Newbie goal - Peru in May?
 

I'm definitely a newbie to travel hacking - I can't believe it took me this long to figure out how to make use of airline miles.

At any rate, I'm graduating grad school and want to go to Peru for the month of May. I'm flying from the US East coast, and a rt flight is currently about $600-750. AA, United, continental, LAN, and TACA all make the NYC-Lima route and I've been busily investigating points options for all of these. Looks like about 35k-50k miles would get me a rt.

Currently I have 35k on Delta, and I've just gotten 2 AA citibank cards, but those points won't post soon enough. I've also only seen options for united and continental for 30k bonuses. I guess getting 30k on each airline and booking one way flights would be an option? Their websites are definitely less than clear on this point.

I hope I've posted this in the right place - your forums are fantastic and I'm looking forward to becoming an active member!

AA is only 30000 in coach RT up until mid June as I have gone that route.Usually avaiability is good except Summer and they often open seats inside the 21 day period. I would think some of your AA bonuses may post in time.rbc100

Why won't your points on AA post fast enough, jsut get out there and spend the money and earn the points...

You can also change the billing date...

Agreed. I applied for my cards on Oct 19. Received them Nov 2, spent the threshold amounts by Nov 6 and the miles posted in Dec.

You will have to call and pay the phone ticketing fee, but if you're flying coach, I would really recommend using your AA miles to get flights on LAN. They can mix/match with AA flights if one leg is not available. We did this for 35K last Sept. and the LAN flight down was much more pleasant than the AA return.

Also, if Lima is not your only planned destination, keep in mind that you can get an additional domestic flight on LAN Peru tagged on to each of the int'l flights, with a stopover in Lima on one end or the other, for no cost beyond the departure taxes. There is a thread in the AA forum about which combinations of stopovers and open jaws are allowed.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.601 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

Changes were made to award-travel rules when AA went to a one-way award concept a couple of years ago. Now, if you are redeeming AA miles for travel on an all-partner award, you would not be entitled to a free stopover in LIM or anywhere else, other than the North American "gateway" city. You could "connect" in LIM when travelling to or from another city on the award, but a connection means a stop of less than 24 hours.

In addition, one does not have to be concerned with open-jaw rules since the awards are one-way awards. You can fly on a one-way award from New York to Lima, and then fly on another one-way award from Quito to Maui (with or without a free stopover at a North American gateway) if you wish.