Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan - best use of miles for dream trip

I'm about a year away from finally being free of obligations before going and looking for a job. (finishing a phd and will probably then end up making 5X what i do now...)

I've got MVP status (and will have it next year), ~160k AS miles, available time and funds (though I travel on a budget ie couch surfing/camping/etc). What would be the best use of all this, maximizing open jaw/stopover/upgrade/etc to see the world. I've done most of europe, would like to go back to australia, go to NZ, go to the "far east", africa, etc. If I use stopovers and then a paid RT ticket to another place that's cool too.

Am thinking something like, if possible, BA first for award seats, to sydney via LHR/SIN, then bum around east coast australia & NZ, then stopover in SIN or bangkok & bum around, then stopover in LHR and bum around (maybe then use paid RT ticket to africa(kenya?)?) then back to seattle/wherever.

I only suggest BA first because it sounds like quite the experience - though quite in contrast with the way i'd do everything on the ground. Am not above sitting in coach if it means I'll get to somewhere cool.

Thoughts, suggestions, comments? I'm not necessarily looking for what to do when I'm there, but want to hit as much as I can, maximizing the value of the miles that I have to burn. I wouldn't flinch at this taking a year...

I'd suggest either BA first, or CX First.

The cool thing about CX is that they have the Hong Kong based awards, so you can take a stopover in Hong Kong and then do a separate award to somewhere else.

Or you could look into their All Asia Pass (http://www.cathayusa.com/offers/AllAsiaPass/offer.asp) to add on to the existing award. I'm not sure if they do one without the North American segments..but certainly worth checking into.

Personally I was blown away by Club World on BA, I can only imagine what the experience in First would be like.

Thailand would be a great place to travel on miles... it's a pretty cheap country to travel in (especially outside of Bangkok) and it's absolutely beautiful to boot. The most expensive part of the trip is airfare, and you've already got that covered w/ miles on CX.

Looking at the likelihood of actually finding the award, I would go with BA FIRST, the CX awards in first have historically been tough to get and with the new first class configuration coming on line with even fewer seats it will likely be more difficult (read non-existent). I have heard there are very good ex-BKK fares, both regional and RTW tickets, and the BA FIRST tickets are pretty easy to come by.

One thing to remember is you are only allowed one open jaw OR stop over on award tickets. So you will only be able to do a layover in LHR, BKK or SIN. You may be able to get a one day forced layover in LHR on the way there or back, but not enough time to go anywhere.

[QUOTE=doog;8424614]Personally I was blown away by Club World on BA, I can only imagine what the experience in First would be like. /QUOTE]

BA was awesome this time last year. Definitely BA for me. ^ :D ^ Food, wines, service, beds, it's all good!!!!!!

One thing to remember is you are only allowed one open jaw OR stop over on award tickets. So you will only be able to do a layover in LHR, BKK or SIN. You may be able to get a one day forced layover in LHR on the way there or back, but not enough time to go anywhere.

Good to know - that changes things..

Can one ways or RTW be done on BA w/ award tix?

Don't know if Kenya is worth a separate trip - went this summer - not impressed, esp. with Nairobi. Mombasa was better. Safari is great of course, but be prepared to pay $400/night for the lodge, cars, guides, etc. Different story if you know someone - I did not.

I'd rather spend more time in Asia.

Just don't steal my seats. I've long been planning the same trip and am (like you) now approaching (again, like you, about a year out) the ability to spend the time to do it. (I'm not getting a Ph.D, though...) I've also more or less seen all of Europe and would love to go back to Australia.

So if I find out that I can't get to SYD next October or so because you took the last seat in F, I'll be hoppin' mad!

(Seriously, have fun on the trip--it'd be a blast!)

BA or CP are both great. Just as a word of caution as you plan your trip - on a reward ticket, you can only get one additional stop-over. So you could do Australia and one more visit, but not 2.

If you are used to US first or any coach, either airlines (or even business on either one) will be an exceptional trip.

