Back from Europe on OneWorld

[Matt]

Get the miles while you can, before they aren't as good for most redemptions...

Yep! I have the 3 of us booked on AA to LHR next summer, which took me down to 25K and her to 50K... 1 card each saves me pulling the trigger immediately on the SPG txf...

Am now starting to plot the return from another EU city, time to start looking up the OneWorld routes.

 

[TheBOSman]

AMS-LHR-XXX

Save yourself a $150 payment per person to Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs , but not making it to the CDG or FRA folks who charge quite a lot as well...

Also don't forget AB's new routes to BOS and DFW (and SFO) starting up, availability might still be good on those and that's a decent trip for business class with no surcharges.

I'm down to ~130k AA myself, looking probably at one last Australia/New Zealand trip.

 

[Matt]

I moved this out of the L2 thread before people got mad at me!

Good ideas, but I'm looking non-stop. Am considering AB, IB and wondering who else has a non stop to NY.

 

[Mountain Trader]

Finnair runs a non-stop from Helsinki to JFK. I have not flown them but I would.

Helsinki is pretty cool little city for a 2 or 3 day visit, and Tallinn in Estonia is an easy ferry ride of a couple of hours to an active city with an interesting past and vibrant present. We're going back to HEL for a few more days next spring as we didn't get to all the shopping we wanted to see.

The Hilton at HEL airport had the best free breakfast we've ever had, and the rest of the hotel is very good too.

 

[Matt]

Finnair runs a non-stop from Helsinki to JFK. I have not flown them but I would.

Helsinki is pretty cool little city for a 2 or 3 day visit, and Tallinn in Estonia is an easy ferry ride of a couple of hours to an active city with an interesting past and vibrant present. We're going back to HEL for a few more days next spring as we didn't get to all the shopping we wanted to see.

The Hilton at HEL airport had the best free breakfast we've ever had, and the rest of the hotel is very good too.

Was thinking of them, not sure if I've been there before or not... too many places seemed the same back when I explored that part of the world! But the non stop option works. Tallinn is certainly new to me, and would be cool.

 

[Mountain Trader]

Rick Steves has pretty good coverage of both HEL and Tallinn.

 

[smittytabb]

Finnair runs a non-stop from Helsinki to JFK. I have not flown them but I would.

Helsinki is pretty cool little city for a 2 or 3 day visit, and Tallinn in Estonia is an easy ferry ride of a couple of hours to an active city with an interesting past and vibrant present. We're going back to HEL for a few more days next spring as we didn't get to all the shopping we wanted to see.

The Hilton at HEL airport had the best free breakfast we've ever had, and the rest of the hotel is very good too.

I can vouch for all of the above. I've flown Finnair nonstop to Chicago from Helsinki, have visited Tallinn and Helsinki and really enjoyed both. I went back to Helsinki last summer and even stayed at the Hilton at HEL airport the second time. I also liked the hotel and had access to the Club Lounge as a Gold member and had breakfast and reception that ended up being dinner in the lounge as well. If you stay here you can get into town easily by taking the Finnair bus that stops at the terminal right near the hotel. I found this an easy way to get to the heart of the city with no hassles.

 

[nickelfish1]

I'm open to suggestions too!!

Trying to get four of us home. We're flying JFK-LHR-SPU in first and have return tickets on AA hold from CDG in economy.
**BA business fees are $325/pp while Icelandair CDG-JFK is $351/pp with an hour layover in KEF. With the cost the same I'd rather pay IA since KEF-JFK is a breeze.

The original plan was SPU, drive to DBV ferry/fly to BRI. Fly to CDG and then JFK. Now, its looking like it'll be Bosnia/Montenegro instead of Bari.
I can get to Split via London easily on pts but trying to go home the same route can't be done without two or three layovers.
We didn't really want to go to Paris but if it's the best route home we'll go for a few days.

 

[SanDiego1K]

I'm open to suggestions too!!

Trying to get four of us home. We're flying JFK-LHR-SPU in first and have return tickets on AA hold from CDG in economy.

