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Vacations and World TravelVisiting our beautiful city? Come stay at the Arbutus Vista - Vancouver's Bed & Breakfast.
How was your trip? Which tour packages would you recommend/avoid? Must do's and must eats? Share tips, photos and experiences with other senior RS members who just want to get away..
I figured you guys might get a kick out of my upcoming adventure. I am going travelling for about 5 months, mostly backpacking, but I am a bit of a plane geek and am travelling on an Aeroplan First class travel reward.
This is the current itinerary, but the plan is to switch my return from FRA-ORD-YVR to FRA-YVR in Lufthansa first class, getting to try out the Lufthansa First Class Terminal. Availability for this cabin doesn't open until 2 weeks before the flight so I will make that change once I am on the trip.
Some of the highlights in terms of flights... Thai A380 First Class FRA-BKK, Thai 744 New First Class BKK-HND, All Nippon 777 New First Square HND-FRA, and hopefully Lufthansa's new style 747-400 with full time bed first class for FRA-YVR.
I stick with Avion. Using one card only for purchases, I try and gain as many points as possible. Then take advantage of transfer bonuses to Avios and/or AAdvantage.
I find AP an exercise in frustration. Whenever I attempt to book, availability is either never there, or I get an itinerary with multiple connections and ridiculous flying times. Plus insane YQ charges.
AAdvantage is a great program btw. Fees/taxes are next to nothing. I have flown CX F from HKG to YVR for 67,500 points plus $16 in fees.
As with any FF travel, the hard part is never collecting points. It's finding availability when you want to travel. Takes a lot of patience and research, but the result is worth it. Flying around the world in F class is a wonderful experience.
I paid for ExpertFlyer but unfortunately they have been gutted from a StarAlliance perspective. I use ANA's tool extensively but it sure would be nice to have ExpertFlyer return to full functionality.
I am on the phone with Aeroplan, trying to make something big happen... long shot, but never know.
__________________ I'm old now - boring street cars and sweet race cars.
Do you have status with *A or any other OW? if so you can try to status match it to GO if you can't get the AMEX GO.
I don't have any status at all - haven't flown (far) enough recently. I mostly do short hops between PG and YVR because I live near Smithers now, but go back to visit family. Used to have OW Ruby through JAL, but now that I don't fly back to Asia with family a lot it's gone. Dad is OW Emerald so I leech off him when flying with him.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Amuro Ray
The thing with sitting in always sitting in business or first is that you can't go back to the "commoner" economy class Posted via RS Mobile
As long as it's not China Southern economy, I can deal with it. God what a horrible airline.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hehe
4 words:
Award nexus +KVS tools.
It's just so much faster.
Award Nexus has been awesome so far. KVS looks pretty complicated...
Quote:
Originally Posted by lowside67
I am on the phone with Aeroplan, trying to make something big happen... long shot, but never know.
My goal is to try 4 First class cabins on one ticket with mandatory stops in IST, BKK - specifically the list below. My plan was to change my ticket from YVR-BKK to YYZ-SYD (to take advantage of the MASSIVE 21,000 MPM5 allowance travelling via the Atlantic).
Lufthansa (ideally with the first class terminal in FRA)
All Nippon
Thai (ideally leaving BKK to try the spa)
Asiana A380 (ICN-LAX only)
So I plotted the following outbound routing (20,060 miles)...
YYZ-IST (ticket in TK J, switch to Lufthansa F within 14 days of departure)
-stopover-
IST-CDG (TK J)
-overnight-
CDG-HND (NH F)
-overnight-
HND-BKK (TG F)
-stopover-
BKK-SYD (TG F)
-stopover-
This tickets just fine, the challenge is getting back.
This is over the mileage allowance (it is 13,334 vs 12,100 allowed) for Pacific travel and can't be ticketed... frustrating! Aeroplan is happy to pay for me to fly another 4 first class flights going over the atlantic but won't budge for this much quicker setup.
Mark
__________________ I'm old now - boring street cars and sweet race cars.
I've flown first on Lufthansa from CYVR - EDDF - VIDP. The the first class terminal at EDDF is sick and they'll drive you to the plane in a Cayenne, S500 or 750i. Defiantly worth the experiencing and ranks 2nd best F product available. The first would be Emirates, hands down the best F I've ever flown and the new lounge at the new terminal at OMBD is massive.
I will be booking a trip using Aeroplan points (75k) to HKG from YVR. Star Alliance, E50K member. I have 40 E-Upgrade points, would I be able to use these points for my Aeroplan ticket, if so how many E-Upgrade points does it use? Their site is confusing
I will be booking a trip using Aeroplan points (75k) to HKG from YVR. Star Alliance, E50K member. I have 40 E-Upgrade points, would I be able to use these points for my Aeroplan ticket, if so how many E-Upgrade points does it use? Their site is confusing
None.
Any kind of points-upgrade is only for revenue, paid tickets.
Has anybody flown with Turkish? The first international leg of my trip is TK018 and just trying to figure out about seat booking... looks like 100 days out, but just trying to confirm.
Mark
__________________ I'm old now - boring street cars and sweet race cars.
I know it's been dabbled on in other threads but I'd appreciate if anyone has any input as the best way to upgrade to business class?
