Originally Posted by DealsRock
I've learned that NW has an economy RTW award available for 140,000 miles with a maximum of 6 stopovers (3 per continent) and that it needs to be booked over the WorldPerks phone line.
So I've looked at the SkyTeam cities a little bit and am thinking that it would be interesting to visit SYD, BKK, OSL, RIO and SCL. I'm guessing that something like this might be hard to actually get ticketed.
Do any of you have any experiences, suggestions or recent itineraries you would be willing to share to help me get started on planning this?
Thanks in advance!
Well, I booked a RTW in Biz class, so mostly the same beast. I hope you have a lot of patience, and aren't prone to pulling your hair out.
When I booked, there were many dates not available yet, so a couple of weeks ago, I changed some of the later legs (and left some others out, since I knew I would change them again). Talk about a pain.
Going to Oz will probably be the first hurdle. Remember you fly E-W or W-E generally. I had a number of agents tell me that I couldn't go to Oz at all on this ticket.
First thing I would do is get a calendar and mark the days that you can travel. I'm spreading mine out over 9-11 months, and flying back from some destinations to actually work in the mean time.
I'd get the Skyteam schedule program. (Look on Skyteam.com for it). It helps greatly to know who flys where.
Remember all flights must be on Skyteam metal.
Remember that most agents don't know *anything* about doing these tickets. I have gotten so much wrong info from agents that it's ridiculous.
Remember it's okay to backtrack if it's for a connection. I had 4 different agent tell me that I couldn't fly LAX-ICN-SYD-ICN-BKK. However, this is the only way you can get to Sydney and then to Bangkok (Unless you want to go through NRT).
I, personally would research all the routes and dates for a week or two before you call them. I read through lots of posts here on FT, and then used the program and a calendar for almost two weeks before I finally attempted it.
Many agents will tell you that they can't ticket this, and you have to call the RTW desk. Not true.
You can often schedule less than 24 hours at a location without it being a stopover. I had an agent give me 25 hours in one location, and not count it as a stopoever. I was happy with it. However when I went back to change some segments (after that), they had a cow and said it was illegal. I was pretty amazed, since *they* had set it up, ticketed it, and charged me all the taxes months ago.
Here's my original flights LAX-ICN-SYD-ICN-BKK-CDG-CAI-AMS-CPH-AMS-MXP-EZE-ATL-SJO-ATL-LAX.