Getting to Aust/NZ

[ozland]

DrFUN:

 

I haven't forgotten about my promise to update if we had any more information regarding our return flight from Sydney. Unfortunately, we are STILL trying.....nothing has opened up for FF miles as yet.....or so we're told.;)

 

Jennie: Thanks for the tip about reserving a "day room". But, since we arrive at 5:30 am and depart at 1:00 am, I'm not sure how that would work for us unless we reserve a paid room for our arrival time (from the night before) and then check out into a day room (at checkout time) and stay there until 1:00 am ??? Ahhh....so many details! :confused:

[DrFUN]

Thanks so much, dear Ozland (is it Katie?)!

 

You are so thoughtful. I'm praying that you'll hear soon about getting BACK. Will they extend your two-week courtesy hold if they can't accommodate you? It would be awful to pay the R/T points for just one way! (One AA agent told me the best thing to do if you get to end of the two weeks is to book ANY date open for the return--and then keep checking to change it....)

 

Since you last wrote, I've researched ATN, and they actually sound wonderful. Are you in business or first class? Their only downside is that it's not non-stop from California, but it might be OK to get out and move around.

 

It's just too bad that AA can't get you to the coast in ONE flight, especially considering that you have two international flights. (From Phoenix, where we live, they can't even reasonably do it: We'd have to fly from PHX to DFW, cand then hange planes to fly from DFW to LAX to pick up the LAX-SYD flight--but it's only an hour by air from PHX to LAX with our home-town airline, America West/US Airways. So we'll just purchase our domestic leg, which we don't mind doing--but it's a pain because the baggage allowance is different and we might have to retrieve the baggage at LAX domestic and carry it on the shuttle to the international terminal. NOT FUN!)

 

Please know how much we appreciate you--and that we're sending positive vibes for you to get your return business seats SOON! Do let me know....

 

Best,

Mary-Lou

[ozland]

Hi Mary-Lou!

 

Thank you for your good wishes and prayers!

 

Oh, but this has been an education. I now know so much more than I ever cared to know about FF miles, and code shares, and oneworld alliances....and on and on. ;)

 

We had been told by a number of agents that we could not extend our hold on our outgoing flights......which expired yesterday. But, on Saturday, one wonderful agent told us we could extend for 10 days and she did so.

 

That is a good tip regarding booking the return for anytime that's open and THEN trying for an earlier return. We had not been told that in the many calls to date, so thanks for passing it along.

 

We are outgoing in business class, would hate to have to give it up. :eek:

 

My in-laws who will be doing this voyage from Vancouver to Sydney live in Sun City West.....so no far from you! They plan on booking their air through Celebrity.....Phoenix to Vancouver, then return from Sydney.

 

We'll keep each other posted!

 

Not Katie......it's Gail......:)

[DrFUN]

Dear GAIL: (I have no idea where I got "Katie"!! SORRY. :o)

 

Thanks to your thoughtful posts, we are now holding AA FF business seats on Air Tahiti Nui for our outbound flights (LAX to Papeete, only a 4-1/2 layover, and then Papeete to Sydney, where our 12/23 cruise embarks). We're going a week early to tour eastern Australia a bit on our own. The only problems are (1) AA can't yet find flights BACK from Auckland; (2) they can't really get us from from Phoenix to LA (only an hour via our hometown airline AmericaWest/US Airways), as we'd have to go PHX to DFW, change planes and fly DFW to LAX, which would require us to start the day before and stay overnight in LAX, so we'll just have to purchase the PHX-LAX legs (which then makes a problem with the lower baggage allowance for solely domestic flights).... But at least -- like you -- we're half-way there! Maybe we'll just STAY. ;)

 

Please feel free to email me -- DrFUN@RealisticRomance.com -- to discuss the details of our mutual frustration (and, let's hope, our ultimate success) in getting our business seats with AA FF miles. I can then also give you our phone number in case your in-laws here in Phoenix want to talk about the cruise. (We all envy your in-laws with that super extended cruise. I look forward to hearing how they enjoyed it. Maybe we could all connect at Sydney for a quick coffee or something as you're disembarking and before we embark....)

