Originally Posted by
Thunderroad
You can use AA miles on Qantas, but it can be tough since Qantas opens up award seats to its own FF members about a year in advance and they can be gone by the time the AA 330 day window opens up. Still, worth a try.
On Star Alliance, the most direct way to get to Australia is on UA, but other options such as NZ are good.
If you don't mind going out of your way and probably shelling out extra AA miles, Cathay is great in business class and even more superb in first, and often has availability far in advance and sometimes even close in to a trip. And Hong Kong could make a great stopover.
I wouldn;t mind doing hk also. So it would be using AA miles from sfo-hkg-Aus?
What would be the total redemption there? I don't think AA allow free layover and sfo-hkg is 135k in F.. from hkg to Aus is like another 80-00k in F id imagine.
Not sure I want to spend that much if no necessary though. It'll be a family of 4, so trying to minimize miles but maximize experience
