I guess they’ve improved it.
Frankfurt is a total mess most of the time. You have to get really lucky for it to work well. Munich’s okay. I’d say Charles de Gaulle, I’ve had some of the worst experiences in my life, so I’m not sure I like going through Charles de Gaulle. Amsterdam, I’m not a fan either.
Yes. Have you noticed that it has been getting worse for ground transportation? I used to be able to get an Uber relatively easily from any airport, and now there are a lot of airports outside the US where I’m taking taxi because it’s actually much easier, much more convenient, at least from the airport. They make it on purpose, I guess, a nightmare to use Uber from the airport.
I think some of it’s related to local regulations. Some of it is just to your point, they’re making it worse. But I agree. It’s like, even Lisbon, the way that Bolt and Uber operates out of the airport in Lisbon is a mess. They’ve now created a new area for pickups only. I haven’t used that area. I don’t know if it’s better or not. But the old area they had it in was absolutely awful. Mind-boggling awful.
Actually, LAX in the US is also bad. If you want to take an Uber, you have to walk 10 minutes.
Ten minutes if you’re lucky. If you want to get UberX up to, I think up to Black. Black and above does curbside, which could be actually slow as well because LAX is a mess of an airport. Talking about messes of airport really depends on the terminal, I guess. The international terminal is very nice, but then the ground transportation in and out is messy. It depends what time of the day, departures, arrivals. I haven’t really figured out the patterns to that airport yet.
San Francisco is doable for the most. Although Terminal 3 right now in San Francisco is a total mess as well because it’s under construction at least until I think it’s 2027 or 2028. It’s going to be a while.
A lot of airports that are not great, some of them in the US. I mean, Atlanta is a mess. I know they’re working on stuff, but it’s a total mess. One of the largest airports in the world by movements, I believe. Newark, I’ve had some good experiences in New York. It’s in New Jersey, I guess. Then you have these funky airports, the smaller airports that somehow managed to be better. Like John Wayne in Orange County. Long Beach Airport, which is mostly Southwest.
I was going to say in New York, usually the issue is the traffic to get to the airport. You have to be very careful about that.
Or coming from the airport. If you are taking ground transportation.
Do you have any big favourites? Any ones that you really dislike that you avoid at all costs?
I’m not sure. I can just say that Seattle Airport that I’m using now as my base airport. We recently got two luggage lost. It was on some minor airlines. You could argue they were not lost in Seattle, but before. But that’s still not a great experience from that perspective. I must say I like the airport so far. As you say Charles de Gaulle is not so great, but sometimes I have to go there travelling to France, so no other options are there.
In Madrid, I’ve had some bad experiences.
The mainland Chinese airport, in terms of food options are just usually not great. Yeah, that’s not why you want to use them.
I still have nightmares with Beijing Capital Terminal 3. But honestly it wasn’t a bad terminal. It’s just I guess I spent too much time there, and you have to walk a lot in and out. But yes.
Yes, it’s a big one. You have to walk a lot. Usually the food options are quite limited. But I mean clean and modern, that part was okay. No, it’s not as if the other ones I will [inaudible 00:25:05]. To be frank, I try to go direct as much as possible. Usually I have. If I’m in an airport, it’s because I have to be there, if you see what I mean. It’s not I have to go somewhere close by.
Let’s switch to lounges. Loves and hates. Your most beloved and hated lounges, Bertrand.
Honestly, at least from my perspective, they’re all crap for food and coffee.
Is that what you want? You want just food and coffee? That’s the play?
That’s a core part. Either I’m not so hungry or just snacks and okay, whatever. If it’s food and coffee, then usually I will pick somewhere else my food and coffee, and go to the lounge for a bit more safety, a bit more relaxation, less noise. I would say relatively whatever.
I would be a bit more picky if I have really a long time to be at the lounge. That’s when I start to check, “Okay, what are my options?” If I know I have 5, 6, 7 hours to stay because some random stuff. Last time was a cancelled flight last minute and I had to pick another one. Yeah, I end up to spend 6 hours, 7 hours. That’s when you have to start to be a bit picky of which one you take. Also, some might not let you go in. Some might say, “Oh, you can only come in before the flight” or whatever. I would be a bit more picky.
I like to go early to airports. I don’t like to stress out, and I work from airports. I either do calls or work on stuff on my laptop, et cetera. Going to the lounge is really mostly to have a place where I can just hang out and work for a bit. Silence could be or not very important, but maybe not super important. Food’s probably a little bit less. It’s great to have something to eat while you’re there. To your point, most lounges are crap on food.
I have a couple of notable amazing ones. Obviously lounges normally are business class or first class as people would know. There’s a couple of other options with Priority Pass that you get access to business class level lounges. My experience with Pass is very mixed. Some lounges are really good, some lounges are all but crap.
On the positive side, I’d say again, the Middle Eastern airlines just are silly. Emirates business class, Qatar Airways business class. I’ve never been to the Qatar Airways first class one. I’ve been to the Emirates first class one once, and it was a bit silly because they have counters for any type of food. Like counters for desserts and ice cream, a counter for desserts and ice cream, a counter for sushi and sashimi, a counter for whatever.
You can still order stuff à la carte because that’s what you do. I was in that lounge at night and I recall clearly it’s like maybe it was 20 of us in the lounge and there were like, I don’t know, five or six counters like this open, and you’re like, “Really?” There were more people working there than… Just the counters than people I guess actually eating. It’s absolutely exceptional.
Singapore Airline, their business class lounges are very good. I’ve been only to their first class lounge once. Changi, it was really exceptional as well. À la carte, very nice kind of service. I would give a shout-out actually to United Airlines. I think they’ve won a bunch of awards. The United Airlines lounge at SFO for international. They’ve won a bunch of awards I think, and it’s actually pretty good by American Airlines in any way kind of lounges. It’s really, really good.