 

BTW: Tell your in-laws in Sun City West that we're professors in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism & Mass Communication at Arizona State University. My website is http://www.RealisticRomance.com.

 

Thanks again,

Mary-Lou

"Dr. FUN"

:)

[ozland]

Mary-Lou"

 

Yeah for the outgoing seats! One down and one to go!

 

Just checked this morning again and still nothing open for the return.

 

Maybe we will just have to stay too!

 

(P.S............You have mail. :) )

 

Gail

[DrFUN]

Mary-Lou"

 

(P.S............You have mail. :) )

 

Gail

 

 

Didn't receive it, Gail.... :confused:

 

Best, Mary-Lou

[ozland]

Didn't receive it, Gail.... :confused:

 

Best, Mary-Lou

 

Hi Mary Lou:

 

I just *re-sent* it......checked the address and had it right so hopefully it will reach you this time. :)

 

If not I'll go ahead a post the links here. I just wasn't sure if the moderators would appreciate me posting them here. There are a couple of links for airlines *inside* information.....but available to anyone who knows the site.

 

Let me know.

 

(P.S. If anyone else would like to have the site address just let me know here and we'll figure something out. Gee, I think I'm making this far more mysterious than I need to......:o )

 

Gail

[ozland]

Mary-Lou:

 

Just thought I'd let you know there are two roll call threads for your legs of the voyage in case you want to visit (and hadn't seen them as yet).

 

Mercury 11/23/2007 HI/Auckland Repo

 

Mercury 12/09/07 Auckland to Sydney

 

Gail

[Aussie Cruisers]

I was thinking that you may like to try Air Pacific as they are based in Fiji and use QF 747-400s and the crew are also trained by QF, so you know they are among the best in the world. Also, Fiji is more direct than Tahiti and since the coup, the place will not be full!!!!

 

Also, since you are using FF points, you may go better with a round the world ticket - okay, sounds really long, but it is not that bad... and as the tickets can be booked open, it may allow you more choice and less worry. To be honest though, I have never booked RTW with FF pts, only money, so I have NO past experience with the ease of booking these via points! I was only trying to give more suggestions!:D

[ozland]

Thanks for the tip, Aussie Cruisers!

 

We need all the suggestions we can get. We'll be hitting the phones again today and tomorrow with the airline (AA) and find that we need to make the "suggestions" to them in order to have the agent look at alternatives. ;)

[kenexx]

I was thinking that you may like to try Air Pacific as they are based in Fiji and use QF 747-400s and the crew are also trained by QF, so you know they are among the best in the world. Also, Fiji is more direct than Tahiti and since the coup, the place will not be full!!!!

 

Also, since you are using FF points, you may go better with a round the world ticket - okay, sounds really long, but it is not that bad... and as the tickets can be booked open, it may allow you more choice and less worry. To be honest though, I have never booked RTW with FF pts, only money, so I have NO past experience with the ease of booking these via points! I was only trying to give more suggestions!:D

 

Just to clarify, the Air Pacific (FJ) 744 aircraft are actually from Singapore Airlines (SQ) and interestingly are the ones that Ansett International operated before Ansett went out of business. The FJ 744s are Pratt and Whitney powered and the QF 744s are GE/RR.

 

I've got nothing better to do at 0700 on a Sunday morning...:p

 

Maurice

[jane02]

Just to clarify, the Air Pacific (FJ) 744 aircraft are actually from Singapore Airlines (SQ) and interestingly are the ones that Ansett International operated before Ansett went out of business. The FJ 744s are Pratt and Whitney powered and the QF 744s are GE/RR.