There is a OneWorld connection on Iberia to Madrid from Dubrovnik, overnight in Madrid, and onward to New York on AA.

AA has a nonstop FCO-JFK flight if you can find an inexpensive flight to Rome.

I use flights.google.com when I'm working on possible routings. You can choose a specific airline, a specific alliance, nonstop, one stop, class of service.

I love the Croatian coast but it is surprisingly difficult to find flights, whether to Dubrovnik or Split. Croatian Airlines is part of Star. There are many seasonal flights, some on budget carriers.

 

[nickelfish1]

AA has a nonstop FCO-JFK flight if you can find an inexpensive flight to Rome.

Just checked it out...no saver awards for four people on our date....and refuse to pay 65k to fly economy.
I could leave two days earlier and get economy saver's for four at $263 pp with a LHR stop. Seems I should stay the two days and pay $351 on Icelandair.

 

[Matt]

Just checked it out...no saver awards for four people on our date....and refuse to pay 65k to fly economy.
I could leave two days earlier and get economy saver's for four at $263 pp with a LHR stop. Seems I should stay the two days and pay $351 on Icelandair.

I found that route popular and hard to get, mxp was more open though.

I've also been looking at secondary airports in uk- AA seems to have a number of nonstops. Couldn't find much in J though...

 

[niehaubs]

This might be more specific than Europe-US but I will be searching and hoping to get some IST-CVG flights for mid-November next year. Best routing I can find searching as far out as possible for reference is IST-LHR-PHL-CVG. I am super willing to pay the BA fees for this award, but I need 3, preferably all in the same first or business class. I had no luck finding anything from IST through Madrid to US or on AB. So sad. Done all my searching on AA.com. Any other options? I see I can use less miles with Aeroplan and go IST-YYZ-CVG, which is also pretty awesome routing, but not OW. Star is my 2nd option though.

 

[dukerau]

This might be more specific than Europe-US but I will be searching and hoping to get some IST-CVG flights for mid-November next year. Best routing I can find searching as far out as possible for reference is IST-LHR-PHL-CVG. I am super willing to pay the BA fees for this award, but I need 3, preferably all in the same first or business class. I had no luck finding anything from IST through Madrid to US or on AB. So sad. Done all my searching on AA.com. Any other options? I see I can use less miles with Aeroplan and go IST-YYZ-CVG, which is also pretty awesome routing, but not OW. Star is my 2nd option though.

Is there a reason you are focused on oneworld? Turkish will be the best routing as you pointed out (I imagine you could also do IST-ORD-CVG or IST-IAH-CVG). As for oneworld, searching on aa.com will only show availability on AA, AB, AY, and BA. The major partner you're missing there is IB. You need to search on ba.com, iberia.com, or a paid service (ExpertFlyer, Award Nexus, etc) to search Iberia availability via Madrid. If using ba.com or iberia.com, definitely search by segment.

 

[niehaubs]

I have the points to burn with AA (250K remaining), and I did search on BA for the segments through Madrid without a lot of luck. I have just recently started looking at the Star routings and the transfer partners to get the best mileage rate. I only have like 5K United points so anything Star will come out of my Chase URs (or MR, or SPG depending on the program, of course). I particularly liked the Air Canada IST to YYZ on the Dreamliner option.

 

[dukerau]

I have the points to burn with AA (250K remaining), and I did search on BA for the segments through Madrid without a lot of luck. I have just recently started looking at the Star routings and the transfer partners to get the best mileage rate. I only have like 5K United points so anything Star will come out of my Chase URs (or MR, or SPG depending on the program, of course). I particularly liked the Air Canada IST to YYZ on the Dreamliner option.

To fly business class one way on Turkish, Aeroplan is the best mileage rate @ 52.5k, going up to 57.5k for bookings made after 12/15/15. If you need round trip (and are flying on the no fuel surcharge *A airlines - United, Swiss, Turkish, SAS, Brussels - at least for the overwater segments) you'd be better off with ANA at 88k round trip.

 

[smittytabb]

Don't forget to look at

www.skyscanner.com

for less well known routings and airlines in Europe.