Delta has a really nice lounge at the LAX, Delta Air Lines. There’s a couple of really good American Airlines’ lounges around. My last shout-out, I think on the positive side is the Concorde lounge for British Airways, which I’ve been to a few of them and that’s when you’re flying first class.
Just to explain, I don’t fly first class. It just happened to be… I’m a hacker. It just happened to be that at some point in time British Airways had this promotion that if you booked a ticket, I think it was July to September, if you booked a ticket, and it was considered a full ticket in business class, you could upgrade one of the legs to first class based on availability. I ended up doing a bunch of those where there was Concorde lounges, which was I think New York at JFK. In London, Heathrow, you can go to the Concorde lounge, not the first class lounge, but the Concorde lounge. It was very nice and very fancy. I remember that fondly.
In terms of first class lounge, I did once the Air France La Première, and I must say it was quite amazing. From the lounge to the first class in the plane, it was quite amazing experience. The food was top level. You even have a spa if you want. They bring you to the plane by a private luxury car. You get in not seeing any other passenger but people in first. I must say it was quite an amazing experience. I forgot how I ended up doing it, but price wise it was expensive, but it was not so insane versus the other option basically. That’s why I end up doing it.
American Express has a bunch of lounges, as we know, for Platinum and Centurion members around the world. I’ve been to a few of them. They’re normally pretty good. Recent issue with American Express has been that there’s always a wait list because there’s too many people I guess with Platinum cards. They’ve again increased the price of Platinum card and whatever. Then Centurion as we know is very complex as well to attain.
Then on the negative side, I would say as I mentioned before, some of the Priority Pass access ones, those lounge-y things that are the commonly used ones are not great. TAP’s I think still running out of SFO, the Portuguese Airline. Still running out of SFO with this China Airlines Lounge, which is really not very good. I mean no disrespect to the people who work there, but it’s just the lounge is not very good. There’s a bunch of lounges that I feel are just a bit of a waste. Like you might as well go to the gate and wait.
In some airports there are actually good food options. Maybe just go to one of the food options and have dinner there or lunch or some snack and just use it as a place to work from. Something like that.
Hotel chains, Airbnb, what’s your preference, Bertrand? Loyalty cards, whatever. What do you go for? What’s your addiction?
I would say I don’t do Airbnb too often. Once in a while, and typically for vacations, short vacation, I will say. Sometimes I use it for short vacation, few days. Usually typically I’m using hotel chains. I don’t want to bother take a chance in a lot of situations. Do I have a favourite hotel chain? I used to like Hotel W. I still remember the one in Taipei very well. It was really a nice place. But it really depends where. I’m doing Bonvoy quite often that’s probably one of the main one I’m using.
Yeah, I’m a big Bonvoy guy.
Yeah. At the end of the day it really depends on where I go, what the price are. I mean I’m not forcing myself basically.
I have one force mechanism which is Marriott Bonvoy. I was a Starwood member back in the day and I got to Lifetime Gold. I think I missed Lifetime Platinum on the Starwood terms by 1 year to be a Lifetime Platinum. I used to fly and travel a lot in particular when I was at McKinsey. When they merged with Marriott I think the merger wasn’t too bad in terms of their loyalty program, but now you need a lot more years to get to Lifetime Platinum. I think I’m 2 years out from Lifetime Platinum or something like that.
But that’s the one that I have preference on. I think the largest in the world, the Marriott as a chain, and they have a lot of brands that are exceptional. I mean on the top end obviously the St. Regis of the world, the Ritz-Carltons, et cetera. But even if you go one level below, you can find some of the boutique things are actually very nice as well with Marriott like Edition.
The Ws have gone one level down. I think the Edition has taken that place, more top-end boutique. Ws are now a little bit more accessible as well in terms of cost and price. Westons depends on the part of the world you’re in. I mean in Asia the Westons are very nice. Some parts of Europe they’re also very nice.
Sheratons similarly, not great in the US but in other parts of the world they might be okay. They have so many brands like I’ve stated, Residence Inns. There’s so many lower end brands, longer stay brands that they have that are really, really nice. I mean, you get really big rooms for not a lot of money, and they’re exceptional.
I think often for me, it’s a question of location. Do you get access to a real, not just like is it a good hotel? You have the facility, but is it a special location? We were in vacation this summer in Banff in Canada. We spent a few days around Lake Louise, and we went to the Fairmont because that was the only hotel authorised at Lake Louise per se. It was just amazing. It was just an amazing experience. If you don’t stay at this hotel obviously you have to stay much further away, they limit access to cars, I mean it’s a total nightmare. But if you are at the Fairmont Lake Louise it’s just a magical experience. I mean prices are insane to be clear, but you have a special experience for a few days that cannot be replicated with another hotel.
I mean we could do an episode just on hotels, so I’ll just cut to the chase. I think there’s a couple of chains that I quite like. I do like the Grand Heights of the world, the Park Heights of the world are very top end. Prices vary a lot, I mean, some of these hotels are very, very expensive.
Hotels have become more expensive. Hopefully at some point it will be a step back. There’s amazing resorts as you were saying, all around the world. I have this love for Aman Resorts, A-M-A-N Resorts. They’ve become super expensive, almost unbearable. I was an Aman junkie back in the day. I’ve been to a lot of their properties. They’re very beautiful location kind of properties, but they’re super expensive now as well.
But there’s great places, as we were saying, that are great value for money. I’ve stayed at places that I wouldn’t have thought of spending time on, and they’re really, really, really nice for not a lot of money, and I think location matters a lot to me, but at the end of the day also having a place where for example if I need to work from the hotel room that I can work from the hotel room. If I don’t need to, then potentially that’s less of an important thing in terms of space and desk space et cetera. But Marriott’s is really the only obsession that I have just to get my layer at least of Platinum every year if I can so that I get to that Lifetime Platinum thing at some point in time, and then I can just get it.
Mandarin Oriental, huge shout-out probably of the urban hotels. They’re quite expensive in some parts of the world but of the urban hotels.
