Originally Posted by
mumoko
As suggested, main destinations aimed in this trip are S. America and South Pacific, and possibly a couple of Central American countries with an open jaw between Mexico and Bogotá/Caracas. Does the OneWorld Circle Pacific fare allow for international open jaw or only for domestics?
If you allow me, a couple of fine-tunning questions:
1) Is a possible flight between Santiago - Mount Pleasant - Santiago - considered a case of backtracking or is permissible under fare rules?
2) Let's say in next 5-6 months is it to be expected that Star Alliance will rival OneWorld Circle Pacific fare by including Continental Micronesia flights into Star Alliance Circle Pacific fare or OneWorld will remain the best option to combine S.America and the Pacific?
Rules:
http://www.oneworld.com/content/libr...rule_sheet.pdf
The rules don't differentiate between international and domestic open jaws.
The rules allow up to 3 transfers in a city. Therefore it is possible to do two return trips from SCL (eg IPC and MPN). I cannot see any rule that prevents a backtrack return. You just have to find an agent that will ticket your proposal - if one airline won't do it, try another!
I think, though, that you will run out of miles rather than be excluded by the rules. The SCL-MPN round trip will eat 2830 miles - and that flight is only once a week. If an Antarctic tour group books onto that flight, it will be be completely full (speaking from experience).
An alternate if MPN is too far on the xCIRC29 is to redeem miles for the flight SCL-MPN-SCL. Its all economy class. Take food as the snacks on board are truely dreadful if you are hungry.
As for Q2, I wouldn't hold off assuming something will happen. Anything can happen with these fares - price rises, new rules - anything.