We just booked our first ever flight with Regent (to Cape Town) - in fact with any cruise line -- because the number of miles required for business class was absurd. I relied on my TA to explain the process and my options. Although we live in Tucson, I consulted with my TA and told him to get us a flight out of LA. We can hop on Southwest and be in LA in an hour. Even when we book mileage flights, they always depart from a large city (hard to get anywhere from Tucson) My TA told me to look at my options for flights to Cape Town from LA. I chose Qatar flights because I wanted to try a Qsuite and I got exactly the flights I requested. I found the process easy.