Wideman is correct in theory but your example is a major exception. Because of an unrelated rule, once youre in HNL you can *only* leave from HNL (or another Hawaiian island). You cant do an open jaw to or from HNL *anywhere* but otherwise open jaws are generally allowed save exceptions like wideman pointed out.

That's interesting - I had no idea the HNL rule was there, and had just been looking for a personal schedule opportunity to zip out to HNL and oj back to the mainland. Wonder if the AA rtw agents generally know that rule.

Yes, people have reported they do. I dont have personal experience because I have no need to go to HI but others who do have said that all airlines support the same view.

OK, so once you hit HNL, your next stop on your xONEx ticket has to be to another continent. If I do a surface trip back to LAX, then it has to be a round trip, and if I go from North America to Australia, and plan on stopping in HNL before I leave, I can only take the SYD flight from HNL, which has no F seats.

That means that it makes more sense to fly into North America, landing at HNL and proceeding to the mainland, rather than flying out of North America by stopping in HNL first.

Also, given the outrageous cost to get to CAI from here, it almost makes more sense to fly to HKG and start an AONEx from there, flying into North America (JFK), and then either to Australia or Europe as the next continent. The cost of the trip to CAI or CMB seems to more than wipe out any price savings. In other words, the cost of a flight to CAI or CMB from LAX plus the AONEx from there seems to be higher than the cost of the trip to HKG plus the AONEx from there.

HKG-<N America>-<Australia>-... can never be a valid routing for a xONEn ticket (you start from TC3 (Asia + Australasia), so you can only re-enter it at the end). If you go HKG-<N America> the next continent (in the absence of any NA-Africa flights) must be Europe.

So, then, when someone suggested a routing from SYD-LHR, a couple of stops in Europe, and then later had a series of North America stops, they were proposing an invalid routing, right?

I dont think that's what I said. What I said is that when you get to HNL, you only have a choice from leaving from HNL or another continent.

Coming to think of it, that is not completely correct. I am tired so if I make no sense then I apologize. Here are the *only* routings including HNL (and ignoring the other HI destinations because it would be the same).

Eastbound
1. SYD-HNL-LAX
2. SYD-HNL-DFW
3. SYD-HNL-ORD
4. SYD-HNL-SJC
5. SYD-HNL-SFO
6. SYD-HNL//LAX
7. SYD-HNL//DFW
8. SYD-HNL//ORD
9. SYD-HNL//SJC
10. SYD-HNL//SFO

Westbound
1. LAX-HNL-SYD
2. DFW-HNL-SYD
3. ORD-HNL-SYD
4. SJC-HNL-SYD
5. SFO-HNL-SYD
6. LAX//HNL-SYD
7. DFW//HNL-SYD
8. ORD//HNL-SYD
9. SJC//HNL-SYD
10. SFO//HNL-SYD

The // is an open jaw. These are almost the only combinations you can take and use Honolulu, again assuming that you are not interested in visiting other islands. So yes, you can open jaw but it would make absolutely no sense to me for you to do so. So in that regard I stand corrected.

The three rules implicated are 1) no open jaws across the pacific ocean, 2) only one flight to or from Hawaii is permitted, and 3) no backtracking between Hawaii and the mainland. The third is what very explicitly prohibits you from open jawing back to the mainland after getting to Hawaii from the US.

No, not necessarily. It would if they get from Europe to Australia via North America but not via Asia. I dont know the thread but just considering wht you said you could do Australia-London via Bangkok, European stops, London to North America, North American stops, then North America back to Australia. It goes in one direction (westbound).

One possible justification/use for an open-jaw involving HNL would be to include one of the many cruises to the mainland in your itinerary (and they're very nice, too - personal experience.) I presume the fact that you can do an open-jaw ex/to Hawaii means the transoceanic surface segment ban only refers to the whole ocean, not just part.

It raises an interesting matter: due to US cabotage law, the one-way cruises leaving Hawaii all go to Ensenada, Mexico. Mexico is not mentioned in the "no-backtrack" rule. One could relatively easily get from Ensenada or nearby Tijuana to MEX, then hook up with LA for playing around in S. America. If you then traveled on to AKL or SYD from SCL, you'd never set down back in the US after leaving Hawaii, so you wouldn't have violated the explicit backtrack rule. This might be a way for westbound xONEx itineraries that include South America to visit Hawaii before going on to S. America; e.g., xxx-LAX-HNL//MEX-SCL-etc-SYD. Otherwise they'd need to do S. America first so that exiting HNL would be the last stop in the zone. More flexibility results. Hmmm.

I can think of 2 particularly good values for xONE tickets:

1. Going to Australia from the US. This is a long trip and you cannot upgrade, so you're going to be stuck in coach for a long time. The price of a business class seat to Australia is probably similar to a RTW ticket. Unless you use miles to get a ticket, you're going to be in the back.

2. If your company is sending you across the world in business class, it may be just as cheap to get a RTW ticket if you can convince them to do this. There is a time limit to the RTW tickets (7 days I believe) to stop you from doing quick trips, but you can buy another cheap ticket to get around that rule if needed.

Some destinations are not good for RTW trips, notably Hawaii. Also, you don't want to use your RTW segments on cheap segments in the US like LGB-JFK, but for costlier destinations like Alaska or expensive Caribbean destinations like Barbados.

I think the best value is to make a list of all the places in the world you'd like to see and figure out which of those places is the most expensive to get to. Then try and make a RTW trip that includes these pricey destinations and fly in business or first class. In the process, you will likely make enough miles back that you can fly for free for a while afterwards.

If you can get it ticketed then that would be the only exception. However, you would not be able to touch the US again including connecting from South America to Europe or Australia via North America. American very clearly does not want Hawaii being used on a OWE. I think the only reason that they included the places they did is because that's where flights happen to be. But AA has very consistently interpreted the rule that once youre in HI that you need to move on to Australia or v.v.