OK, I'm relatively new to FT. I've been flying for over 30 years, mostly East Coast. A couple of transatlantics for vacations.

Other than vacations, all my flying has been in order to get someplace. The closest I ever came to a mileage run was last year when I needed some segments on US, but I didn't do it because I used some miles for a vacation trip.

As I read the posts on the various forums ("lurk and learn"), people often casually mention RTW trips. I mean, fly around the world for...what? Just to do it? Mileage runs? I'm imagining the "to do" lists:

1. Eat breakfast
2. Meet with Joe
3. Fly around the world
4. Watch tv

Is this a big deal, or is it really cheap, or is there something I'm missing?

Do you all do it once a month or so just to, I dunno, torture yourselves? What kind of a group have I stumbled into?

While I haven't done one, it seems to mostly be a mega-vacation.

Much like a cruise that stops in various ports of call, you build an RTW itinerary to visit the places that you want to spend some time.

You might start in London for a few days, then go on to Egypt and see the pyramids, catch another flight to India to catch up on your spiritual guidance, fly on to Hong Kong to stock up on DVD's, and wrap it up with a week on the beach in Cabo San Lucas before heading back to New York.

I think you can string together a large number of stops with the general delimiter being the number of miles you fly in total (which determines the price). The big rule is no backtracking (including specifically a limit of 1 Atlantic and 1 Pacific crossing), and some limits on the number of stops on your home continent.

Now, some really travel often enough that they use these tickets as a pricing tool, structuring complex nested itineraries combining multing RTW itinieraies with various point-to-point and round-trip itinieraries.

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robb is clearly within the margin of sampling error - Googlism

It might be worth to note that Skyteam RTW awards allow backtracking only within a continent.

FYI, one good place to learn more is on the Star and OneWorld forums. Do a search on RTW. There are real experts on RTWs there.

Some people flying on business find it more economical to purchase rtw tickets....even with origin in another country. This seems to be the case particuolarly for travel to/from Asia in business class.

I've set a goal to do one next year for a 2 month renewal leave. Working in non-profit, I never dreamed I could do something like this, but I've already got more than enough miles banked, and am piling up hhonors points for lodging. I intend to sign up for award flyer (Randy's FF Travel Agency) to help with all the award bookings.

This trip wouldn't have been possible without knowledge learned from this community. Cool, huh?

JP

Cool is right! Before I discovered FT, my goals were something like getting an aisle seat. Now I'm saving for a Concorde trip (something I had thought perpetually impossible) and now it looks like an RTW might be in the cards, too.

I love these guys.

--RTW?--Take the long-road home...and you can have great French food, an Italian feast and come home with a belly-full of Chinese Food. --RTW is a great deal--not advertised and only known by "those-in-the-know"--Now, you know. --

I found it exhilirating to keep flying in one direction, more or less, until I eventually got back where I'd started. Plus, it was a great opportunity to combine trips to places that wouldn't ordinarily make for a single trip. For me, the contrasting harmonies of Paris and Hong Kong, Dublin and Bali made for an especially satisfying set of places to visit.

Plus, the mileage opportunities can be immense, and the planning (which can be as much or more fun than actually going) can be a full-time job.

Finally, it's a lower-cost way to fly in premium cabins. A Boston-London round-trip in 1st class would cost me over $12,000(!); conversely, I can fly 1st class around-the-world with an amazing itinerary for a bit over $7,000 -- that's flying RTW 1st-class for 60% the price of a BOS-LHR trip!

Can do your RTW over a number of months, right?

Can you can use another separate R/T ticket to get home, say, and then return to the city you were at (or another city) and continue it later on?

Rules vary by airline/alliance. Within one, there may be more than one category of RTW ticket.

The maximum time to use a ticket is usually around a year. There's also often a minimum, 10 days or so, to prevent people from using them as cheap business- or first-class trans-ocean tickets for business trips. (See wideman's post above for an example of the potential savings, if your trip can extend over more than a week plus its two adjacent weekends.)

Returning to your city (or country, or continent) of origin usually ends the trip. However, I know one couple that bought an RTW starting somewhere else, traveled to some places, came home, stayed several months (which for purposes of their tickets was a stop-over) and then traveled to more places. Two long vacations, all first class travel, at a reasonable price. (They had to get to and from the ticket's nominal point of origin, of course, but with all the miles they have for upgrading cheap tickets that wasn't too costly.)