The flight in question will be the second leg of our trip to Paris from Toronto to CDG
On that leg we will be playing on air Canada's A330-300
Is it best to try the day we arrive in Toronto, when we board the first leg in Vamcouver? Or right at the gate? Posted via RS Mobile
The best way to upgrade is to pay. Sometimes the paid upgrades are offered when you check in online, other times you will have to go to the desk to do it. You can probably do this in YVR for your YYZ-CDG leg. To give you an idea, there are no set prices, but a lot of people are reporting that they are being offered prices between $998 and $1600+ per person to upgrade YYZ-CDG. (EDIT - this is EACH WAY)
The second best and only other alternative is to upgrade is using your e-upgrade credits corresponding with your AC status.
If you don't pay and dont use e-upgrade credits, you simply are not getting an upgrade barring some absolute fluke. AC will happily let a plane leave with empty J seats, no questions asked.
Mark
__________________ I'm old now - boring street cars and sweet race cars.
Keep in mind, even paying up front, the difference in price is close to that much. A round trip ticket in economy YYZ-CDG is probably $1100 and I would bet that a business ticket is $4100. That's $1500 each way difference... I wouldn't expect last minute to be much of a discount, many airlines have made their policy clear that they would prefer to have their premium seats empty than devalue them by giving them away or making them cheap to get to.
Mark
EDIT...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hondaracer
Coming back from London with BA we got the world traveler upgrade for $250 each Posted via RS Mobile
Wait... that's just an upgrade to premium economy isn't it? That's a WAY cheaper class of service than business class. Air Canada doesn't have premium economy on YYZ-CDG, though they do on YUL-CDG.
Sorry it was actually the "club world" we got for 250, the individual lay flat cubicles
Although as far as I could tell on the BA 747, they only had the club world, business, then first, I didn't think there was any premium economy outside of your bulkhead seats etc Posted via RS Mobile
Sorry it was actually the "club world" we got for 250, the individual lay flat cubicles
Although as far as I could tell on the BA 747, they only had the club world, business, then first, I didn't think there was any premium economy outside of your bulkhead seats etc Posted via RS Mobile
250 GBP or 250 CDN? if 250 CDN that is a steal! but if GBP that is roughly 420 ish each.. maybe not so much of a steal.
Outside of paying the like, $50-$150 to get business on a 737 that was my only experience upgrading on long haul flights so I kind of assumed deals were to be had more readily lol
Posted via RS Mobile
Last edited by Hondaracer; 03-10-2014 at 02:50 PM.
Well no luck with Australia. It also adds a TON of fees as I end up adding another 2 first class legs (with scam charges) and Australia charges massive taxes just to fly in and out of their cities so I took a pass on that. I ended up switching my first few flights around slightly so I have an overnight in Paris rather than a same day connection in Frankfurt - seemed like a nice opportunity, I still fly the A380 with Thai, just CDG-BKK instead of FRA-BKK. Also managed to change dates slightly so I was able to add YVR-YYZ in J instead of Y. Overall, the changes added about $32 to my taxes/fees (primarily due to flying in J with AC instead of Y). Total taxes and fees are $1000 and 210,000 points with all the first class. I am still planning on switching my return home from FRA-ORD-YVR with United F for FRA-YVR in Lufthansa F for the first class terminal and direct flight but that will have to wait until 2 weeks before my return flight in October 2014.
Nice routing, just missing that TPAC leg for a RTW trip! Too bad about Australia - both the UK and Australia seem to have very high taxes/fees. Good hunting for that LH F flight, they definitely seem difficult to grab further out. Just like CX F...
However... I MANAGED TO SNAG CX F YESTERDAY!!! Two seats, all the way to Singapore, no less! It's basically like winning the lottery. I feel amazing!!! I thought I would have to fret about it closer and monitor the Award Nexus site daily, but on a whim I checked the JAL site yesterday at lunch, saw that 2 F seats had opened on Nov 30 and my fingers immediately dialed Alaska Airline's phone number. After 15 minutes of nerve-wracking waiting the agent had managed to re-book our flights. Just had to add extra miles. I managed to find a HKG-SIN F flight on the 744 as well, but it remains to be seen if it will stay a 744 because the HKG-SIN sector is a bit of a crapshoot overall in terms of what planes get assigned where.
Here's my completed itinerary:
Mark, how did you get that nice little legend to appear?
Yeah I gave up the TPAC leg as I wanted more F legs so going back via the Atlantic gives me more time in the air. I'm also flying YYZ-IST with a friend so I am stuck in J for that one though I could probably find a YVR-MUC-IST in F leg if I wasn't staying on the same flight as him. I've still been wrestling with the idea of changing my return to ICN-LAX (New OZ A380 First Suites). If I do though, I give up NH's F AND LH F plus the FCT in FRA so probably not worth it.
Congrats on CX F!!! Someday we need to have a beer, I dont know the first thing about accumulating non Staralliance points. What kind of plane do you fly for YVR-HKG-SIN?
As to the legend and the faded cities for the stopovers... I could tell you... but I'd have to kill you.
Spoiler!
Actually, Photoshop.
I created a composite image with a few different versions of the map which allowed me to create the dotted line, the legend, and fade the stopovers to 50%
__________________ I'm old now - boring street cars and sweet race cars.
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