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Old Mar 21, 2018, 12:47 pm
  #10  
Rowyourboat
 
Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: SFO
Programs: AA PP, OZ *G, Hyatt Expl, Marriott Gold, Lots of Ex-statuses
Posts: 317
See the mini-RTW guide for information on how to book a mini-RTW and how to maximize your flights.

I recently booked an F routing on Aeroplan so here's everything you need to know. These are the bookable *A carriers:
Air China
ANA
Asiana
Lufthansa
Singapore Airlines (short-haul, inter-asia basically)
Thai
United

Asiana has 3 F routes, ICN to LAX, JFK, and FRA. ICN-JFK is seasonal.
United flies everywhere but UA F isn't really worth it.
CA F has lots of routes, and I heard the hard product is pretty good.
Thai F has lots of routes from BKK to NRT, SYD, FRA, CDG, and others.
LH F has good routes from MUC/FRA to SFO/LAX/ORD/JFK/EWR/IAD/IAH/MIA/etc., but only releases 14 days before the flight departure. So you'd either have to book very close to flying, or call and upgrade later. ANA also has lots of routes, the US ones are to LAX/SFO/ORD/JFK/IAD. Pretty good availability.

So you need to decide where you want to go, and a lot of routes have a maximum permitted mileage. But generally speaking, you can get three first class flights in on any given route. A North America to Asia hope (ANA/Asiana/Air China), Asia to Europe (Thai/ANA/Asiana/Air China), and then Europe back to NA (Lufthansa). There's variations where you go from Asia to Australia on TH F, or you go for inter-asia F with Thai/SQ. Even BKK to NRT is a 6 hour flight and a good amount of time to enjoy a F cabin.

Each redemption will cost about 200-215K miles, so you're covered for two people. What helped me a lot in planning was using Mini RTW listing - Turn Left AtTurn Left At. I would just check the "current" rule, enter cities I wanted (JFK, ICN, etc.) and then found valid itineraries. Then I used the United and Aeroplan sites to find availability for segments. Once it was all available for the dates I wanted, I called Aeroplan to book.
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