Originally Posted by
Bondiboy
I think that using your miles for a low season roundtrip on AA to enither ATH os IST, and then buying a ticket for your onward journey to Cairo is an excellent plan. Not only is it a smart use of your miles, it gives you an opportunity to visit another country or two.
Personally, I would recommend that you make IST your first destination and that you consider a stopover somewhere in Europe depending upon your carrier. There are great connections between IST and CAI.
I would forget Cyprus (LCA) as the times of arrival and departure are usually at the most inconvenient of times and compared to (say) IST, it is rather a boring destination (not to mention expensive) for a short stopover.
Thanks for the input. I am glad some others see some wisdom in what I am proposing. Bondiboy, this was along the lines that I was thinking. While we want to use up some miles we want to use our miles wisely.
Cyprus sounds like an interesting place to go, but does not seem the most practical.
Given a choice it seems like Athens of Istanbul would seem the easiest destination to go via miles and then the cheapest to find a flight onward. (Any other ideas?) At this point it seems like I have one vote for Greece and one for Turkey. I am thinking that Turkey might be a cheaper place to lay over for a couple days and provide some easy sightseeing.
What are the "cons" for a layover in Athens?