An novice's question about the Round the World Ticket
 

Hi,

I'm a student from India and I have a few months before I start working.
The wanderlust has been tugging at me for a few years now and I decided to give in and go on a Round the world trip(with the not-so-much money I saved while studying).

I have a few questions before buying a RTWT:

1. Can I use frequen flyer miles earned by someone else? It it transferable?

2. All the online RTWT planners I saw forced me to travel only by air all the time. Is it possible that I can choose air travel only for some instances?

Here is my probable itinerary...
India->Dubai->Egypt->Turkey->Greece->Romania->Hungary->Austria->Switzerland->England->Brazil->Parguay->Argentina->Peru->Colombia->New Zealand->Australia->Malaysia->India

Any tips/tricks for the trip are also welcome :)
I don't know if this is the right place to post this...but I hope somebody is able to help :)

Cheers,
Gandalf

Welcome to Flyer Talk gandalf7 :)

FF miles are credited to the flyer only. There are some programs that allow pooling through a household account, and some programs allow accounts to redeem awards for other people.

You can book surface segments by simply not selecting a flight for the relevant segment. Note these are still included in the segment count (max 16).

PS you have too many stops to include them all on a single ticket.

Hi Kiwi Flyer! Thank you :)

I was hoping I could use up my relative's FF miles, now have to think of something else :(

I didn't understand what you meant by "You can book surface segments by simply not selecting a flight for the relevant segment. Note these are still included in the segment count"

ok, I see that I have more than 16 stops...but I intend to cover some of them via road/rail(For example, East Europe). You mean to say that it is a cost advantage to hit only 16 airports or less?

your relative may be able to book the flight but in your name

what program do they have miles with?

I'm a student myself and I recommend you figure out your finances before planning this trip. You have to think of the hotel/motel/hostel and food cost. If you're like me and read a lot of Trip Reports on FT then don't even think of staying at the Park Hyatt Buenos Aires for example unless you come from a wealthy family or have a lot of Hyatt points to splurge on. Just my two cents on this. But good luck if you figure out the finances! :)

That means that you can drive from Prague to Warsaw by train/car. Star Alliance will count that so called surface sector as one of the 16 segments.

When you are flying AAA-PRG and WAW-BBB, this will count as three segments although you only took two flights.

The same is true if you are flying AAA-PRG and then FCO-BBB and you are driving from Prague to Warsaw and then on to Vienna, Zurich and finally Rome. There will be only one surface sector (between PRG and FCO), no matter where and how you spent your time in between.

RWT tickets are also limited by the total number of miles. The highest level RTW ticket in the *A limits your total itinerary to 39,000 miles. Ground segments also count toward that total. So if you fly into PRG, take a train to Rome and fly out of FCO, the flight distance from PRG to FCO is included in the total for your itinerary, even though you didn't actually fly that segment.

*A 16 segments & 39000 miles RTW limitation only applies to purchased fare. If it is using miles it depends on the FF program, some only allows 5 stopovers total.

To answer your initial question, your relative (the one with the mileage - ;)) can request a ticket in your name. You should warn them that they'll probably spend quite a bit of time (hours) on the phone with their FF program to set everything up.

Specifically, for UA, the max numbers are 16 segments, 5 stopovers, and 36,000 miles. At least that was the situation a year ago when I booked a similar trip for a relative.

As was noted previously, your trip is too ambitious, you are way over any likely stopover limit your FF plan has.

I agree it is probably a bit ambitious. But a quick suggestion is doable on a paid ticket - I have minimised South America stops, and the ATH-ZRH sector should be surfaced. I have not checked that *A atually operates all segments (DEL-DXB in particluar could be an issue).

This comes to 13 segments and just over 32,000 miles:
del-dxb-cai-ist-ath-zrh-lhr-lis-gru-sfo-akl-syd-sin-del.

this leaves room for additional 3 segments (to cover for inoperable city pairs and may an added city).

This depends on the program. Some allow bookings for everyone while others only allow inner family circle.

I'm back! :)
 

Hi,

Thank you so much for all your responses.
After much deliberation, I pruned my itinerary to the following destinations.

Bangalore - Dubai - Cairo - Athens - Istanbul - Bucharest - Budapest - Vienna - Salzburg - Zurich - Paris - London - Bangalore

It was a bit of a let down :( but I guess it makes sense monetarily. Also I will be able to spend more time at each destination! :)

Will I have any problems with the above itinerary? I mean...since I would be coming back from London, and crossing over between Asia<-> Europe twice? I was not able to plan this trip on the Star Alliance website because of this issue.


any other suggestions/comments most welcome!

You can't book this itin on the *A website because it is not a RTW but a RT India-London with (too many) stopovers. Much of your travel can be done better (or only) by train or with LCC's within Europe. You might want to have a look at the Europe Airpass but I doubt it really fits into your plans.

Looks like the best way to do this: Buy a regular ticket (open jaw) to/from two points in europe. If you use Emirates you can add a stop in Dubai on the way there/back. You could make a sidetrip to CAI from there.
Then use trains (look at eurorail passes) or LCCs to get around in europe.
On many of your city pairs the train is actually faster than flying and you save the expenses to/from the airport. Budapest-Vienna for example is only around 3 hours with at least one train per hour.

If your relative has miles to give you, then do the following :

Bangalore - London / / Return from Paris - Bangalore

From London, take a low cost carrier, like Ryanair, or Easy Jet to Budapest.
www.easyjet.com

From Budapest - take the train, (use a Eurailpass for people under 26 years old) to the rest of your destinations. You may see how much it costs here:http://www.eurail.com/eurail-passes/eurail-global-pass

Go to a travel agent in Bangalore (or your home town) to buy this pass before you travel - and they can also explain to you how this works. The best one for you is the 10 days in 21 days.. which means you can use this pass 10 days in 21 days so you can stopover and see the sights a few days here and there. Your travel agent can also advise and assist you in obtaining visas for the many countries that you're going.

End your journey in Paris and fly home from there.

Forget about Cairo for now. Same with Istanbul. You may consider them at another time. Cos its harder to get to the latter from Europe on a train! Unless you want to take another low cost carrier from say Vienna. Besides Cairo may not be the best place to go for now...