For the last 6 months - since deciding to do a LONE5 (ex Oz) I have been an avide user (and fan) of this forum. However, all this focus on DONE*s and AONE*s has finally got to me ... I have now decided to get a cheap seat to Europe and get a DONE4 ex CAI. The fact that the $A is quite strong at the moment is a defining factor, as is the fact that this allows me to stay away for more than 12 months.

I am confident of my planned routing - most of the issues seem to have been covered in old threads - so I won't bother anyone with that. What I am still not completely clear about is the process for getting my ticket (Yes, I have searched and looked at all the old posts).

1. I'm in Oz ... who do I call to make the initial reservation - QF, BA, CX, AA. Does it need to be AA if I want to use (the much recommended) ENEMCO? Maybe the question is, who will give me less grief?

2. Do I need to tell QF, BA etc to pass this on to EMENCO OR can I just make the resevation and then call / email EMENCO with a ref and tell them to take it over? OR plan B - can I just deal directly with EMENCO?

3. Will ENEMCO offer any discount on the published fare?

Any advice, please - especially anyone who has experience from OZ.

Many thanks.

Plan B - Do it all direct with Emeco by email. Send Mrs Kamal the itinerary you need and she will make all the reservations (or be happy to leave it open-dated as you wish). In my experience you will need to email her also scans of your credit card, and it is probably worth calling her briefly once the first time round just to make sure everything is OK. She will be happier if you have a transoceanic reservation on AA (although of course there is no reason why you couldn't change that later, and it needn't cost you anything if it is a transatlantic that BA also flies).

If you want to do an overnight turnround at CAI then she will arrange for someone to meet the flight with the ticket and the credit card form for you to sign.

I am not aware that Emeco discounts from published fares.

And I am based in HKG, not Oz, but I have made arrangements with like this with Emeco three times now (after doing it once before with Mrs Sobhi at BA Cairo) and often been on the road when doing so.

I've worked with Mrs. Sobhi once in the past and will be doing it again in a few weeks. Very well organized and a pleasure to work with.

I tend to be one of those that believe it helps to go with the airline you'll be flying with the most, as long as there are offices you can contact in every country. With either AA or BA you'll be fine. Start with an e-mail and go from there. Have a great time on your trip!

Oh never mind!

Sorry I didn't focus enough on your questions.

I would recommend working directly with either of the two via e-mail.

The first step might be to get a full oneworld timetable (you can download it from CX's site) and work out the itinerary you wold like, even if the dates for most flights are left open. the current policy is that you have one stop leaving Australia and one stop returning. If you're in SYD you can stop, say in PER leaving and in AKL returning to SYD. When you land in a continent you have have 4 flight segments within that continent. The only exception is the US where you would be allowed 6 segments. You can have a maximum of 20 segments on the entire trip. You can buy a few additional segments within a country fairly cheap as long as you don't exceed the 20. (Other flights might be picked up on the cheap locally)

The reason to do this work before getting the ticket is that you pave to pay for changes made after the ticket is printed.

Once you have firmed the routing you want to take then I would contact either of the two office directly. Since you are going to be gone for a year the only seat availability concerns would be for the initial flights, which is easy to handle over the internet.

I doubt if you will get a discount from ENEMCO. They know that they have the cheapest fares in the world and sell a lot of them. They might, however, be able to get you a very good rate at a local hotel, things like that, but I'd be surprised to see discounts on the airfare.

NB. If you are going to stay away for more than 12 months then you need to buy your ticket after you leave Australia - the ticket is only good for 12 months. I would wait until you are into your trip and see if you want to make any changes to the routing, then get the ticket. Your departure city must be Cairo and your ticket will return you there, unless you get to Australia and throw away the rest of the ticket.

KENM - thanks for all your good advice. I have all the timetables etc, and am now pretty confident about all the rules etc.

I have made email contact with Emeco (Delia), who is being quite helpful, but isn't keen to courier the ticket to me ... I'm sure I have seen posts from plenty of others saying that they will courier the ticket.

Whats your experience? Others?

Thanks

I don't understand this comment - the rules are that you may have two stopovers in your continent of origin, but whether you take both atthe beginning or both at the end or one each is up to you.

And since the OP is talking about an ex-CAI ticket it is the stopovers in Europe/ME that are limited to two, not the stopovers in SWPacific (where s/he could have four).

My DONE4 is ex CAI. In any event, the itinerary is Europe-NA-SA-(NA)-Asia-Europe, and so SWP is a non-issue; I understand the 2 stopover restriction in Europe. Thanks