After arriving in Prague from Bucharest, with more than hour to go before our scheduled connection to Paris on Czech Airlines, we decided to sneak in a little lounge time. Having already sampled the Erste Premier Lounge on the way to Bucharest, we decided to try the other Priority Pass lounge in Terminal 2, the Menzies Aviation Lounge. We only had 25-30 minutes, just enough time to grab a quick phone charge and a few drinks and snacks.
See also: Rocky’s review of the Menzies Aviation Lounge from 2013.
Date of Visit: October 30, 2015
Location: next door to the Erste Premier Lounge. After clearing security for Terminal 2, turn right towards the C and D gates, and you’ll find an elevator to the right to take you up to the second floor. After stepping off the elevator, turn right and follow the signs to the lounge.
Access: Finnair and Iberia Business Class customers; oneworld elite members; Priority Pass cardholders; and Lounge Club cardholders. Any passenger can purchase access to the lounge for a fee; I believe it was roughly 25 euros per person.
There’s really not much to say about this lounge. It’s small, tiny, even. Once you check in at the desk, you turn left down a corridor, and you’ll find two rooms, a longer room on the left featuring a food and drink selection, and this small seating area to the right.
The largest sitting area is behind the flight monitors, with couches and tables arranged in a square. Enough space to seat maybe 20-25 people. There are also a few seats available in front of the food and drink stations. Fortunately we were able to find two seats.
Speaking of food and drink selections, the food is slim pickins’. All you have are some packaged snacks and some trail mix.
The drink selection is better, though. In addition to a few miscellaneous liquor bottles and the soda machine that can be seen in the first photo above, there is a selection of Czech beer (Grambrinus Original and Pilsner Urquell), mini-bottles of red and white wine, boxed juice, and bottled water. There are also a few additional snacks here – some yogurt, along with some packaged cheese and what appeared to be pate.
There are also two Lavazza offee machines, serving both black coffee and basic espresso drinks. I didn’t try any, but I’d imagine the product is comparable to any Lavazza machine you’d find elsewhere.
I grabbed a Gambrinus and made my way to the sitting area.
Gambrinus is a good beer, but sadly, that was probably the highlight of this lounge. Because the sitting area is so small, it’s inevitably going to be crowded, and the snack selection is remarkably medicore (the circular disk of what I thought was pate was particularly dreadful). Worst was the WiFi, which was so slow to the point of being effectively useless. I ended up connecting to the network of the Erste lounge next door.
If you’re transiting through Prague, my advice would be to skip the Menzies lounge and head to the Erste Premier Lounge next door if you have a choice. If you don’t, definitely don’t plan on getting to the airport early just to come here. Perhaps my opinion might have been different if it were daytime, and I could have enjoyed the runway views as Rocky did.
This post is part of my trip report series about our trip to the Czech Republic and Romania in October. Click here for the introductory post and trip report index.
