One of my many gripes with Bangalore’s Airport in Devanahalli, apart from the distance, has been the lack of a lounge for the longest time for Jet Airways elites. Hey, they used to give you food coupons to eat in the Food Court, not appreciating that the lounge was not about the food but about the environment. This got fixed last year when Kingfisher evacuated from Bangalore Airport, and this place was made the Pause Lounge, accessible via select credit cards and for 9W elites & Business class travellers.

I haven’t been able to sample this lounge for my few trips to Bangalore all this year, so this was my first time when I actually built in time into my schedule (read schedule a late departure), to be able to check out the lounge for once.  I arrived on a busy evening with about 45 minutes extra to be able to check out the lounge. The lounge sits behind the vast area taken over by Shoppers Stop airside. It is still in the red colors, perhaps thanks to the legacy left behind by the Kingfisher team.

Access is via a Lounge Coupon issued by Jet Airways, or you could try your Visa Signature/Infinite card for access as well. The lounge is about a 50-seater, my guess, but it was full the day I went there, because of the large bank of evening flights that would be departing over the next few hours.

Here are a few pictures of the Lounge seating:

There was also a large workstation area, with about 5 iMacs at the disposal of the passengers

Since there was a while to my flight, and I’d been surviving on liquid diet (read water) most of the day, I thought it’d be a good idea to eat something. I went around surveying their offerings, and there were sandwiches & pasta salads on offer, apart from South Indian snacks such as Idlis and meal stuff such as Pulav (Rice). There was also soup and soft drinks available complimentary. Also, there was a sweet of the day, which I did not try out.

I helped myself to some of this stuff, and I must accept the idlis and rice were pretty good. The sandwiches were bleh and a little crumby, but then that is how they are all over, right?

The one other good thing about the place was that in spite of the traffic the place witnessed, plates were being cleared and water being replaced all over the place at super quick speeds, so hats off to the waiting staff for that.

Overall, a good experience to kill time as compared to some of the other contract lounges I’ve been to.

Related Posts:

• Get Lounge Access with Visa Cards in India (2013 edition)

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