After several iterations, I have come up with the following and would appreciate any suggestions / warnings / comments. My wife and I will be leaving in January 2008 and returning in late April 2008. The most important flights to ensure that we get in J are the long haul flights.

MCO-JFK JetBlue
JFK-PEK (CX x YVR - assuming that I wont be able to get the JFK-HKG nonstop. also, the layover time in HKG is not great, may use a 20k OW award to get better connection times and eliminate the 1,234 miles and 2 segment HKG-PEK RT)
PEK-HKG (CX)
HKG-AKL (CX) [AKL-NAN on separate tkt]
AKL-BKK (QP x SYD and BA) [BKK-CEI-HKT-HAN-HUI-DAD-SGN-REP-BKK on separate tickets which I plan to buy when I get to SE Asia - any other ideas?]
BKK-JNB (CX x HKG)
JNB-TLV (BA x LHR or IB x MAD) [TLV-AMM-ETH-TLV-IST-ATH on separate ticket]
ATH-BCN (IB) [my open jaw]
BCN-JFK (IB x LHR BA to JFK) [IB BCN-JFK as a backup]
JFK-MCO JetBlue

OW - 14 segments and 34,322 miles

> if I book 270 - 300 days in advance, how is "usual" the availability on the routes listed? In particular, JFK-YVR-HKG in early January; HKG-AKL in mid-January; SYD-BKK in early Feb (a few days before TET); BKK-JNB in early March; and JNB-TLV (x LHR or MAD) in mid-March (1 week before Easter).
> any ideas on a multi-SE Asia ticket.

I realize I am asking for a lot of feedback when no one really knows the answer (i.e. on J availability), but I would expect many of you have tried these segments in the past and may have some experience in obtaining award seats.

thanks again to the board for your feedback.

Jeff

If there were a list of the 10 most difficult routes to get award tickets on, you would have 7 out of the 10 on this ticket (plus wanting 2 seats on the same flights). But presumably you have complete flexibility on dates by a day or 2 and some routing flexibility. Which helps a lot (increases your chances by an order of magnitude). Depending on the exact travel dates, you may have most trouble with HKG-JNB-LHR; BA in particular has been known to have entire months with 0 award seat availability (but you can also try IB JNB-MAD). You probably need an expertflyer subscription to have much hope of booking this (though I'm not a fan of the accuracy of their info and it seems to be getting worse).

Good as it is EF would not help much here, as it lacks info on award availability for virtually all the airlines involved in the itinerary.

Not horribly important, but I only see 12 segments, 13 if the open jaw is counted (can't remember if they are on award tix). Gives a bit more flexibility on the routing.

JFK-HKG-PEK-HKG-AKL-BKK-HKG-JNB-LHR-TLV//ATH-BCN-LHR-JFK

Thanks for the feedback, I do have some flexibility. To the extent that I do not get 2 J seats, I will book coach and then keep trying to upgrade on the same flight.

Unfortunately, in rechecking my segment count I noticed that I was connecting through HKG 3 times (including one stopover). I believe that you can only connect in the same city twice. Also, I need to revise my trans-Atlantic segment to include AA or IB and remove BA (using AA miles). Back to the drawing board.

Yes, but the stopover is additional, so in effect you can travel through a city three times in total.

BCN-JFK (IB x LHR BA to JFK) [IB BCN-JFK as a backup]


If I intepret this correctly you want to fly BA from LHR-JFK. Can't do that.

I agree, I was planning to change to IB BCN-JFK

I take a couple of award trips to Africa each year and I check availability almost every day. The last year or so I've found that HKG-JNB on CX in J has been harder that the JNB-LHR route. Big change from a few years ago. Forget about SYD-JNB. JNB-MAD is almost always available. HRE-LHR and LUN-LHR on BA are usually open in J.

thanks. I did manage to book two J awards for BOS-JNB (xLHR) on BA for this coming April but that was done 300+ days in advance. You are right though, the availability was scarce.

good idea on the HRE and LUN to LHR. May need to go down a notch and use IB for JNB-TLV. How is the service on the IB JNB-MAD?

you read my mind since i was going to ask about SYD-JNB availability. well, i may just have to chance it with the HKG-JNB on CX.

Are you sure, i discussed with an AA agent and she said no, even the website says only 2 stopovers:

http://www.aa.com/content/disclaimer...XU1DUQBFFSWVMD

Your site says what people have interpreted the rule to be. You are allowed two connections through any one city. You are allowed only one stopover in any one city. Thus, you are allowed two connections and one stopover in any one city. So under the rules I could do LAX-xNRT-xHKG-oPEK-xHKG-oDPS-oHKG-oNRT-LAX

IB on MAD-JNB in J is fine. Good seats actually. Never done the route in Y. The biggest problem that I have with these flights are that they leave late from MAD which I don't like and they arrive in JNB too late to catch the connection flight that I like to take.

SYD-JNB seems harder to book than LAX-SYD which we already know is almost impossible.

Don't count on getting the CX flight.

Sign up for both Asiamiles (CX) and the Qantas QFF programs and you can see award availability on their respective websites. Note it may not be the same inventory/quantity for AA members as it would be for their own, but it's certainly better than the EF info blackout.

Yeah your logic makes sense, I just couldn't get that lady to budge, I should have used the logic: Connections are less than 24hrs and stopovers more than 24hrs. Does the origination city and destination city have to be the same or even in the same country?