Star Alliance - 400K Miles to burn to get to AKL -- how would you do it?

My wife has just over 400K miles in her UA account, and we're trying to figure out a good way to take a special vacation to New Zealand (probably arrive/depart AKL).

We want to get an F award, and (hopefully without igniting a total flame war) we're not sure we want to fly on UA itself. We're not sure that the UA F product is as good as some of the other *A carriers.

Dates are still tentative, but maybe Nov/Dec/Jan/Feb. We live in SFO.

So curious to get ideas.... how would you route this? Who would you fly? A stopover in somewhere neat on the way or way back might be cool too.

My wife has just over 400K miles in her UA account, and we're trying to figure out a good way to take a special vacation to New Zealand (probably arrive/depart AKL).

We want to get an F award, and (hopefully without igniting a total flame war) we're not sure we want to fly on UA itself. We're not sure that the UA F product is as good as some of the other *A partners.

Dates are still tentative, but maybe Nov/Dec/Jan/Feb. We live in SFO.

So curious to get ideas.... how would you route this? Who would you fly? A stopover in somewhere neat on the way or way back might be cool too.

NZ does not have F. I would fly to Sydney thru Asia on NH/OZ/TG in F & then get a NZ flight in C to AKL. W that many miles you can stop in someplace like BKK & make SYD your final destination Then get a seperate tkt on NZ from SYD-AKL in C. You can do that all for aprx 400K

Another option would be flying to HKG in F & C on OZ/NH, stopping in HKG & then NZ non stop to AKL in C.

stopping in HKG & then NZ non stop to AKL in C.

For two years, I havent seen that flight in anything but Y.

Flew AKL-BKK-ICN on crappy Thai C this summer because it was the only option , another option is SQ to SYD (on the flights with regional C). CA's new C also looks good.

You can also get down to Australia on TG F or CA F

Since I've booked this flight I'd be happy to let you know the routing I'm taking

US-NRT-BKK-SYD-AKL-SYD-BKK-ICN-US

I booked this as an F award but as I'm travelling alone, I don't know if its possible to get 2 F tickets on this route. Here is the breakdown of the planes by leg:

NRT - NH 777 New F
BKK - TG A380 F
SYD - TG 747-400 F
AKL - NZ 777-200 J (I think, didn't note this plane)
SYD - NZ 767-300 J
BKK - TG 747-400 F
ICN - TG 777-300 F
USA - OZ 777-300 New F

The cost was 160k miles and less than $200. This is nowhere near the most direct route I could get (I wasn't planning far enough in advance for QF A380) but I decided to do some airplane tourism and arranged to have almost full day layovers in addition to my two destinations.

Good luck!

Since I've booked this flight I'd be happy to let you know the routing I'm taking

US-NRT-BKK-SYD-AKL-SYD-BKK-ICN-US

I booked this as an F award but as I'm travelling alone, I don't know if its possible to get 2 F tickets on this route. Here is the breakdown of the planes by leg:

NRT - NH 777 New F
BKK - TG A380 F
SYD - TG 747-400 F
AKL - NZ 777-200 J (I think, didn't note this plane)
SYD - NZ 767-300 J
BKK - TG 747-400 F
ICN - TG 777-300 F
USA - OZ 777-300 New F

The cost was 160k miles and less than $200. This is nowhere near the most direct route I could get (I wasn't planning far enough in advance for QF A380) but I decided to do some airplane tourism and arranged to have almost full day layovers in addition to my two destinations.

Good luck!
This is a really good routing. When did TG start flying the 77W from BKK to ICN? I thought it was the 772 that continues to LAX?

No idea - I haven't flown any of this route before so I just looked at plane options and then read up on the service.