Ah, Mandarin Oriental, yes, amazing.
I’ve always had exceptional experiences with them but again very expensive.
Hong Kong. I’ve not stayed at the one in Paris, but I’ve been to the one in Paris, and it seemed exceptional as well. I’ve been to the one in Barcelona, I’ve been to a few of their other Mandarin Orientals around the world, and I’ve never had a bad experience. They’re all very, very exceptional. Very, very thoughtful in terms of how they do service, et cetera.
Four Seasons, for example, I’ve had mixed experiences in different places. A lot of people love them. But anyway, that’s our addictions.
Ground transportation. We just heard from you. Now you’re preferring taxis to Ubers and Lyfts in some parts of the world.
If they make the Uber experience terrible, yes. I’m discovering that more and more I’m picking up especially… Where did that happen? In Hong Kong, in Paris. I end up picking up taxi versus Uber. In some location, even in the US if you have to do a 10, 15 minutes walk, sometimes I might not take the Uber or Lyft as usual.
Yeah, for in and out of the airport, I agree with you. I think Uber and Lyft every time that they’re available, in some cases Lyft is actually a better option and cheaper.
Yes, I always check both.
Yeah. Uber is a little bit more reliable in some ways and sort of the average quality I think is a little bit higher. But agreed with you also that there’s some cases where taxi is the better option, just easier. Just get into a car and go. Not necessarily super pricey. Some taxis obviously are very, very expensive. Like taxis in the Nordics are expensive. Japan very expensive. It depends sort of the country that you’re in.
Car rentals, I do mostly in the US or unless I’m on vacation, I need to go around some place, whatever. I don’t do it that often everywhere else. I try and optimise for a location where I stay in the city and then if I can walk to most of the places or just do quick Ubers, that’s great, and not rent a car.
Yeah, same as you. I rent a car if I really need to. Nice vacation trip and we’re driving quite a lot. But if it’s not that, if it’s business, typically I would just do [inaudible 00:37:04].
In the US it’s sometimes worthwhile if you’re for example, going to an area, and you need like I don’t know. If I went to see you in Seattle, Bertrand, I won’t say where you live, but maybe to go to you, I’d get a rental because you’re not necessarily in the centre of Seattle. Then, if I want to go to Redmond to see people at Microsoft, it would be worthwhile having the rental rather than just Ubering around because that could be quite costly.
Public transportation, I can’t say I’m a huge user of public transportation around the world, so apologies for that. I know there’s amazing undergrounds in many cities that work really well. I mean, London, I believe it still works extremely well, et cetera. Probably the fastest way to move around London is through the underground, through the tube, as they call it over there. Trains in some cases, obviously the Heathrow train, the Heathrow Express is a relatively fast way to get into town from Heathrow, et cetera, et cetera. There’s obviously a lot of interesting options there. I can’t say I’m the best person to probably opine on that.
Yeah, I would take the subway once in a while if it’s really convenient. It could be Paris, could be London, could be Hong Kong. Tokyo actually has a good subway, but typically I will end up doing quite a bit of Uber. But really depends, am I in a rush? Is there a lot of traffic? That sort of stuff. On this topic, I don’t know you, but me, 6 years living in China, I didn’t take the bus a single time, I think.
I took it during the Olympics in Beijing because to move… There was one day or two days where… This was a whole mess for those… It is first world problems, I’m sure. But I got too many tickets for the Olympics. In Beijing at that point in time there were even an odds on the licence plates, every other day were evens and odds. I had a driver, and I had to hire his wife as well because they had another car, a tiny little car, but the other car, I think one of them was even, the other one was odd. The licence plate. They could drive me all days. But for some reason someday they couldn’t, so I had to take the underground and I had to take bus and whatever. It was actually much better than I expected to be honest. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.
The underground in Beijing or Shanghai was quite good. I didn’t take it a lot because usually it was too far away. It’s not as if it was dense. Usually you would not walk from where you want to go from the subways, that’s a problem. It could be too long, but as long as not using a rush hour, it was usually not too bad.
Global Entry / TSA Pre / Clear / Nexus
Maybe last and not the least on travel preferences, any other hacks that we have, the global entries of the world and all that stuff?
I mean, Global Entry/TSA Pre for me is critical. I would not survive without this. This is great. Getting in the US for sure. Skipping the lines. Once you have Global Entry, you get TSA Pre. Then inside the US you also skip the lines. For me, it’s quite critical. No question.
Yeah, I agree with you. I think it’s life changing to have Global Entry if you’re entering the US because obviously you’re coming in an international flight. I’m a US citizen now. Even the lines for US Passports are not always neglectable. They’re faster for sure, but they’re not neglectable. Global Entry is a game-changer. I mean, you can go what I call Singapore Changi time. You can go less than a minute, and you’re past immigration. It’s incredible.
Yeah. It’s typically one minute, and now it goes even faster if you do the facial recognition. Now there is a new way to go facial with your phone, I think. I don’t think it’s available everywhere. There might be a new way to do that I just discovered.
Yes. We’re now in the seconds, which, for those that have a very painful experience getting into the US with foreign passports and whatever. I’m sorry, I apologise in advance on our behalf. But it is what it is, sadly. TSA Pre, obviously, it’s great to get out. To get into the lines that have TSA Pre, both for international flights and also for domestic in the US.
There are some airports where TSA Pre has become a mess as well. Not staffed properly. Because American Express has this thing going on where they pay for your CLEAR subscription effectively, I got CLEAR as well. This is the ultimate hack. At those airports, if the TSA Pre line is very long, I get CLEAR. Then CLEAR, you jump in the line of TSA Pre. CLEAR, if you have TSA Pre, you jump in front of the line of TSA Pre. Because they take you to the front of the line of TSA Pre. In the US Everything you pay for, it magically gets higher and higher, VIP level. CLEAR, if you have TSA Pre, they will jump you in front of the TSA Pre line. Effectively, you’re jumping in front of the TSA Pre line, so you go even faster.