 

I've got nothing better to do at 0700 on a Sunday morning...:p

 

Maurice

Hi Maurice,

We flew Air Pacific to Fiji in Sept. The flight over left late at night from Melbourne and was a very old plane. We flew Business Class - the seats were uncomfortable - they didnt recline properly, terrible food and disinterested crew who were quite offhand when son asked nicely for a glass of water. They simply had no idea. The return flight home however was a different story - w flew into Sydney on a beautiful modern plane - great crew and a fabulous choice of food. Don't think I would fly with them again if I had a choice.

Jane;)

[DrFUN]

Also, since you are using FF points, you may go better with a round the world ticket - okay, sounds really long, but it is not that bad... and as the tickets can be booked open, it may allow you more choice and less worry.

 

Thanks for the advice--but I'm not sure what a "round the world" ticket is. I'd be grateful for clarification.

 

Best,

Mary-Lou

[DrFUN]

Mary-Lou:

 

Just thought I'd let you know there are two roll call threads for your legs of the voyage in case you want to visit (and hadn't seen them as yet).

 

Mercury 11/23/2007 HI/Auckland Repo

 

Mercury 12/09/07 Auckland to Sydney

 

Gail

 

THANKS, Gail! I'll check those. I'm still looking for your email, too--but nothing has come through yet. Wonder what happened out in cyberspace.

 

BTW: We've been checking DAILY for our return, but NOTHING is available. They said it's because of the holidays.... I'm still hopeful, but it's so frustrating to keep calling every single day. Oh, well.... :rolleyes:

 

Best,

Mary-Lou

[Aussie Gal]

Dr. Fun,

 

A Round the World ticket usually involves a couple of different airlines all within the same alliance. eg. One World would involve say Qantas and American Airlines and perhaps Cathay Pacific.

 

What happens is you buy or use your F.F. points for a ticket that literally goes around the globe. In other words, you get the ticket to go from L.A. to say Auckland and then the rest of the ticket will take you from Auckland back to L.A. via Asia and Europe. It is a long way to go home, but if you are desperate and cannot get a normal return flight home, a round the world will often be available and if you have the time you can take advantage of it. You usually can have a few stopovers eg. Singapore, London, etc before arriving back home. By the way, it does take use more points than a normal return flight.

 

Both my chlidren and their partners bought RTW tickets last year as they wanted to go via the U.S. and Canada to Europe. One couple went via Auckland, Honolulu, San Francisco, New York etc. to Paris. They then returned back via Singapore to Melbourne and the other couple went Singapore, Munich, London, New York, L.A. Honolulu, Melbourne.

 

Usually you can have 3 or so stops or even more and it is a great way to see the world. I don't think it will work in your case as I believe that time is of the essence and I think I have read that you cannot afford more than a few days to return home after your cruise.

 

Jennie

[DrFUN]

Wow! Fascinating.... We'll look into that, Jennie. THANKS! :)

[ozland]

Mary-Lou:

 

I just now realized I gave you the wrong roll call threads for your voyage. You're getting on when I get off.........I knew that........:o

 

As for the e-mail.....a mystery! I will keep trying. Maybe I'm in your spam folder somewhere!

 

Ditto on the flights. We will be calling again this afternoon. Our holds on our outgoing are about to expire so we need to lock in the reservation for those.

 

Gail

[DrFUN]

THANKS TO ALL who have provided helpful info and support about using our AA FF miles to get to Sydney from LAX and back from Auckland for our holiday cruise on Celebrity's Mercury.... We're truly grateful.

 

UPDATE:

The courtesy hold on our outbound business awards seats on AA partner Air Tahiti Nui expired in a few hours--with no return seeming possible, and we just got SOOOO tired of checking daily (sometimes twice daily) for the award seats at this busy time ... so today we just went ahead and booked Pacific Premium Economy on Air New Zealand (PHX to LAX to AKL to SYD, returning non-stop AKL to LAX and then LAX to PHX). It cost us $3200 per person -- ouch! :eek: -- but still nothing like the $8000 for real business class!

