Since you're thinking of using miles in lieu of revenue tickets, it may be worth noting that BA miles are sometimes very good value on partner arilines. I've booked F seats on CX from North America to Asia for 75k BA miles plus a few dollars for taxes (and not the many hundreds of dollars of taxes and fuel charges that they charge for travel on BA), and they allow an enroute stopover for free. They also charge only 80K for RT travel from NA to Easter Island on LAN's excellent J, and allow 2 free stopovers for RTs. I consider both of those to be very good value.