I have to be very honest, if there’s anyone from CLEAR that’s listening to this, you guys should be paying attention to the quality of your ground service and the staff that you have around there. I know it’s difficult to hire people and staff and all that stuff. But I’ve had at least two significant issues with CLEAR staff that are just unacceptable. It’s like just rudeness, aggressiveness that I would expect maybe from an immigration officer that is really pissed off. Not from someone that is providing a paid service. That is really a nice-to-have service at the end of the day. I’ll leave that note.
It’s great to jump in front of line. I’ve had a lot of great positive experiences, but I’ve had two experiences that were very negative with CLEAR staff over the years. I think they were both at San Francisco Airport at SFO. Anyway, I don’t remember names of people. I won’t name them, but definitely very negative experiences.
Going to different topics. In terms of luggage, what do you do, Nuno, typically?
If you guys see the guy that has a bag that looks mysteriously a little bit too big to put inside the plane, that’s me. I don’t like check-in bags. I’ve only had like two lost bags, I think, or three, maybe in my life. I don’t like to check in bags, though. I’m a RIMOWA guy. I know they’re expensive, but they last a lifetime, literally. I mean, I’ve had a RIMOWA…
They use the Cabin Plus, which as the name indicates, it’s a little bit above the size of a cabin bag. They literally call it Cabin Plus. Basically, the way it works, it’s very simple. If you don’t have to go check in at the counter and if you go straight to the gate and if you either have tierage with the loyalty program for the airline, or you’re flying in business or first class, nobody will bug you. They won’t make you check the bag, they won’t make you weigh the bag, et cetera. They’ll just let you in. I mean, that’s the ultimate hack. They’ll just differentiate based on your tierage if you’re flying in business or above. My experience over the years is they don’t bug me.
I’ll just bring in my Cabin Plus bag. I have two Cabin Plus bags from RIMOWA for reasons I can’t really explain. Then one of them I’ve had for 15 years. It’s travelled with me all over the world. Back when I was in Asia, I already had this bag. I mean, it’s a pretty incredible bag. It’s aluminium. It withstands a bunch of stuff it gets the marks on the aluminium, but I think it’s part of the passage thing. Then I normally carry a backpack. I don’t remember what’s the brands of the backpacks I’m carrying right now. I have a Troubadour, that’s my smaller backpack, which is very nice, very clean, very nice looking. Then I have another one, I forget the name, which is my bulkier one. For many years, I travelled with the TUMI backpack which is a classic. The black one backpack.
I have the same. I used to have blue, and they exchanged for black. When you have an issue with your bags, they exchange with a new one.
RIMOWA, also I think my 15-year-old bag, the only issue I’ve had was I had one of the things that opens the bag at some point started breaking, and so I had it switched. But you pay for it of course, if you’re past warranty, which I was. But it wasn’t super expensive and it looks brand-new thing. It’s brand new except as I said with aluminium you get the dings on the aluminium, which I feel it’s part of the game.
When I initially got one, I was like, “I just got this ding on my aluminium bag that I just bought and it was so expensive.” But then you get used to it, the rite of passage, et cetera. But almost all my big bags are RIMOWA. I have a big one that I rarely use. It’s only for big trips, which I forget the name of it, but it’s I think the largest bag that they have also in aluminium.
Me actually, I must say I’ve changed quite a bit of approach. I used to be big on TUMI for the travel bag, but recently I discovered that they are adding 2 or 3 kilos versus the lightest bag you can get.
Now I have the opposite approach. Which is what is the absolutely lightest bag I can get. I want the lightest for two reason: one is they start to bug you in terms of your bag weight and stuff because you are not business, you are not big on their loyalty program, you are travelling just regular, economy, or economy premium. They might bug you on economy premium.
Then saving 2, 3 kilos can make a huge difference fitting their limits. Especially in Asia where it can be very little. That’s one, and two, I want to be careful. I had back issues and stuff, so now I just want the lightest bag. I mean, there will be some stuff I will bring anywhere. I’m bringing usually a lot of electronics, so my bags are heavy, so I’m trying to get the lightest possible one. What I notice is that if I want the absolute lightest bag luggage, typically it will come with no brand. I move from TUMI to Travelpro to make sure I have the lightest bag, full stop.
Yes. I was a Samsonite guy, and then I was a TUMI guy, and I played around with a bunch of brands, and I ended up with RIMOWA. I know they’re not the lightest, but they’re also not very heavy. People always say, “Because they’re aluminium, they’re very heavy.” It’s actually not really true either. For me, the must is the four wheels. The four wheels from RIMOWA are exceptional. It’s like the Asia thing taught us, four wheels are better than two. You can put your laptop on it as well. You have your laptop on top of the bag, and you’re just moving at the speed of life through the airport, in and out.
To your point, the back obviously suffers a bit if you have to put the bag up. I have to be honest, I’m normally kind if there’s something that needs to be done to the bags at some point. Not only I help other passengers, but for my own bag, I never let anyone touch my bag, including the flight attendant, because it’s so heavy. I don’t want to hurt them. I help them push the thing up and whatever to close it if it’s one of those.
You don’t want them to notice you are way above.
Yes. I also don’t want them I’m way above the weight, but I do want to help.
Just in case they suddenly become nasty and stuff?
Like you, I would do my absolute best to always travel with cabin luggage. It’s only now when we travel as a family that sometimes for some family trips we have to have a bigger luggage. That’s usually the ones that might get lost. But yeah, by default good four wheels, something that is cabin, and a backpack that you attach to your travel cabin luggage. That’s the best combo, no question.
I have to be honest, I only started putting AirTags on my luggage—I’m a bit of a late adopter on that—a couple of years ago. I know a lot of people have been doing it for many years and having it maybe for a year and a half, 2 years, it’s more recent for me, but it’s God sent. I mean, you can serve nowhere it is.
