BlissWorld

Well, let me ask you this, do you mind connecting at all if you are able to get on a better airline? Or do you just want the shortest route? Also, first is just slightly more than business, are you willing to spend the additional miles for first?

RichardInSF

Aren't there flights from IAD to PVG? And I know there is a flight from SFO to PVG! What's wrong with those choices?

robyng

Hello again Richard (and pleased to meet the rest of you too). Continental does have good service from EWR and Houston to Shanghai (and those cities are non-stop from JAX). But they are super premium type flights in business class in terms of reward travel. 150,000 miles pp each way (if any reward tickets are available at all).

As for miles - I'm not flush. I have about 200,000 AMEX points that I won't be able to convert to Continental (where I also have some miles in the bank) after September next year (AMEX and Continental are parting ways). So I'm trying to squeeze at least 1 and possibly 2 business class tickets out of those points. Preferably to Asia - preferably to China (my husband and I have never been before). For some reason - Continental frequently has cheap partner business class rewards (before Continental and Delta parted ways - it was always "cheaper" to buy a business class ticket on Delta using Continental miles than going to Delta directly - don't have a clue why). Today - there are some flights to Shanghai on United through Chicago - and lots on Air Canada through Toronto. Only 125,000 miles PP RT.

As for San Francisco - I went through the math before when we went to Tokyo - about "going west" to get east. It takes us a full day with connecting flights to get to the west coast - and we don't save any time going to Asia because of the polar route. But I'll plug in SF as a gateway - and see what comes up.

In terms of connections - my husband reminded me today that he doesn't want to leave the car at the Orlando airport for a couple of weeks. So we'll be flying out of JAX. No way to avoid connections coming out of JAX . Ideally I'd like to get to "airport to Asia" - wherever that is - on day 1 - and go to Asia on day 2 (don't much care for waking up at 3 am - and that schedule worked out fine when we went to Japan). Robyn

P.S. To Richard and those of you I've spoken with before. I didn't fall off the face of the earth. This was just my year for 50,000 mile maintenance - a bunch of minor surgeries (2 planned - 1 unplanned) that had me out of commission and kept me close to home. It's nice to be making some travel plans again .

Brattflyer

Heard a rumor from a FA today that 777 conversions have been suspended. I was on UA 917 FRA-IAD. The FA told me that everything about the plane was in disrepair toilets, seats, entertainment, with no current plan to fix or update this particular plane, which he said was the first 777 rolled out by UA 15 years ago.

Could this be in response to a forthcoming decision of whether to continue with 3 cabins or convert to the CO model of just 2? I could see this rumor having some truth to it. What do you all think?

FriendlySkies

It could just be a rumor. FAs are known for them.. As I mentioned before, I would think that UA has some sort of contract with the companies doing the reconfig. Assuming that it's a standard contract, I would guess that there would be some penalties for suspending or canceling the work..

GoingAway

It could also be that it's old config and that plane will go in for refurb yet, so they aren't doing maintenance. Never know and FAs have been known to give out wrong info on occasion

taipeipeter

Just a little warning about this issue, from a fellow stomach sleeper. UA's flat seats are not good for stomach sleeping--at least I find--because you really feel the folding seams when the seat is flat. However, if you can modify your habits slightly to side sleeping or even semi-side sleeping, they are great.

mahasamatman

FA rumors are as reliable as political campaign ads (and we've certainly had enough of those).

WineCountryUA

personally I'm more inclined to trust this source

timg

Another option, although it would likely require an extra connection, is AC via YVR. I flew to Shanghai on AC from vancouver a few months ago, and it was pretty good. In fact, I'd say the business class on AC overseas is the best of any north american carrier. Sounds like from your posts that you are willing to connect in a north american city and perhaps spend some time - Vancouver is much nicer than Toronto, in my opinion.

I am not sure how to hyperlink, but there is a thread in the CO summarizes some of the differences in business class on different airlines (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/conti...ess-class.html) - See post 14 and 21.

epiding

no IAD-PVG flights. PVG flight on UA metal only originate from SFO, ORD currently, and LAX in near future. IAD only has IAD-PEK.

unrdchi

I am a stomach sleeper and find both the first and business seats to be quite comfortable for sleeping.

robyng

Thanks for the idea. After checking lots of options - turns out Delta has perhaps the best flights/connections from JAX (through Detroit) - and some of the worst equipment. No reason to spend lots of miles on its "business class" (which doesn't look a lot better than economy class - especially since I've seen RT flights at less than $900 in economy class). The carriers with the nicest looking equipment (like AC) don't have bad flights - they're just long trips. Like spending Day 1 from JAX to YVR - then day 2 to Shanghai - arriving on Day 3. The latter is what we did to Japan - and it was tough. Note that we do like Vancouver - a lot. Perhaps we'll just end our trip in Vancouver and call it a day . Robyn

Silver Fox

I don't know about the status but I do know that my flight on Saturday has switched 777's 3 times now and leaves me on tenterhooks that I will get my preferred seat. Getting rather annoying now.

rob_flies_ua

I was booking a flight to LHR and had the choice of routing through ORD or IAD; one of the IAD-LHR options had the new seatmap loaded and NC space available. It's far enough out that the likelihood of having new seats is pretty high considering how far along the refits will be, but I ended up booking through ORD to guarantee lie-flat on the 767 and not have to worry about it.