Using miles to cross the Pacific
 

Hi everyone,

I have Miles&more miles I would like to use to cross the Pacific from either Australia or New Zealand to South America, sometime between November 20 and November 27
From what I see, Air New Zealand has a direct flight from AKL to EZE 3 times a week but with my limited experience in looking for award flights I see no availability for my dates.
The other option would be flying United to North America and then flying to South America from there. Both Air New Zealand and United have low additional fees.

Anyone has experience in crossing the Pacific using miles? Is there a chance Air New Zealand will offer more award seats?
Do you know of any other option to get from Australia to South America?
I find a flight, how do I book it?
If I have to fly trough USA, is there a chance I could have a stopover there?

Thank you for any help or tips you could provide

Do you mean November in one month? That will be _very_difficult.

Regarding AKL-EZE on NZ, NZ is known not to release seats to *A partners. As this route appears to be doing well, it's highly unlikely you'll find any availability.

On *A you don't really have much choice. I would do it like this: go on UA and search any combination of awards between (SYD, MEL, WLG, AKL) and (EZE, SCL, GIG, GRU, PTY). If you find a seat, any seat, go to the Aeroplan website and search the same flight. If it is available there as well, call M&M and feed them exactly what you find (i.e. "I want XX123 on XX/11/17", not "I want to fly from XXX to YYY"). They will book for you and quote the surcharge.

I see a seat from AKL to LAX on 15/11 and 16/11 with a connection to PTY. Beyond that, it's probably going to be easier to purchase a revenue ticket.

Good luck!

Uff, I didn't know it will be such a big problem. Unfortunatelly 15.11 or 16.11 is not an option because I am arriving to Australia on 18.11 and was have to stay there for a couple of days.

If I arrange the flights myself, do I still pay Australia-South America region-to-region or it is considered as two separate region-to-region hops ?

Also keep in mind that a connection in a different region (like North America) will make this into a 3 region award (in the M+M program). Significantly more miles. A One Way 3 region also does not allow any stops (the RT allows this).

I am confused now... is there such a thing as one-way three region?

Yes, in the M&M program, you have to pay the higher number of miles for a 3 region award if you connect a 3rd region when travelling between two other regions, even if there is no other way to fly between the two regions:

Since you'd be connecting in North America during your trip from Australia/NZ to South America, you'd have to pay 50k miles in Y / 92.5k miles in J for a one-way trip.

I ended up booking a business class seat in New Zealand flight AKL-EZE for 67k miles and only 22 EUR in surcharges. Unfortunatelly the flight is much later than I was hoping for but this was the only reasonable option I was able to find that wouldn't cost me a fortune.

On the positive side, I am looking forward to flying on a Dreamliner for the first time, business class on it should be awesome.

Now thr question is how to move around South America cheaply.

Thank you guys for your help!

Excellent find, well done!

Did you use any specific trick or did you just add flexibility?

I had to extend my search to December because there were no seats available in November. The first available economy seat was another week later or so.

I found the seat on united.com and double-checked on aeroplan as suggested by you earlier.
Surprisingly, there are seats available for tomorrow which might suggest they do release award seats from time to time. I will check tomorrow if an earlier flight shows up and try to rebook (there should be 24 hours allowed to cancel the booking I have made)