Yeah, no question. Usually I try to have one in every luggage, and sometimes that helps because if you complain with a luggage issue or something, or someone tried to pick your luggage, it adds peace of mind. Let’s put it this way.
Yes, maybe moving to clothes and shoes, what’s your program for that? How do you travel with them? How do you pack them? I just roll my stuff in, and I normally go with two pairs of shoes if it’s a longer trip. Some all bird stuff, and some more formal shoes. One will be on the luggage, one will go on me.
Yeah, it’s one typically, you have no other choice. For me, it really depends. Is it a business trip, vacation trip? Is it a hiking trip? Then it’s trouble. That means a bigger luggage.
I roll my stuff in. Over the years even I find a way to do that for shirts, et cetera. Then what I do is… Most of the hotels, shockingly enough, do have irons. If they don’t, you can ask for one. Normally, they will bring you one, and I’ll just iron my clothes and get everything done. Trousers, everything else, and shirts.
Usually I try to have a shirt jacket that are supposedly iron-free up to a point I guess. I’m usually very careful. I have small pouches and stuff to put clothes in inside my luggage. Usually, I already fold them carefully. I have these travel systems to put all my stuff carefully. Usually, it’s not too bad when I take them out if they are iron-free, wrinkle-free. It can be okay without iron. As you say, every hotel will give you an iron if you call them.
I am the guy who jumps on my bag to close it. That is even more of a testament for the RIMOWAs. They’re so full of stuff. I think I travel pretty light, but sometimes some of my trips are a week. I’ve been on trips as recent as this year, that were two weeks and a half. I try to optimise. At some point I might have to do some hotel cleaning, which is the most expensive activity of all time I think. You might as well buy new clothes, to be honest. That’s how expensive a lot of the cleaning is.
Yes, it’s very unacceptable. Now I try to be more careful and not end up with any cleaning because… Sometimes you have no choice but it just…
Sometimes there’s no choice. If you’re 2 weeks on the road, there’s nothing you can do really.
Yeah, exactly. If you are 2 weeks. But now if I’m travelling a week or 10 days, I try to see how I can optimise it. Just unreasonable.
Sleeping, what’s your game on sleeping?
For sure, I have a sleeping mask. I will take sleeping pills, but very light ones. I’m absolutely not taking anything that is not over the counter. I’m very careful that if I have longer trips and big time zone change, I will usually take the Tylenol PM. One thing I’ve learned, don’t drink alcohol with that. Don’t take that wine of glass in the plane because that’s a really bad combo. I finally read the notice at some point and it’s a bad idea. Now I understand why I had these nightmares and stuff. Be strong and don’t drink any alcohol with that. I would do that flying and maybe one or two nights after flying if there was a big change of time. If not, I would take some even lighter ones.
My process for sleeping is, first, I don’t sleep on flights very well. I have to be extremely tired to get any sleep on a flight. Which makes sometimes the point of even being in business class a little bit moot because you’re not going to sleep.
The good news of that is I arrive at the place I’m in, and I just adapt to that place immediately. I go into that time. I think red eyes can be a bit of a killer if you get in the morning at the other place. But if I get in the evening or the afternoon, it’s very doable. That first night I normally sleep very well. To your point, the second night’s normally the trickier night. In particular, if there’s big time differences and I haven’t found a magic way of dealing with it. I really don’t.
I started wearing a sleeping mask very recently. Maybe 2 years ago I started wearing sleeping. I never did. It bugged me. Obviously, being a nerd, I ended up looking around for several sleeping masks, and I ended up with this sleeping mask called Manta Sleep. I have a few of them, one at home, one that goes with me on the road. I actually may have three of them. But anyway they’re very nice. They’re a bit expensive, but they’re very nice.
Then I use AirPods on my ears. At home, I use I think it’s Ozlo, O-Z-L-O, and I put some background noise for a period of time, and then I sleep. Then there’s a really good brand. I forget the name of the brand. I think they’re Finnish. They’re expensive and they don’t put any sounds. I think they’re as expensive as Ozlo, and there’s no sound on it. It’s just white noise. But they’re really good. I take them on the road with me. Those are the ones I take on the road. Ozlo are the ones I use at home. They’re called QuietOn, and they’re quite expensive, but they’re really good. They eliminate a ton of noise. The first time I used them, my alarm clock went off, and I couldn’t hear my alarm clock. That’s a little bit scary. I had to put my phone closer to me
I’ve never used that type of stuff. What I use, however, because I try to sleep in the plane, and that’s why I need my sleeping pill in the plane. I would use my noise-canceling headset, but if I’m not in the plane I don’t put anything in my ears. I usually have no problem sleeping. My issue will be there is too much light in the room. That’s why I started to use sleeping mask, which of course you have to use in the plane, but I will use in other places if there is a risk that the room is too bright because that will wake me up.
Yeah, I started using it recently. Both things, both sleeping mask and earbuds. AirPods thing for sleeping. As I said, Ozlo and QuietOn. By the way, I have no participation, no investment in any of these companies that I’m mentioning. I just use their products, and they’re pretty cool.
I bought the Ozlo for my wife.
It took me a while to get used to the Ozlo. It’s a bit quirky also on how it activates, in particular on the iPhone. But it’s been life-changing for me. I really do sleep better with those devices on. I don’t take pills unless I’ll indulge in the odd one NyQuil pill if I’m coming to a cold and take the leverage of that and sleep very nicely that evening. But I try to avoid pills as much as I can, and I can’t sleep on planes anyway, so I just avoid it altogether.
Electronics, I used to carry a lot. I used to carry like three phones, switch phones on the road. I had different numbers for different countries I was in particular when I was in Asia. That is no longer true. I fly with one phone now, normally, unless I go to Portugal where I have my local phone as well and local numbers. I normally travel with that.
