Help with award plan B to Cape Town next June
 

Help with award plan B

I have just over 200,000 miles on both American and United (appreciations to all of you!) so am open to OneWorld or StarAlliance suggestions and will post this in both FlyerTalk areas.

I have Gold on AA and no status on UA.

I want one award ticket to Africa, round-trip, business (or first).

I am unwilling to fly without an advanced reserved seat (thus, if BA, first).

I will go through BAA if I have to (I have a carry-on that will work for me and will check one bag).

I depart from SFO (or SJC).

My preferred routings are BA SFO LHR CPT or UA/SAA SFO FRA CPT.

I must be in Cape Town, South Africa by Friday June 27, 2008. I’d like to arrive there Thursday June 26, leaving US Tuesday June 24.

I will start phoning at -330. I’m posting for help because these routings seem very hard to get and I wonder if you could suggest alternative routings using either network so that when I call I have in mind my options. And if you have input on which call to make first?

I’ll be returning about a month later, probably from DAR. I’ll have a few days flexibility for the return Do I fake a return date, purchase the award, then change? Will they hold for at least a few days, so that return will be in the computer?

Sylvia

The first thing that comes to my mind is that you cannot use AA miles to travel SFO-LHR on BA.

YVR-LHR would be the solution.
You can do SFO-YVR on AS. Connecting times in YVR might not be the best though... You could also fly AA to another gateway in Canada or Mexico and pick up ur BA tatl from there.

Try SFO-YVR(AS)-LHR(BA)-CPT(BA) return. NA to Africa Partners award for 150k in J and can be routed via Europe on 1 award.

As for the return date - for AAdvantage awards, dates can be changed for free after ticketing, however the ticket will only be valid for a year from date of issue.

BA availability LHR-CPT is difficult year-round.

An acceptable alternative, and one which avoids BAA ;) , is to use LH or SA from FRA or MUC or LX from ZRH, using LH or UA across the pond. There is generally more *A availability via MUC, FRA and ZRH than with BA via LON.

Good luck.

If BAA isn't a problem :eek: and the OP really wants BA for some reason - LHR-JNB-CPT should be slightly easier. JNB-CPT is operated by ComAir - I believe awards can be had on BA franchises like regular BA flights?

The easiest to obtain FF mile J class award to Africa is MAD-JNB on IB.

LHR-CPT has actually been easier this year than LHR-JNB, but neither is very easy. F awards for JNB/CPT actually seem easier to score than J.

If trying to use AA miles it's almost certain that the routing would be SFO - east coast (probably JFK, could be BOS) - LHR on AA metal, then BA to JNB or CPT, then back the same way. Alternatives would be SFO-JFK-LHR-MAD-JNB-CPT using IB, or even LHR-HRE-JNB-CPT with a several-hour layover in Harare. Might also get routed through ORD.

YVR-LHR in a premium cabin is almost as hard to score as JNB or CPT.

Frankly if it was me I'd look either for a Oneworld Award from the east coast of the US to CPT (130K miles in J) and fly on a paid ticket to the east coast. You'd need 2 OW carriers in addition to AA, so likely would be JFK-(AA)-xLHR-(BA)-xMAD-(IB)-xJNB-(BA)-CPT and v.v.

Another solution is to use Star miles to Europe then AA's excellent 75K J award Europe-Africa.

You wouldn't necessarily need to buy a ticket to the east coast...

LAX-CPT is 9993 miles, so it would also be 130K miles in J. SAN is even closer.

SJC/SFO-LAX might be a little cheaper than a paid transcon.

Thank you for all the suggestions. No, I'm not wedded to BA; I didn't know I couldn't use miles on BA from SFO to LHR (I did know I couldn't earn them). Before, I've been in earning mode and paid for SFO coach to Europe on UA, used miles to upgrade sometimes, then used miles from Europe onwards. Now I'm in spending mode. I'll check out the other options and connections going east on OneWorld. I have occasionally been able to get SFO JFK non-stop with miles.

Using *Alliance, FRA CPT is also hard to get and UA availability generally shows much more from SFO going through BAA than FRA/MUC.

I guess two legs is going to become three or four!

I want to have in front of me some alternatives before I call, and have decided which network to start with.

Sylvia

Have you considered using IB to get between Europe and Africa?

The main downside of using IB is that you would have to fly via JNB.

... and no first class, in case your heart is bent on that.

I'd try and make it a true RTW. Fly on CX to HKG and onward to JNB, switching to BA for the JNB-CPT flight. Finally, route via LHR or MAD to get back to the States.

Perhaps:

SFO QF x/YVR BA x/LHR BA CPT ?

Not sure if the schedules line up, but could be the most comfortable mostly BA-option.

The QF flight between SFO and YVR is seasonal.

Since the OP has some rather specific dates, relying on hard-to-get routes like YVR-LHR-CPT at the peak period is (IMO) almost unreasonably optimistic. BA in particular is not that keen to release seats on high-revenue routes like CPT, at least not at a point where the OP could count on getting specific dates.

I suspect the reality is that beggars won't be able to choose much, hence things like AA over the pond and IB ex-MAD will be the most likely outcomes.

PresRDC's idea about turning it into a bona fide RTW by going west is intriguing - except there you run into CX availability in the summer. SFO-NRT-HKG-JNB with JAL as far as Tokyo or HK might be more doable, but again, probably the best thing is to throw yourself at the mercy of the AA award people and hope for the best.

One thing I would encourage the OP to do is join Qantas' FF program and use their award availability engine to look at Oneworld flights to the desired destinations. It defaults to BA for transatlantic availability, so not useful for AA miles, but in most other routes it's a pretty good tool for seeing availability.