Brian/38/FRA/Mainz
Flyertalk shows up in Google a lot when I am searching for the answers to obscure questions. After reading a few posts every few months, I finally felt called to write some advice myself recently, which required registering, and then I discovered the roll call while browsing the forum, so here I am.
I live about 25 km (15 mi) west of the Frankfurt airport. My most frequent route is FRA-ORD, as my parents live in CMI. In the 1990s, when I was a grad student in PHL with a German bf, I got enough miles with BA Executive Club to get a free transatlantic trip, but stopped collecting there after that. 2002 I started with Lufthansa Miles and More, but due to their mile expiration rules (not as good as US programs), no longer really try at Star Alliance anymore. 2004 Swiss was offering a much better fare trans-Atlantic, but I had wised up to the US-partner-airline idea and started with AAdvantage (this was before they moved to Star Alliance), and about the same time AA displaced UA as offering the better FRA-ORD deals, and my parents asked me to figure out a way to get rid of their AAdvantage miles (ca. 50k each), which I used for transatlantic upgrades twice for me and my bf. Still haven't made elite status (2007 I was just about 2000 miles short and considered a year-end mileage run, but that conflicted with holiday blackouts for discounted fares) anywhere ever, but I guess the fact that I am considering mileage runs, even if not taking them, means I should sign up for this forum, right?
The SkyMiles is a recent result of a LAX-LMM/CUU-GDL-PVR trip, where I booked the "outbound" on Delta Connection and the "return" on AeroMexico, then Delta cancelled the first and put me on AM LAX-HMO-LMM, charged $75 extra, and gave me a $75 voucher for a future Delta trip. I figured I might as well get some miles for all that as well, and have just spent the voucher for an upcoming DL flight FRA-JFK-FLL/FLL-ATL-FRA in February. We'll see if the mileage program amounts to anything for me.