Hello folks,

Even before I put forth my request, here's my disclaimer: I'm an absolute newbie to this game of earning/redeeming points for travel and stays.

Having said that here's my situation: I want to book 2 RT tickets to SYD. Dates of travel would be leaving between June 11 - 13th and returning on June 22 - 25th.

I have enough *Alliance points to book 2 RT business class tickets. However, here's the problem i'm running into. For my dates of travel I'm not able to find absolutely any availability for the return leg. There is some availability for the onward leg. I've tried multiple times now with different airlines (e.g., ANA, Singapore Airlines, Air NZ, Air Canada, UA) with different combinations of departure (ORD, JFK, LAX, Vancouver, SFO) and arrival cities. And I've also chosen different transit cities as well (NRT, LHR, SIN)

So here are my questions:
1. Are these black out dates for travel out of SYD? How do I find this out? I looked extensively on the ANA website, but having spent close to 2 hours for this search I might have missed it.
2. Are there any other routes that you can think of that I could use in my search? I can fly out of any major city in the US, that's not a problem at all. Finding availability on the return leg is turning out to be a PITA (pain in the, well, @$$)
3. Should I perhaps look at flying into one of the other major Australian cities and then take a domestic flight into SYD? From what i've seen so far it looks like SYD is the city that's served by most *Alliance partners.

I certainly don't want to spend in excess of $4K to fly coach to SYD, so any help that you folks can offer will be extremely appreciated.

Cheers!

The only return availability I see for 2 in business class is on 6/24 via PEK to SFO on Air China with a lengthy longover in PEK. Better than nothing I suppose.

Where in the USA are you trying to go? For example, I am in LA and find multiple 3-flight routes from SYD to LAX (SYD-ICN-HND on OZ + HND-LAX on NH is one example). You also can search TG (SYD-BKK), OZ (SYD-ICN), CA (SYD-PVG/PEK) in addition to the ones you've listed.

Also, which miles are you trying to use? Since you have a wide departure window, would a stopover somewhere in Asia for a while be of interest?

Iceman & Amolkold,

Thanks for your suggestions!

Amolkold, I will be using my US Airways points and I am based in MSY currently. Getting from MSY to any other major US city is not a problem for me. Let me check the routes that you have mentioned. At this point I'm not planning a stop over in Asia. If anything I'd love a stop over in AKL, but haven't give it much serious thought, especially as I was getting frustrated with no return flights out of SYD for my return dates.

I certainly appreciate your help folks!

Look for BNE & MEL (both served by Air NZ)

If you're using US Airways miles, then you get either a stopover or an open-jaw. I think using the open-jaw may be the best idea for your purposes, since you can have a different departure city and arrival city, and get from/to MSY from the different cities.

You will likely not find a direct Oceania - North America flight, so Air NZ/United/Air Canada are out for direct flights.

Instead, search for SYD-ICN/BKK/TYO/PEK/PVG/SIN first, see what's available, then search for Asia-North America. If you get to a United hub, you can try to find space to MSY as well to keep on the same award ticket. Basically, SYD-Asia + Asia-North America, plus any connecting flights in between.

US Airways places an 8-segment limit on RT awards, but you might be able to get 1 or 2 more if it's absolutely necessary. It really matters on the agent.

Btw, the flights I found just off the top of my head with a double search were

6/24 OZ 602, OZ 178 SYD-ICN-HND
6/25 NH 1006 HND-LAX

This is only 3 flights. You could try to do LAX-IAH-MSY on UA, which would be 5.