Countries Unreachable on Miles
 

I'm recently back from a trip to East Timor, which cannot be reached using any major frequent flyer program; the only flights in are on Merpati, Batavia, Air Timor, Timorair and Airnorth, altogether landing from anywhere in the world roughly once a day. This made me curious: what other countries are unreachable using frequent flyer miles? I'll ignore temporary suspensions due to war such as in Libya, and focus only on the 193 UN member states. Let's divide them into groups:

Reachable with a major alliance but not with US miles for political reasons: Iran, Cuba, N. Korea

No major alliance but easy partner: Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Tuvalu (all on Air Pacific)

Microstate with no airport of its own: San Marino, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Monaco (all but Andorra have very close airports - as close as Narita or Arlanda to their related cities)

Probably reachable: Sao Tome, Lesotho, Swaziland (flights to these three are on subsidiaries of TAP and S. African which I believe can be used on United or Continental awards)

Unreachable on miles: Somalia (Kenya used to fly to Hargeisa but no longer), Nauru (tiny state), East Timor, Bhutan (Druk Air has state monopoly)

That is, as far as I can tell, you really can see the whole world using only miles!

While by no means unreachable it always amazes me how hard it is to get to places in the former Soviet Union using miles (besides Moscow/Petersburg). Even places like Minsk and Kharkov are a real challenge, and they're medium-sized European cities.

Cuba is reachable using United miles on occasion.:D

Andorra doesn't have air service.

Your question is interesting from theoretical but not practical perspective - for example there are many WORTH SEEING places in Russia that are much further from any airport you can reach with miles than any place in the countries you listed as unreachable. Yet Russia didn't make your list because of an easy- reachable Moscow.

But anyway, following your definition I think (didn't confirm in wikipedia though) at least Vatican is missing.

I believe Vatican City would fall under this as well, though this may well be a moot point for obvious reasons.

I believe SilkAir flies to Dili (from SIN). Can't you use SQ miles with SilkAir (I know they don't accept Star Alliance miles, but thought SQ worked). And there's probably a few more places in the South Pacific (Tonga, Samoa, Vanuatu) that would be hard to reach on miles?

Minsk a real challenge? :p With LH, LO, OS, TK (*A); SU, OK (ST) all serving MSQ, there are worse destinations to try and get to with miles. (True, if you are loyal to OW you have more of a problem, unless S7 fly there now).

I was going to suggest Tajikistan, but S7 and TK both fly to DYU.

IIRC I was trying to book a flight there with AA miles at some point and couldn't find anything on any partner carrier.

Lots of the former Soviet Union has become more inaccessible by air than it was 20 years ago. I think Belarus used to have 4-5 passenger airports (I'd say commercial but there was no non-state commerce...). Now there's only one as far as I know. There are similar defunct airports in Ukraine and in Russia.

And yes, as stated above there are many, many places in Russia that are a dozen (or more) hours by ground transport to the nearest commercial airport. Even in European Russia that's true.

Having lived there for two years, including six months in provincial Russia, it amazes me that a country so large with a history of aircraft production and a large aerospace sector relies so heavily on trains for long-distance passenger transport. I understand the economics but it's to the point that even economically it doesn't make much sense.

Vatican City is not a UN member state, though of course they also don't have commercial air service.

Air Timor has a wet lease plane from SilkAir for the DIL-SIN route but it does not accrue *A miles and *A can't be used on the flight.

The rest of the S. Pacific is actually pretty well handled, with Continental Micronesia in the north and Air NZ/Qantas in the south. Africa is surprisingly well covered due to colonial flag carriers plus Kenya Air, SAA and the odd Africa-heavy airline like Brussels.

Actually, there may several "micro" or otherwise smaller countries in Europe that technically fall under this, but in all cases they're not that from a major airport in an adjacent country where it's easy to fly into (perhaps even with carriers in more than one alliance).

I would say it's "unreachable on miles" if there's no practical way to get there with miles plus some reasonable ground transportation. A land country which is a few hours drive or train ride or boat ride from a major country, doesn't count.

I don't know, for example, if an alliance flies to each of the Baltic countries, but Estonia is just a 90ish minute boat ride from Helsinki, so I don't care if you can't fly directly into Estonia with miles, since it's so easy to fly into Helsinki with miles.

But, btw, a list defined even this way only helps if you have miles in all the major alliances, plus either Alaska or Icelandair (or is there another way to get reasonbly from the US to Iceland with miles?), or if you don't care how big a country is and how long it takes to go across it (if the alliance can only get you to the capital in one corner). On the latter point, and example is Norway: Any alliance can get you to Oslo, only two can get you to the southwest coast, and any further north (and it stretches far north!) and only Star Alliance can get you there.

