The ONE Time Silver Is Top Tier...

"Silver Elite"

This has been a long time coming, but as I just put over 200 miles on this shiny,  new, Audi A4 Quattro, I decided to make time.  The review at hand- "The car rental that doesn't suck." (their words, but mine as well)  This truly eloquent company is Silvercar, and yes, the internet has already sung its praises, but here's my take:

Renting from Silvercar has a certain 'Bond. James Bond.' appeal to it, as much as any reasonably priced car service can.  It's the 'Uber Black' of rentals, if you will.  No, you probably don't 'need' the horsepower or the bling to get to your airport hotel or to see the in-laws, but it sure doesn't hurt.  Plus, it feels good to roll up to 'that meeting,' or to take a client out to dinner with a little panache.

Glamour shot...

Quattro

So far, I've rented at two of their locations- SFO and ORD.  Adding to the international 'man of mystery' feel, the pick up instructions at each location are different.  Awhile ago, when I rented at SFO, it was a covert-feeling multi-step process involving a non-Silvercar marked van, a location inside an offsite general use airport parking garage, and a guy with an iphone guarding two A4s parked in a corner.  The website generally just directs you to 'text us when you've landed, and we'll give you the details' ie., 'your mission, should you choose to accept it.'  But, when the benefit of finding the place is taking one of these for a weekend in Sonoma, I'll happily accept the challenge.

Never seen a National Ex aisle look like this!

 Thankfully, the staff are uniformly polite, young, and enthusiastic.  Little surprise, given that it's the 'tech startup' of rental cars.  Today I was dropped off personally at ORD in my actual rental car, eliminating any extra stops, or transferring of luggage.  I approve.

The Pros-
 -Guaranteed silver (get it??) current year Audi A4.  Every single time.  No picked over lots, or third-in-a-goddamn-row Malibus that always pull to the right. (I'm looking at you, Hertz 'gold')
-No base models here, they're all quattro all wheel drive.
-Slick rental app.
-Cars come (mostly) fully loaded, including some nice extras like nav, wifi, working bluetooth & sirius radio.
-Car charger to USB adapter included. 
-Concierge-feeling customer service.
-Feeling elite without paying (too bad) of a price.

VERY THOUGHTFUL

The Cons:
-Severely limited locations, so it can't be your 'go-to' everywhere.
-On average, cars seem to have a decent amount of miles on them, at least in comparison to some of the very low mileage I can usually find on a well stocked National aisle.
-As they're new, and not a main line car rental, getting to their lot is a different experience at each location, and you need to be aware of the instructions before you go to pick up.
-No real elite program, or accrual of free days.
-If you need a bigger car, you'll have to go elsewhere. 

In short, I happily pick Silvercar where possible, and where they're price-compeditive.  Surprisingly, even with the premium fleet, they can meet this criteria pretty often.  The only hesitation I have is missing out on status and free day credits with National....but it passes about the time I hit 60mph!

Happy driving,

~CruisingAAltitude 

If you're going to San Francisco...

Turns out I’m kinda okay with being stuck in the fog.  And here’s why- The newly redone American terminal in SFO has about everything good that can be good about airports.  It’s airy, clean, well decorated, and much quieter than the major airports most of the time (it’s a ghost town in comparison to LAX today, and that’s with all the delayed flights).  

The Admiral’s club is new and well done, even down to the floor-to-ceiling fake pines that somehow don’t seem as tacky as they should.  Plus, yes they do have showers, and they're much nicer than mine at home.  And for delayed flights they make gate announcements.  I’m in love.  Only flaw is the view isn’t of very many active gates/taxiways/runways.  But there I’m spoiled, haven’t found one that beats LAX for that yet.

The food choices in the main terminal are great, and reflective of the city- Wine bar, organic café, sushi, etc.  And the club makes a spicy bloody mary, both the glass and I are sweating a little.  Plus, it’s given me some time to tweet with my new best friend- that being, whoever is stuck on social media duty at American’s marketing division.  I’ve been sure to keep them updated with my travel plans, and they answer dutifully.  It’s like having a private anonymous mileage run cheerleader….or a tweeting robot buddy.  Now I’m just working out how best to have a little fun with it, since whoever it is must already think I’m crazy, so why not?  However, it does look like I’ll have to head out at some point here- my standby is going to clear, so once they get us a plane, I’ll be headed back to the City of Angels.

Lost in the fog....

Sitting on the runway waiting to take my short flight up to SFO and back.  Since I got in on time from BOS and I wouldn't mind getting home a little early from this weekend's adventure, I caught an earlier flight by a few hours.  This has it's benefits and drawbacks:

Benefits- Early arrival, lunch in SFO (way better options in that terminal), and I now know, thanks to Skymall, that the 'human slingshot' exists.

Drawbacks- Gave up my priority exit row seat, not sure if the Club there has showers (I could use one), did almost an immediate connecting flight for the second time in a row.

And, though I'm not sure how it plays, the weather is deteriorating in SFO, so all the flights into there are significantly delayed.  No, San Fran doesn't get the snow storms I'm worried about in the northeast, but through a striking bit of unfortunate planning, the runway setup doesn't handle.....fog well.  Yes fog...as if no one saw that as a potential issue with this...

Especially as I don't have anywhere to be until the evening, I'm willing to go along with it and still enjoy the little things.  For instance, our pilots are doing their best to remain congenial with the already delayed passengers and have started giving a (slowly) rolling tour of the scenic LAX taxiway- 

"And for those of you on the left side of the aircraft, you will be able to see two Airbus 380s, you may have heard about them in the news.  They're...really large..."

Gold star guys, gold star.... Consider me entertained.  Now, let's get up the coast.  There's some vegetarian pho with my name on it.