In 2005 we did the SEA-LHR-BKK-SYD flight on BA in First and then came back MEL-SIN-LHR-SEA. This was our dream trip and it was amazing. For value for your miles I don't think you can do better than this. I priced the tickets on Expedia and it showed me $26,000 each. (I know, nobody actually pays this, but it gave me a reference point.) Consider that BA First to LHR is what, 150,000 miles, but to Australia IIRC is 175,000 miles. Makes that extra 21 hours in First seem pretty worth it.

We enjoyed every minute of the journey. We were treated well by BA even though we were obviously way out of our league. They were kind and welcoming and I had several nice chats with the FAs. What a start and end to an amazing trip!

Our next big trip will be CX first / business to New Zealand. I have the miles, but now we have a cat fighting lymphoma so we won't be going on any extended trips for a while.

It always seems pretty silly to me to cash in miles for a ticket SEA-LAX or something that you could get for $200. For me, miles are meant to be used for tickets I would NEVER purchase. :D

It always seems pretty silly to me to cash in miles for a ticket SEA-LAX or something that you could get for $200. For me, miles are meant to be used for tickets I would NEVER purchase. :D

Yes! We're exactly on the same page! ^

If you do the CX trip before I plan my BA trip, let me know which one you liked better. I only have enough miles to do one (I think--with the flying I've done lately, I may end up with enough for both...)

FYI, I did the CX 1st product trans-pac to Hong Kong from SFO 2 years ago. IMO, they are comparable. The IFE for CX was superior at the time (AVOD), but BA has that now. Perhaps the BA FAs were slightly more apparent (which I find slightly annoying, being of the "Please leave me alone" mentality, but I can appreciate as a class of service), but no great differences. The one major difference is - where do you want to transit through HKG or LHR. For a transit, HKG is far superior. If you want to have a layover, then it's a question of personal taste.

In 2005 we did the SEA-LHR-BKK-SYD flight on BA in First and then came back MEL-SIN-LHR-SEA. This was our dream trip and it was amazing. For value for your miles I don't think you can do better than this.

Going to Australia the long way in BA First Class would be my choice. I also think you will find better availability than CX.

brarrr, you are going to absolutely LOVE Autralia and New Zealand. Be sure to give yourself enough time in each. I could've spent 2 weeks in SYD alone, it was so nice. SYD, MEL, BNE, and CNS are all worth a visit, and you might even want to try PER, ADL (if you're into wines) in Australia.

In NZ, the new Westin AKL is worth the trip alone, Also in NZ, WLG, ZQN, CHC would be fun add-ons.

My inclination would be to use miles to get to places where the purchased price in a premium cabin would be prohibitive, and/or where it'd be unlikely you'd travel in the course of most years, due to the time and distance involved. Europe is available fairly easily on paid or upgraded itineraries, while places like Oz/NZ or especially Africa are not easy to access comfortably from North America.

I personally would look at the CX J award NA <> Africa myself - for 125K miles it's a heck of a deal, as it would likely involve CX's new J product for the transpac by the time you travel (which is probably the equivalent of most other carriers' F) and you'd get a twofer out of it - HKG (from which a stopover could be used for visits to China or other south Asian places) and South Africa. That's a lot of the world for 125K miles (I'd recommend J because CX's F service HKG-JNB is seasonal and you might end up with no F offered on that long sector.)

Maybe LHR T5 will be the salvation of BA, but it's going to take some doing to convince me that any optional travel through LHR is a good idea.

FWIW, though, I still think the LA J award to deep South America is the best bargain in the AS award universe.

Gardyloo, how does the CX N America - Africa award route?

I assume (NA Gateway - JFK/YYZ/YVR/SFO/LAX)-HKG-JNB.

Brarrr,

We are going IAD-LHR-BKK & return in First on BA using Alaska Air miles. Our trip is next April and I booked back in June. I would start looking now for availability. I agree with using miles for a ticket that you would never purchase. Our fare priced out at $16,000 each. Hey if you want to fly BA go to Qantas & sign up as a FF member. You can then use their award system to see what seats BA has available in all classes. I used it, found my dates and then called Alaska Air. I told the lady what date & flight numbers and she confirmed while I was on the phone. Much easier than calling everyday to see if seats are available.