Using UA miles from Cairns(CNS)
 

Hi All,

I'm trying to figure out all my options to fly from CNS-SFO. I'm not an expert redeeming awards nor am I asking for help to find availability.

I searched for a one way award from CNS-SFO for 2 passengers but UA website kept saying "unable to process your request". What exactly does this mean?

Is this an invalid routing? Just wondering so I know for future reference. Thanks!

per Cairns Airport (Wikipedia), NZ is the only *A carrier servicing CNS and that service is seasonal (Australian winter).

UA eliminated the CNS-GUM link a couple years ago

You may need to buy a one way ticket to Brisbane or Sydney and get a Star Alliance award ticket to SFO from there. :)

I suspect its because CNS is only *sometimes* available as a *A destination. Air New Zealand, the only *A carrier that flies there according to the non-authority that is Wikipedia, only serves it seasonally. Without your date of travel, its impossible to tell if it does in fact fall outside the dates where UA would be able to book you on a *A flight at all, award ticket or not.

Thanks for the replies. I didn't know that...now it makes sense. My dates are early feb. 2018. I'll go with CX then!

As a 1k 2mm UA flyer resident in Cairns, I urge you to do anything possible to avoid flying with ANY of the Australian carriers.

Yeah, flying UA will never be the same after seeing how much better they are (eg. A 1 hr Syd-Mel flight gets a meal even in Economy on Qantas)

Looks like Silk Air might be an option, depending on when you are traveling

Don't believe UA miles can be used to redeem SilkAir (MI) flights (at least could not in the past).

UA provided meals SYD-MEL as well when it was in service. And unlike QF, they gate checked strollers too.

good thread topic - I too was looking for award options from CNS and it is sad to see UA have no Aussie airline tie ins.

Is this still true? I'm looking at SIN-Darwin, and can't get it to book as a MileagePlus award on United's website. No other star alliance on the route.

SilkAir is owned by SQ, but it’s not Star Alliance and you can neither earn nor use United miles on MI flights.

It’s an awful dodge and I wish that the other carriers would put more pressure on SQ to play nice, but that doesn’t seem likely. UA and SQ aren’t exactly best pals anyway.

You can purchase a ticket to AKL and (try to) redeem award inventory on NZ to SFO, but R and X class inventory on NZ is dismal at best. Or, you can buy a ticket to SYD and take a UA flight to SFO.

the term "meal"might be a stretch yesterday I got a hot pie in a cardboard box in Qantas economy BNE-MEL, and a nice bottle of water!

Want to use United miles for Sydney and Cairns from DTW
 

Trying to use United miles to book flights from DTW -> SYD -> CNS. We are planning on flying last week of june/first week of July. Flexible with flying dates as long as it's in June/July. So far I'm able to find flights DTW -> SYD but having no luck finding flights that go to CNS. Would be nice if at least one leg of the journey was either starting or ending in CNS. Any ideas on what I can do to fly to CNS?