++

A good example is Smolensk, Russia, which is a metro area of half a million people, and is famous because of the Polish plane crash there a year and a half ago. But as far as I know there are no commercial flights there, and the nearest big airport is Moscow, about 10 hours away by ground transit.

All 3 are certainly served by SAS and I will be very surprised if they are not served by Aeroflot

SAS (and Air Berlin once it enters ow) flies to Iceland. Many airlines fly to Estonia. The list I gave in the first post should be complete: every other country has at least one airport with a major alliance flight.

And indeed, many places within countries are tough to reach. I don't think there is any way to the huge Canadian territory of Nunavut on miles, for instance. Or anywhere in Mongolia aside from UB. Or Irian Jaya. Nonetheless, I'm surprised how many countries you can get to only on major alliance miles. I would've guessed there were a dozen or two unreachable countries in addition to the microstates.

The nearest major airport should be Minsk, but considering much more options from Moscow this is certainly the choice of most Smolensk citizens (unless they have compelling non-monetary reasons to prefer Minsk but this is an off topic subject)

That's why they are "major" - they work pretty hard to get all you money when you're travelling from point A to point B unless you're on some exotic commercially nonviable routes.

how about southern Sudan ?

I haven't flown it yet, but S7 is part of the Oneworld alliance and flies to lots of places in Russia, including, I think, most of the places a tourist is likely to go the first couple of times in the country. Since Vatican City is entirely within Rome, it is as easy to visit with miles as Rome is. Andorra is indeed a bit of a drive from Barcelona, but not hard to visit from there.

Not quite true -- I've used Delta miles to book an award redemption from the US to Iran on Air France. I'm sure one could also redeem for trips on BA, Al Italia, or a couple others.

You can get to all of these on Air New Zealand (*A), Air Pacific (OW if you use QF codeshares) and Virgin Australia. You can also get to Vanuatu on Air Caledonie using Flying Blue miles.

You can on Canadian North and First Air with Aeroplan miles.

Yep, and lots of options to Nunavut using Continental miles. I should say availability, rather than options. Availability is amazingly decent.

Bhutan should be on everyone's list to visit - but with one government-owned airline flying in and out of the capital, you can't use miles to get there...but you can get to BKK or KTM using miles, and connect onwards to Bhutan from there.

Not exactly a country, but I don't believe any of the south Atlantic UK territories can be reached by miles... St. Helena, Ascnesion, and Tristan da Cunha. (If anybody figures out a way, please post!)

What about Antartica and Greenland? Can you go there with miles?

I would add what was until a few years ago, Europe's last feudal state, the channel island of Sark, ruled by a nobleman known as the Seigneur, who appointed his legislative body, the Chief Pleas, until he allowed it to be elected recently. Sark has no airport and must be reached by boat from Guernsey, from whence it makes a great day trip. The Seigneur has nominal allegiance to the British crown but the UK parliament has no authority there. Sark has no income tax and is not a member of the EU.

Also, you could add the non-recognized statelets like Transnistria and Abhazia.

Tuvalu, Nauru, Kiribati?

What about Swaziland & Lesotho? West Sahara (you may dispute if it is a stand-alone country) or maybe the Central African Republic?

Both Manzini,Swaziland and Maseru,Lesotho are serviced by Star Alliance on SAA Airlink. Did both from JNB recently.

Cheers

What about the Lost Continent of Atlantis?

How about anywhere Delta flies? :D

http://instantrimshot.com/

I thought there were 192. Ok, South Sudan joined.
Anyway, I find it interesting that there are far fewer members of the U.N. than the 321 "countries" listed by the
Traveler's Century Club.
http://www.travelerscenturyclub.org/countries.html

Beat me to it.

What an odd list. According to their definition of a country Alaska is one. And there are seven of them in Antarctica. Who knew?

TCC defines its "countries" a little more liberally. If only 192 counted too many of us would just blow past the number.

Regarding Western Sahara, Royal Air Maroc flies there, and one can use Delta miles for a partner award on Royal Air Maroc.

The French side of St. Martin has an airport but no airlines with miles serve it. The Dutch side is where the main airport is.

Nope and nope. SAS used to fly a flight to Greenland but no longer.

Even bigger cities in former USSR are not reachable with miles. Good thing that at least Lufthansa flies to city I need to go!