Thanks for your great suggestions. Although the route is long, I am considering going through Europe to spend a couple of days in each direction.

Australia on 210,000 miles
 

Is Korean Air pretty much the only option when it comes to getting from the US to Oz via Skymiles? With only 210,000 miles (or thereabouts) we'd only qualify for economy on that trip, and would certainly prefer business at least. But it doesn't look that way unless I'm missing something, which I very well may be! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Also, does anyone know if it is possible with this routing to have a two day stop in either Bangkok or Singapore? I see the options on Korean Air are generally Seoul-Sydney direct, Seoul-Singapore-Sydney, or Seoul-Bangkok-Sydney.

You could go to PPT on Skyteam (AF) award and then find an alternate way to Oz.

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"Things work out the best for those who make the best of the way things work out"

You could go to Asia in business and then make your own way down to Oz.

210,000 miles for a coach class ticket to Oz is robbery!

Papeete would be nice, but it looks like the tickets would still be around $800 down to Oz from there.

Looks like Singapore is the cheapest place to get tickets down to Australia, short of Port Moresby, Papau New Guinea.

Actually, I am flying to NZ in October. I wasn't about to fly KE, so I used 95,000 miles to get to Singapore using Singapore Air, best business class around IMO. From there I am using UA miles to get to NZ/OZ. It'd be great if DL would have SOME way of getting to OZ or NZ using miles, but KE just isn't an option! Even doing this route - it comes out to using 170,000 for business class all the way on Singapore Air vs. 210,000 on KE. Even buying a ticket from SIN-SYD was pretty cheap, $800RT this far out, and I am sure the price will go down as it gets cheaper. Good luck!

The lowest prices TO oz from large cities in Asia are Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur (always the lowest) and then SIN and higher still HKG.

But go look at a map .. routing from USA via Asia is the lonnnnng way to do things.

I am surprised that Tahiti costs $800 rt to OZ? Very little competition so it is probably correct. It only takes 40,000 UA miles BIZ class or 20,000 in coach RT on Air NZ - Tahiti to SYD-MEL-PER (PPT-AKL-PER-AKL-PTT is the award of the century for 20/40k - look THAT up on a MAP!!!) And REMEMBER on that award a stop ANYWHERE in NZ is possible too.

That is by far your best option IMO. Gives you stops of your choice of length in Tahiti, Australia AND New Zealand.

So if you have 20K UA miles use them and save $800 for the PPT-OZ-PPT round trip. ANd if you do not talk to me or someone who DOES for goodness sakes! You'll go in classy Air NZ biz class and still be in front. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/thumbsup.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/thumbsup.gif

I flew Air NZ r/t from Tonga to AKL earlier year and they have 767s on that run, and I think also PPT-AKL, so a very nice Biz product there.

Tahiti is a great vacation destination. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

How many DL miles does it take to get to Tahiti out of interest?

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~ Glen ~

Come visit HERE the most ** FRIENDLY FORUM ** on FlyerTalk. No flame wars, no personal abuse, no substance abuse. Not much of anything really!




[This message has been edited by ozstamps (edited 06-04-2003).]

I've been lurking in the AA board for a while with this same issue. We've got a bunch of Delta miles accumulated but at 150k for one ticket in J via Korean Air that's not going to work. I think we've decided to shift our efforts to our AA miles and use their partnership with Quantas to get two tix in J for 185k miles (105k for the first ticket, 80k for the companion ticket).

We're not going until this time next year so hopefully we'll be able to rack up our AA miles this year.

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T DO IT!

The best use of DL miles is a Singapore Airlines award in F. 140K each person to Asia.

Korean seems to be a less-than-premium airline, and to be stuck in economy...No! No! No!

From Singapore or other nearby areas, you could even pay your own way to get to Oz.

Edited to add: And SQ F is better than QF F and certainly better than any Korean Air product. I hope you can find a cheap ticket from SE Asia to Australia and go SQ! They're the best.

Wahoo!



[This message has been edited by First in Class (edited 06-04-2003).]

