Looking for Help Getting to Paris for 2
May 26, 2014, 1:05 pm
#16
Join Date: May 2008
Posts: 1,603
Consider getting the Capital 1 Venture card or the Barclay's Arrival card, whose sign up bonuses reimburse 400-500 dollars for travel related expenses. Try first in your wife's name, so she'll buid up her credit, and apply for separate accounts, so each of you will get the sign up bonus.
The manufactured spending forum teaches how to meet the minimum spending requirements. I find that it takes too much time and effort to be worth my while, but that's just me.
Good luck on your travels!
May 26, 2014, 3:11 pm
#17
Original Poster
Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 20
Paris is perfect for a honeymoon, it is such a romantic city. Don't miss the opportunity to go, even if you can't swing enough miles for award tickets.
Consider getting the Capital 1 Venture card or the Barclay's Arrival card, whose sign up bonuses reimburse 400-500 dollars for travel related expenses. Try first in your wife's name, so she'll buid up her credit, and apply for separate accounts, so each of you will get the sign up bonus.
The manufactured spending forum teaches how to meet the minimum spending requirements. I find that it takes too much time and effort to be worth my while, but that's just me.
Good luck on your travels!
Consider getting the Capital 1 Venture card or the Barclay's Arrival card, whose sign up bonuses reimburse 400-500 dollars for travel related expenses. Try first in your wife's name, so she'll buid up her credit, and apply for separate accounts, so each of you will get the sign up bonus.
The manufactured spending forum teaches how to meet the minimum spending requirements. I find that it takes too much time and effort to be worth my while, but that's just me.
Good luck on your travels!
May 27, 2014, 2:25 pm
#18
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: London
Posts: 17,007
In principle you can use your Delta miles to get an award ticket on AZ (or anyone else in the alliance), but given AZ's inclination to void even premium revenue tickets apparently at random I imagine it would be a challenging exercise even for a seasoned professional. But perhaps they have wide open award space?
If you and your wife are not adverse to taking connections you might find award availability is higher if you are happy to fly somewhere nearby before heading onto Paris.
I would also suggest you keep a close eye on revenue prices, although obviously that isn't as fun as getting a ticket for free.
Last edited by Calchas; May 27, 2014 at 2:31 pm
May 27, 2014, 3:20 pm
#19
Original Poster
Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 20
AZ is the code for Alitalia, much like American Airlines uses AA or Delta uses DL. Alitalia is an airline operating out of Rome Fiumicino. Alitalia is in the same airline alliance as Delta, Air France (AF) and KLM (KL), amongst others. If you stick around FlyerTalk you will notice we sometimes descend into incomprehensible acronyms.
In principle you can use your Delta miles to get an award ticket on AZ (or anyone else in the alliance), but given AZ's inclination to void even premium revenue tickets apparently at random I imagine it would be a challenging exercise even for a seasoned professional. But perhaps they have wide open award space?
If you and your wife are not adverse to taking connections you might find award availability is higher if you are happy to fly somewhere nearby before heading onto Paris.
I would also suggest you keep a close eye on revenue prices, although obviously that isn't as fun as getting a ticket for free.
In principle you can use your Delta miles to get an award ticket on AZ (or anyone else in the alliance), but given AZ's inclination to void even premium revenue tickets apparently at random I imagine it would be a challenging exercise even for a seasoned professional. But perhaps they have wide open award space?
If you and your wife are not adverse to taking connections you might find award availability is higher if you are happy to fly somewhere nearby before heading onto Paris.
I would also suggest you keep a close eye on revenue prices, although obviously that isn't as fun as getting a ticket for free.
As far as connections or flying in/out of another airport, we're definitely open to this. The whole trip is one giant adventure for us, so taking a few hours train ride across EU into Paris just adds to that adventure. I'd read that Brussels, Belgium has some cheap flights into it (initial research suggests this is true.) Any other recommendations to check out?
And, I think I mentioned, while an award ticket would be awesome (and I am building up some points that are scattered about), I don't mind paying some or all of the cost either. Just looking for the best way to get there.
Jun 23, 2014, 1:09 pm
#20
Original Poster
Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 20
OK, just a quick update on my situation and a couple of extremely noobish questions that hopefully you pros can help out with...
I ended up just paying cash for the flight and using Amex points to reduce the cost of the tickets. I get that I probably lost a lot of value on the Amex points, but this is the last chance we're going to have to travel for a while, so it kind of feels like now or never. We're going in December because it's a little further out, so a little more time to plan and it's going to be one giant Christmas vacation because we're going to wind up in the mountains of TN to spend time with family for Christmas, so all-in-all and pretty amazing trip.
Anyways, so now the only question I have would be, is it ever possible to upgrade from E to E+ (or better, although from what I've seen, i'm not holding my breath on that one) using my United points. I know fare class can play into this, and I'm not even exactly sure where to find this, since it wasn't printed on the itinerary that i printed out. I'll have roughly 35,000 united miles by next month (maybe more if I can talk chase into honoring 50,000 deal for their card.) I'm a little mystified by the upgrade process, so would greatly appreciate some help here.
Thanks!
I ended up just paying cash for the flight and using Amex points to reduce the cost of the tickets. I get that I probably lost a lot of value on the Amex points, but this is the last chance we're going to have to travel for a while, so it kind of feels like now or never. We're going in December because it's a little further out, so a little more time to plan and it's going to be one giant Christmas vacation because we're going to wind up in the mountains of TN to spend time with family for Christmas, so all-in-all and pretty amazing trip.
Anyways, so now the only question I have would be, is it ever possible to upgrade from E to E+ (or better, although from what I've seen, i'm not holding my breath on that one) using my United points. I know fare class can play into this, and I'm not even exactly sure where to find this, since it wasn't printed on the itinerary that i printed out. I'll have roughly 35,000 united miles by next month (maybe more if I can talk chase into honoring 50,000 deal for their card.) I'm a little mystified by the upgrade process, so would greatly appreciate some help here.
Thanks!