As you guys probably remember, I collect phones, so I just need to select what’s the phone I’m going to take this time around. But USB-C changes for Europe have changed everything for us. We have to thank the European Commission for that because now everything’s USB-C C really. Even the iPhone. Easy to travel with that. I travel with a Fire Stick right now, an Amazon Fire Stick, also very recently just to go on watch whatever things I have and not have to log in every time, and then clear out every time and all that stuff. To stream from the room, particularly for domestic flights, to be honest. Then I have my laptop with me typically, which is a MacBook Pro.
I, some point considered flying for shorter trips just with my iPad Air. I think that’s the last I have, and I somehow don’t quite do it well. I think I need to improve on that. I still have to fly with my laptop. I stopped taking my iPad Air because it’s just added to it. I do fly with my Kindle. I’m not sure which generation I have anymore, but it’s one of these basic Kindles.
Then I have a bunch of plug adapters because you fly all around the world. I have two nice plug adapters per bag that I have just in case I need to switch stuff in. What else do I have? Then AirPods, I have pros just obviously got the latest version, the Pro 3s, but they haven’t arrived yet. But I had the Pro 2s. If I’m flying with an Android device, I’ll bring in one of the Android earbuds that I have, or EarPods that I have for Android. I have a setup that works for me. I’ve just travel with the same stuff all the time.
If I have a rental car, I also have a setup for that. In the US, I’ve travelled with a radar detector. Radar detectors are legal in all, but I think three states in the US, so I travel with that. Not that I go over to the speed limit just to be clear. I just want to know if there’s police. Then as I said, I have the Fire Stick, I have my Fast Track which I use for California if I’m flying between places in California. I think that’s about it. Just the cables to connect devices and all that stuff to the car, et cetera.
For me, I’m a gadget freak, so I usually travel with a lot of gadgets. I used to travel with my Galaxy Book Ultra and a Galaxy S9 tablet ultra as well, 16-inch laptop, 15-inch tablet. At some point I was feeling it’s too much, so I actually combined them both in a new Surface Pro 11. Went back to Dede with a Surface Pro. I must say this one is amazing because it’s an intel one Lunar Lake. It has huge battery life, and it truly works as a laptop or tablet all in one. It was definitely space-saving to use that. I will use typically Logitech MX Anywhere 3S travel mouse with it. That works really well as a combo.
I bring my Samsung Z Fold 7 with me as a phone. One thing that I really enjoy doing now is my XREAL One Pro glasses. I don’t know if you try this augmented reality glasses, but it used to be crap. At some point it became okay. Now I must say it’s great. It’s your home cinema replacement, and it’s very amazing in the plane, in your hotel room. Now, if I want my big screen to watch a movie, TV show something and be really disconnected, it’s that plus your headset. You don’t need a headset if it’s not noisy. It has its own sound system. But if you use a headset, if you’re in a plane, for instance, it’s just amazing. For me, it’s totally game-changer. If I’m travelling, I don’t watch movies or stuff like this without using my One Pro. That’s one. I would bring the Nintendo Switch 2 now. I must say that now that they finally made a new one.
Just to be clear, you use the XREAL just for consuming content?
Yes. From my perspective, it’s useless to work. At some point it becomes painful on your head, especially if you are standing straight, like walking. But if you are lounging, it’s very comfortable, or lying on the bed, it’s very comfortable. But that’s not a way to work typically. It’s pure entertainment for my use case. I don’t know how anyone will seriously work with that for 3, 4 hours, but for 30 minutes to 2 hours of movies, it’s just amazing.
For me, it’s very interesting because I also have an Apple Vision Pro that I barely use, while I actually use the IZI One Pro. They finally nailed a real good use case. I think the Nintendo Switch 2 is great as a form factor. Finally, 8 inch, very thin, very light. In your backpack it’s not too much. What else? Typically, I would have an E-reader with me. Seven, 8 inch depending, in black and white of colour. What else? I just moved to Bose QuietComfort Ultra second-gen headphone. What I like with Bose versus other options is that it’s very comfortable which I care about if I’m in a long flight, and two. The box is very small. I think it’s the smallest box you can get for a decent headset.
In my backpack, there is only so much space once you have your computer, your console, your One Pro and stuff. At some point space is tight. That’s very important for me. Comfort and a small case. Typically, I will also have some other earbuds, some that are close, some that are open, depending on the situation, because these ones are very small; they are just in your pocket, very convenient. I have a Technics EAH-AZ100 for the closed one, and I have some new SHOKZ that are actually very good. I’ve been very impressed that you can use for sports, or if you just don’t want to isolate yourself, the open dots one. Very good.
I’ll obviously bring some devices with me if I need that are a little bit more specialised along the way. There’s only one game that I systematically play, and it’s on mobile. I’ll bring in a nice gaming device out of the collection, and that’s the game I’ll bring with me that would have hopefully a good battery life as well. Something that’s a little bit more of a compromised device that does both good gaming, good pictures, because obviously I’m on the road, so I’d love to take pictures of what I’m doing and where I’m at, even if it’s business trip, but that becomes my all in device to a certain extent, and then the MacBook Pro is the rest of it.
Then the Fire Stick adds the extension to the TV, which I think is valuable in particular if it’s domestic flights and domestic travelling in the US. I think over the years I just simplified my stack dramatically on travelling. I remember I was always stopped at ISRO and Frankfurt and whatever. They’re like, “Your backpack is like…” They had many questions about my back.
Let’s just say that like, “What is this? Why are there cables here and cables there, and five devices” and whatever. I think over the years I just curated, curated, curated and got to a point where I’m like, actually, “I don’t need to travel with that much stuff.”
But a lot of intriguing stuff from your side. The XREAL thing in particular, in terms of that experience, and how do you have a great content viewing experience in particular, for flights now? Because if we are thinking through a lot of airlines, even on domestic flights, you don’t have screens in some flights any more. You have to use your phone, and it’s a pain in the neck to get your laptop out, et cetera.