Getting back to OZ's points about getting to Tahiti and then using UA miles from Tahiti to SYD, etc.,is it possible to use Delta miles to take Singapore (or anyone else)to Tahiti? When I look under "South Pacific" on the Delta Award Redemption chart Tahiti is listed. Does that mean that Singapore or someone else can take us there with Delta award miles?

I used Delta miles to get to PPT --Delta domestic - in 1st - then Air France LAX to PPT Bus. Cl. It took a lot of miles (125,000 pp - but it was the only way I could figure out to get from West Palm to PPT on my available mileage.

Thanks Renee Moss. 125K is a lot but then you would need only 20K more UA miles to get to SYD, AKL and others and return according to OzStamps. That's coach of course but even at 40K and business you're still well under the 210K needed with Korean, not to mention the latter is a VERY LOOOOONG trip and it is on Korean Air. Not that AF is a great business class but it's not too bad. Would be nice if we could go on Singapore though.
Anyone know how to do that with Delta miles?

(I just noticed I hit 300 posts. Time sure does fly when you're having fun. Thanks, FTers for the good dialog and the good advice. 400 here we come.)

[This message has been edited by upgrader (edited 06-04-2003).]

Glen, (I hope you are sitting down)...
It takes 100K/150K/200K SkyMiles for Y/C/F r/t from North America to Tahiti on Air France. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/eek.gif

I asked the res agent "surely this means via France?" Nope... it is just the little 'ol direct flight from LAX. Yikes!

Also, so we are all on the same page here, I think the premise of siageah's post was that he/she has but 210,000 miles (or thereabouts) total his/her the SkyMiles account but needs to fly two people to OZ. Delta's award chart indicates each pax will require 100,000 miles in econ, not 210,000 per ticket At nearly double the miles required by Star Alliance it is a waste for sure.

https://www.delta.com/skymiles/use/s...t_us/index.jsp

OK so the "bank" has 210,000 or so miles and 2 pax need to be travelling? Iinital post was not entirely clear to me on that.

Well no way are 2 folks going to go Biz class to oz for that - we all realise this, so looking at the realities of that mile bank and a desire to get to oz.

It looks to me that that option to Tahiti - 100K each in coach x 2 just covers the bank balance.

To rustle up the 2 x 20K (or 2 x 40K for Biz) via a bit of horse trading with FT'ers who have UA miles is not going to be too difficult or costly.

And then siageah gets:

1. A stop of any length if required in LAX at least on the award to Tahiti, or maybe somewhere else en-route .. he/she does not indicate USA point of origin AFAIK.

2. A stop for as long as required in Tahiti.

3. A stop for as long as required in New Zealand.

4. A stop for as long as required in OZ ..... even in Perth, which is a LAX-NYC distance from SYD.

Seems like the dream vacation to me .... uses up the DL miles and with a nominal adjustment factored in to cover the Air NZ tickets is pretty good going, and does not set foot on Korean Air for the entire journey! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/thumbsup.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/thumbsup.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/thumbsup.gif

Actually it is not oeven close to 'nearly double' the Star chart to be honest, so not sure why it would be a "waste" if siageah has the miles and wants the vacation. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Using UA miles, to get from anywhere USA to Tahiti round trip is 80/120/150K.

So UA miles takes 160,000 for 2, and DL miles takes 200,000 for 2, and as presumably siageah does not have 160,000 UA miles it is pretty good "value" when compared side by side I think, as routing is identical in both cases. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

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~ Glen ~

Come visit HERE the most ** FRIENDLY FORUM ** on FlyerTalk. No flame wars, no personal abuse, no substance abuse. Not much of anything really!


[This message has been edited by ozstamps (edited 06-04-2003).]

Wow, thank you all for all the responses!

To clear up a few things, yes, it is two passengers and yes, we are leaving from the US. (PHL or thereabouts to be exact)

Korean Air in coach does seem like one of the rings of blazes to me, so these alternatives give us something to work within to attempt something else.

Ozstamps, thanks so much for the Tahiti itinerary posted above! It certainly would be the dream vacation and gives us something to think about considering.

Again, thanks to you all!