April 2024 was supposed to be my Auckland-Cairns Spontaneous Escapes much awaited trip. But a sudden change of plans led me to this instead. Auckland-Cairns will have to wait. Ah wells

Amidst the hectic replanning 5 days prior to my originally scheduled departure to Auckland (and I never want to experience that again), my emotions were buffered by the fact that the ancient city of Xi’an was actually on my list to check off for 2025 as I was stalking the relatively new Ritz Carlton for a while and of course the famous Terracotta Warriors being the former Chinese Studies major that I am (hah).

Now that I am safely back home, I realized that the trip shaped up to be a little busier than what I’d preferred due to the flight timing and routings (not that I had much choice).

FLIGHTS

I flew into and out of Beijing on SQ and revisited the A350 Regional Business Class which is always a pleasure.

To get to Xi-an from Beijing, I tried Air China for the very first time on Economy on its Boeing 737-700. Not sure why Air China don’t have pics of its fleet on the website so please enjoy this erm description of the food.

On my way back from Xi-an to Beijing, I was initially booked on a Air China economy ticket but that flight ended up being cancelled due to weather (which turned out to be sandstorm related) and so my 2hr flight turned into a 4hr high speed train ride to Beijing West Railway Station + 1 hr car ride to Beijing Capital Airport. What an adventure – but I did make the best use of it!

AIRPORT LOUNGES

In Changi, T3 SilverKris was obviously my choice but that has been widely reviewed so I’d skip that. Onwards to Beijing Capital Airport, I was able to access Air China Business lounges either as a KFEG benefit or as a SQ J passenger. And apparently, the official site decided to make the pics a mystery.

PRIORITY PASS EXPERIENCE

For PP non-lounge experiences, I decided to try to zip through whatever I can at the various airports (The Kitchen by Wolfgang Puck in Changi Airport T3 + some sort of Comfort Zone thingy for massages at Beijing Capital) and it was not too bad!.

HOTELS

My hotels for this trip will start in ascending order of prices – not intentional!

Qiuguo S Hotel (Beijing Capital Airport Second Branch)

Due to my ungodly flight timings, I had a 6hour layover in Beijing Capital Airport and because I had to clear immigration and recheck in, I found this property which doesn’t seem to have a website of its own. However, the pics I saw on Tripadvisor was decent, plus it has an airport shuttle on demand all for under SGD$100 so that worked for me.

JW Marriott Xi’an (website)

This property is just 1-year old and while I could not find much dedicated reviews except on TripAdvisor, it was located right next to a mall which will do for shopping and stuff. Plus, it’s not often you get a JW at less than SGD150 a night right?

The Ritz Carlton Xi’an (website)

This was 50% of the reason why I picked the city. A new RC Club Lounge experience at SGD$350ish is pretty hard to say no to!

********************************

Final Itenary:

• Singapore Airlines SQ806 Singapore to Beijing – Business
• Qiuguo S Hotel (Beijing Capital Airport Second Branch)
• Air China Lounge (domestic departure), Beijing Capital Airport
• Air China CA1289 Beijing to Xi’an – Economy
• JW Marriott Xi’an
• Ritz Carlton Xi’an
• High Speed Train G58 Xi-an to Beijing – Business Class
• Comfort Zone, Beijing Capital Airport
• Air China Lounge (international departure), Beijing Capital Airport
• Singapore Airlines SQ801 Beijing to Singapore – Business

LET DO THIS! 🙂