I used to use a tablet for this honestly, in the past, but now I charge the movies on my phone and I watch from my phone using the One Pro. It’s just amazing. Maybe some other stuff is the power adapter. I used to bring a lot of power adapters, but I have just two-power adapter. I have a 65-watt one that is small, tiny that I would use in the plane typically. I have a bigger one, 100-watt. What’s nice with them is that they have typically three or four outputs. Two or three USB-C and one USB-A. Basically, I reduce dramatically how many adapters I need. That, for me, is very convenient.
Typically, I like to have at least two because sometimes in hotel rooms and stuff location might not be great, so you have to optimise differently. Brings you some convenience. And they are lighter than before as well. That’s another thing. If you pick the right ones, it’s a big benefit, and typically, I will have a small power bank, something that I can recharge my phone from. A power bank can be convenient in some situations. This one depends more where I’m travelling.
I carry power banks on my two backpacks, so I just leave one wherever, and it’s always charged, and I just take them with me. Not huge ones, to your point. I think the only huge power bank that I have that is still TSA approved, so I could still fly with it, I think, at the limit. I forget what the limit was, but I just checked the other day because I had to fly with it, and it was at the limit, but it’s for my racing.
Sometimes funky stuff happens to cars and their connection for power to my Garmin Catalyst device. I need my Garmin Catalyst device to work for a variety of reasons including, for racing. You actually have to have a front-view camera that needs to be active and recording in races for issues that may come up with stewards, et cetera, et cetera. The Catalyst needs to be working. I bring in a big ass battery pack in case, for some reason, the car’s lighter is not working because I race Spec Miatas, so the connectivity is not always great. Otherwise, I fly like you with smaller power banks that would cover me for a day. Extra charge for a day, right?
It’s more one or two extra charge for the phone, and usually you find a way to charge it. It’s more peace of mind in that weird situation where there was an issue with your charging port, that sort of stuff.
Mobile and setup. I have to be honest, I was a Google Fi early adopter. My first number actually in the US was a Google FI number, so I chose it.
The P player of Google Fi, it was a Google Voice number, and then I got Google Fi, and the Google Fi was super useful because they used to have this package that was amazing for you to travel internationally, that you’d pay very little for roaming. At some point, they got wise about it, and they started doing this funky thing, actually not very cool, which was to say “Oh, we’re going to suspend your international access.” I’m like, “Why? I’ve been using it, I’ve been paying for it, so why can’t I use it?” They’re like, “Oh, you’re not using it nationally, so we won’t allow you to use it internationally.” They did this to a bunch of people, so I don’t use my Google Fi to be honest, much any more. AT&T now has the daily passport thing, which is expensive-ish.
Maybe it’s $10 per device or $12 now, I think it may have gone up, I’m not sure, but it’s limited to 10 days, I think. In 1 month, 10 days and after that you don’t pay more. It’s a 120-day cap thing. I think it’s now $120.
It’s $10 per line, but I think there’s also a limit. It’s up to two line after that it’s okay. Since I started using that because it gives you unlimited data wherever you are I just stop bothering optimising. I’m just, “Okay, I’m going to pay.”
There’s no point to optimise.
It’s $10, and if it was 20 whatever, but it’s unlimited, so you just don’t care.
I keep my Portuguese number just for more honestly historic reasons. I guess fondness of it. I don’t need it either. It’s just honestly with the Daily Passport things and whatever with AT&T it’s like it’s fine, it’s easy, it’s not super cheap but as you said it’s unlimited, so it’s like you’re just running as if you’re in your own country, and it works well instead of optimising for all these different apps that you have out there that will provision eSIMs and do all these kinds of things I’m like it’s fine, I’m happy with my setup.
I don’t have a VPN service. I used to get VPN through Google One, then they stopped the service. I’d used TunnelBear for many years, which was pretty good. I used a bunch of VPN services in China that I shall not name. Recently, I haven’t really used anything. I haven’t found a significant need to know to use it. I have a phone that has an embedded service, the Punkt. There’s a Punkt. MC, I think it’s the MC03, one of my phones that has an embedded, for privacy reasons, an embedded VPN service for Asia, I think it’s Japan, Germany and US. I think it’s something like that.
I haven’t found a great use for it. If I’m in Europe or if I’m in the Middle East, having access to Netflix US or whatever, cool. I haven’t found huge amounts. I don’t have much time to consume content normally when I’m on the road anyway, so I haven’t found a use case for it.
I just started to subscribe to Mullvad VPN, very, very privacy-focused VPN. For me, some security, some safety, as you say, some access back to the US. I must say there’s a new product I started using called Tailscale, and this one is more your own VPN between your own machines. It’s very, very interesting product, and this one, so it has benefit if you have computers in the cloud, if you have a home network, and you want to access from anywhere, that’s very, very convenient. Tailscale is based on WireGuard. Again, it’s not your typical VPN service. It’s more for your own VPN between your own machines.
Anyway, no VPN for me right now. Maybe I’ll adopt Mullvad as well, because Bertrand is doing that, and I trust Bertrand. Maybe not, we’ll see. Other accessories that I carry around? I don’t think I have much stuff that I carry around. Obviously, I optimise for clothes, travelling light like yourself, Bertrand, as we discussed, I’ve probably curated a little bit more my electronics setup in the last few years.
Is there anything else I carry with me? I already mentioned all these funky things like the radar detector for US and whatever, which is a little bit weird. I know, guys. That’s about it. I don’t think I have much stuff.
I have a little see-through bag I forgot about. I bought on Amazon at some point. That’s very nice looking, and it’s hard-to-see-through bag, so that I don’t need to get all these. I used to have to get all these little baggies and stuff, and I’d normally get them at the airports actually, to carry my liquids, and now I just have the see-through one that I bought a few, and I’m on my second one. I’m about to get my third.
