bergamini

I did book, for 160K, MSN<>ATL<>ICN<>DPS on Delta/KE/Garuda lie flat business. I am sold on a 3-4 nights in Bali. I'm going to do all I can to switch the return to be SYD>LAX and then home on DL or Virgin Australia metal for not an outrageous amount of miles, but we shall see. The RT DPS<>SYD/MEL is 80K or $1500 for lie flat business on Garuda with 75% MQM. Maybe.

bergamini

As of now, I'm booked MKE>ATL>ICN>DPS on outbound and MEL>PVG>LAX on the return, all in Biz. It was 80K for the outbound and 95K miles for the inbound.

I definitely want the stopover in Bali so this is good. I now have 8 months to figure out if I'm going to use 70K for the DPS>SYD direct or pay $1200 for a business fare. Probably going to pay to get MQM's but can't decide if Garuda for lie-flat or Virgin for higher earning ratio.

I can deal with getting from LAX back to Midwest at a later date. Lots of options except with DL unless I want to overnight. Southwest has a direct to MDW that's usually $105 but maybe I'll crash at LAX hotel and get MQM's the next morning on DL.

Or maybe Virgin Australia will be kind to me. Wish I could automate the checks.

BH62

Excluding United, if you wanted to lie-flat on the long haul legs?(not a joke, a serious question)

bergamini

I can rarely sleep on a plane so lie flat isn't the most important thing to me. I want a seat with 18++" of width and 36"+ of pitch. That would be fine.

nichojo

1. Your routing to DPS looks good.
2. Don't splurge on J DPS-SYD. That's a waste. It's a 5.5 hour flight, likely a redeye, and unless you hit jackpot on GA you won't get lie flat. And VA J is domestic FC.
3. CI > CZ > MU. Try to get back on China Airlines - you would have to search separately for this, MEL-TPE (redeye on angeled lie flat a330) and then a FANTASTIC 777 to LAX. Check SFO as a destination, too. China Southern is better than MU so if you can go through CAN, try that instead.
4. Don't waste cash on mainland china premium economy. And don't expect any other real premium economy for < 2k. That said, Air New Zealand sometimes runs PE sales and you may get lucky.
5. No upgrades on Virgin Australia. Welcome to OZ!

DesertNomad

I think you did well picking DPS. We were trying to get to DPS or HAN and ended up getting RNO-SEA-HKG-HAN. DPS seems to be one of the better 160K deals if you can find it, but I could never find 2 J seats on the same flight.

bergamini

Maybe I will just buy Y for DPS>SYD since it's so short. $800 for 5.5 hours is not worth it.

What I'd really like is a reasonable Premium Economy fare from MEL to the states on a SkyTeam airline. I really also wish Delta would have the premium economy on their plane then. Right now Virgin Australia is $3K 1-way. No thanks. I still want to get some MQM's out of this but not at that price point.

gooselee

Every time I see this thread title I want to reply with, "swim."

Great job finding flights. A bit surprising you were able to get the PVG routing for only 95k on the return...I thought DL had nixed redemptions to Oz via Asia. Not a bad way to do it as the SYD-LAX pricing is often outrageous.