I had some great help planning an itinerary for a a ~35-40 day trip in SE Asia this summer over in the BT forum, and I was hoping to come here for some advice on using points and/or miles to experience first class on a leg of my trip.

I'm going to be leaving from LAX on August 3, and flying into HND for a week long stopover before going into BKK. I was planning on traveling around and potentially using an open jaw from SYD to visit a friend or SIN where some other friends live. Both options are only about $950-1050, but it seems like it would be about 100k United miles for economy if I book round trip. From everything I've learned from lurking up here, that just doesn't seem worth it.

However, a one way first class award from SYD in September around the 8th shows up for around 80k, and having never experienced first class, I started thinking that this would be a cool experience. Ideally, I would also love a stopover in another place that's not SE Asia or HNL, even if it's only for a few days but that doesn't seem possible.

Right now I have around:
Chase UR 45k, 12k AMEX MR, 20k AA, and just hit the spend for the 30k United MP (also have about 3k MP). I also am willing to apply for new rewards cards and will gather about 5-10k UR points from normal spending in the next two months or so.

From what I can tell, BA would cost too many miles, although a stop in London would be great, as would Singapore Airlines. I recently learned that I might have been able to use Alaska miles to travel CP, but im not sure on how worth it it would be to take out two additional cards for the miles if i can just use my current stash to fly United first class. I guess having never experienced first class flying but having talked to friends, some have made me think that it may not be worth using the miles for United from SEA. I'm hoping that that's untrue or someone has some advice on best using my points/miles for the best experience I could receive. Thanks.