I think that’s the only thing. Then I have obviously one bag that carries all my electronic stuff for hygiene, like your electric toothbrush, all the stuff you need for your hygiene. Carrying another one.
I have one hygiene bag and I have two small electronics bags. For the chargers, cables, adapters, which takes some space and weight, I must say.
It’s definitely not neutral.
I know this is going to sound really paranoid. I started doing something, maybe, I don’t know, maybe 2, 3 years ago. I don’t know why I started carrying. Obviously, in the US, domestic flights, you can carry your real ID, driver’s licence, so you don’t need to carry passports. Some of you might know I’m a dual citizen, and so I actually carry both my passports with me now, even on domestic travelling. People are like, why? I was like, I don’t know, why not?
I don’t know where I’m going next. In principle, I’m going back home. I think some of the incidents of the last few weeks in the US, travelling abroad in particular and coming back and all that stuff. I’m like, “It’s not a bad idea to carry our passports with you both.” Anyway, it served me really well at some point. This was on an international flying. I was flying around, and I was going to all these countries that the US visa waiver with. I was doing the round the world trip.
We were talking about around the world trip, and I had to go through Istanbul, and I was actually having a couple of meetings in Istanbul. I went to the immigration officer with my American passport, and he looks at the passport like, “Where’s your visa?” You can get, I think, a visa on arrival or something, but where’s your visa? The guy turns to me, he’s like, “Do you happen to have another passport?” That’s a random question. He’s like, “Yeah, I have another passport. Would this one work?” Which was my Portuguese passport, and he’s like, “Yeah, your Portuguese passport works.” I entered with my Portuguese passport into Istanbul. No visa needed, whatever. Fine. Good.
That’s a bad surprise if you forgot to pick up the visa.
That was good. I don’t think that’s when it started. I think I’ve been doing it for a while. Even when I fly domestic, which again, I wouldn’t need my passports when I fly domestic, but I fly with my passports.
Usually, there is some benefit because you never know if there is some urgent travel that you need to do. You want to fly directly from where you are. If you don’t have your passport with you, you are stuck potentially. I think there is value.
Maybe it was the COVID thing. If you remember, we started having all these travel bans with COVID early on. I guess I got a bit jittery as well. I don’t know. Maybe that was the thing that started. Cool stuff. Then credit cards. I have my usual credit cards. Sometimes, if I go to countries that I spend more time in, like Portugal, I will bring some of my local cards with me. I’ll have a different wallet for that. I have these flip wallets that have a limited number of cards. You can carry like eight or something, and then you have stuff on the side, so I don’t have like a proper wallet any more.
I’ll just switch. Like if I go to Portugal, I have a couple of cards that I only use for Portugal, et cetera. Otherwise, that’s it, and then most of the stuff now is on the mobile phone anyway. I do have to say, sometimes I will either print or get a printed version of my boarding pass. I guess that makes me a bit old somehow. It’s like the ads. You’re becoming like your parents. I just like to have the physical boarding pass in case. Honestly, I carry everything on my phone, so normally it’s not a big deal.
I think that the benefit of the phone, I see the phone as a backup. That’s true. That, for instance, I have all my cards on my phone as well. In case I lose my wallet, I have my phone and vice versa. I have a Ridge wallet, like you said, something where you can put maybe eight cards in it, and that’s it. I like it because it’s the smallest wallet you can get. For me, that’s very efficient. Initially, I was like accept to have a wallet like this. It was a gap versus a traditional wallet, but it’s so much better for me. I never went back to a regular wallet. I must say. I’m not an optimiser on the credit card, but maybe I should. That’s one thing. Maybe I should optimise more. I don’t have an American Express, for instance, so I never bother.
I have an American Express, but that means that when I travel international, I have to make sure that at least I have a debit card, for example, Visa or MasterCard, because a lot of countries don’t support much American Express.
That was my issue with American Express: Is that you cannot use it everywhere. That’s why I didn’t bother. Having a second one as backup could make some sense in case there is some whatever issue. One last piece of tech, I have a Yubico Key now. Basically, it’s in case I lose my phone. I would be truly in trouble for authentication on a lot of service. With my Yubico Key, it’s a backup, basically. I can authenticate to any service without my phone. For me, that’s an important backup when I travel.
I have a Ridge wallet as well, but I have a bunch of wallets, and the Ridge is probably the one I use the least and then the one I like the most. Probably it’s a similar format to the ones that pop up, that you have the little button that pops up the cards. It’s a Porsche design wallet, so I quite like it, and it has a little bit of space where you could put a little. Some bills if you’re in some country where you need a little bit of cash, not it doesn’t carry too many, to be very honest. I like that. That’s basically it.
For a nerd, I think I’ve simplified my setup a lot. I used to travel with my own cameras and whatever for the video calls, et cetera. Now, the MacBook Pro has such a good quality camera, and then your phone is such a great quality camera. Why would I do that? I’ve simplified it greatly.
There are questions. If you want a bit better camera, if you want a bit better mic, that’s the one from your headset. I’m the same; I’m trying to simplify. As long as the camera quality is good enough when you are travelling. It really depends. If you had to do a proper professional recording, obviously, you will travel with some other stuff, but if you don’t, I would try to keep it easy. I have a Fujifilm Camera that I use if I travel for vacation. If I have this one, it can double as an exceptional webcam, so I can do that if I want. Typically, I don’t have to mix too much of the two, and it’s usually not really that necessary.
I hope you had a good episode with us. Nothing was sponsored, to be clear. It’s just our personal preference over the years. Travelling in terms of airlines, airports, lounges, fidelity programs, luggage, electronics. What do we do to simplify our life? Build our home away from home when we are travelling, and I think when we travel quite a bit, it’s really nice to have one on one side or all the stuff you need to feel like at home, and at the same time what I think is nice is to try to keep some consistency. Always travel more or less with the same stuff. Make gradual change if needed, but have some routine that makes your travel easier and safer. Thank you, Nuno.