 

The downside is that there's no premium economy on the domestic portions, so we're coach PHX-LAX and LAX-PHX (no big deal as it's only an hour flight). But we're also just in coach on the AKL-SYD flight, which IS a big deal (3-1/2 hours), as we'll be very tired after SOOOO much flying.

 

Oh, well: At least we're set and can get back to working hard to PAY for all this FUN. And now we'll just have to use all those AA FF miles for other international award travel during NON-holiday time.

 

Does anyone know anything about ANZ's Pacific Premium Economy seats and service? Some online reviewers have complained about the hardness of the seats.... :(

 

DH Dave and I sympathize with those of you still working on the awards seats, and we truly hope it works out. We'll keep watching here.

 

Best regards,

Mary-Lou

[ozland]

Oh Mary-Lou, I don't blame you. I have called so often I have everything memorized by now.....AA phone #, prompt #'s, Advantage #, and Record Locators. I can now call from my cell phone from anywhere....:rolleyes:

 

We did get one return booked on Sunday night.....DH took that. DD and I are still hanging in there until Sunday when our outgoing *holds* will expire.

 

It is my understanding that we can lock in the outgoing and keep checking for a return and *add* it later if something opens up. If we don't find a FF return and have to purchase a return ticket we will still have to use the entire 125,000 miles/person for the one-way outgoing.

 

Sorry, but I don't know anything about Air NZ premium economy seats. Haven't ever flown that airline. Hopefully someone here will be able to help with that info.

 

Gail

[cands]

...

 

Does anyone know anything about ANZ's Pacific Premium Economy seats and service? Some online reviewers have complained about the hardness of the seats.... :(

 

 

 

Best regards,

Mary-Lou

 

 

Mary-Lou,

We're flying Air New Zealand premium economy from Melbourne to LA next Wednesday Feb 28th. I'll try and drop a line here to let you know how it is.

We are in premium economy for the Melbourne-Auckland section too, but we do have to change planes in Auckland. They did let us know that the meal service on the shorter Melbourne-Auckland section was stock standard economy, so we are not quite sure what to expect.

 

Cheers,

Steve.

[DrFUN]

Glad you've gotten a LITTLE progress, Gail. I'll keep sending good thoughts your way. Keep me posted....

 

BTW: The AA FF agents told us that it's not a bad idea to book some kind of return (rather than one-way) when you give the miles, as you can change that without charge if you get the return you want later. At the worst, it's a $100 fee to re-instate the miles if you decide to cancel the one-way and buy a ticket. Of course, you'd want to get that info confirmed! :rolleyes:

 

Warmest wishes,

Mary-Lou

[DrFUN]

THANKS, Steve! Have a great flight--and I'll eagerly await your review. :)

 

Best,

Mary-Lou

[illini7173]

We were able to get FF tickets through United Airlines...:):)

Both Qantas and AA told us that their FF seats are "nearly" impossible to get..but United had plenty of seat availability. Funny thing is: we're flying from SanFrancisco to Sydney on Qantas -- go figure!!

At the present time we only have the outbound tickets as we have to wait until early March to get the return tickets from Auckland, due to the 330 booking limit. United told us that it would be "no problem" on the return FF tickets.

[Globaliser]

We were able to get FF tickets through United Airlines...:):)

Both Qantas and AA told us that their FF seats are "nearly" impossible to get..but United had plenty of seat availability. Funny thing is: we're flying from SanFrancisco to Sydney on Qantas -- go figure!!

Are you sure about this? AFAIK, UA has no FF partnership agreement with either AA or QF. But it has its own SFO-SYD non-stops. I suspect you may find that you're on a United flight after all.

[Aussie Gal]

I agree with Globiliser. United is part of the Star Alliance which is completely different from One World which Qantas is part of. I think you are flying with United from S.F. as they do this trip to Sydney most days.

 

Jennie