MilesBuzz! - Ideas About Redeeming Miles ORD-Venice

We are planning a trip to Italy next Sept and tried to redeem my AA miles for the trip only to find out that business FF seats are gone(1 flight per day).I also have Starwood Points that I can convert to many other programs. Any suggestions on where to start? We need to get to Venice and return from Rome. I can also do a one way Rome-Venice on the way there and just book RT Chicago - Rome.

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Hotels in Venice are expensive, so you may come out better using your points for the hotel. I think Starwood has some very nice properties there.

Look into the NEW Swiss (LX). They may survive until Sept.

56k points or so buys 5 nights at the Danielli

How about British Midland (United partner).

Did you look at an AA partner award (Aer Lingus via Dublin, or BA via London using AA trans-Atlantic)? I'm going to Barcelona next summer and these look like the best options for me.

Starwood>Qantas>BA

2 business class BA tickets 80,000 Starpoints
fly ORD LHR VEN
then FCO LHR ORD
take train from VEN to FCO

5 nights @ Danielli in July 40,000 Starpoints

probably have free weekends again for more summer stays in Italy

[This message has been edited by mtacchi (edited 11-10-2002).]

Try looking at other US gateways or different European destinations. I don't know how AA works but US will fly you from your nearaest airport to the international gateway (New York, Philly, Dulles) even when the international segments are on a mileage partner.

We traveled to Italy last spring by flying to Zurich and taking the train under the Alps. This wasn't by necessity - we originally had a connecting flight to Milan but someone persuaded me that the train journey would be worth it, and with some good connections wouldn't significantly increase the travel time from waiting for the connecting flight.

If you're flexible maybe you'll find that you can get there.

PDH

You might see if you can get what you want out of JFK or similar on AA, then eat the cost of the ticket there. I had to do this out of Detroit to Europe on NW this summer, as they had no flights from Phoenix for the whole month of August http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/rolleyes.gif . I cashed in a SW ticket to get from here to DTW & back. A hassle, but it was free, and it worked!

Just an opinion, but with the low prices these days, I might consider buying the ticket and then earning the 8+ k miles you will get and using them toward a much more expensive ticket later on... say, to Hawaii, where it costs like $7-850 to fly there but only needs 35k on most airlines to go with miles. To fly to Europe, on the other hand, can be done right now for aboujt $350-$450 in every case I have seen, with a few exceptions (but I have not looked hard, just noticing things) and yet you need something like 50-60k to fly there...

just a thought.

Thank you for all of your good suggestions. I actually called back and got a more creative agent from AA to work through a number of gateway cities. We were able to get British Air Business class ORD-STL-Gatwick-Venice on the way there and for the return direct from Rome to ORD. I t pays to be persistent and work with more than one agent.

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