Thoughts on Around the World Travel

I was discussing around the world travel with my friend Mary at Pies Etc. the other night and an interesting contrast came up.  Mary sees round the world travel as a month long journey to explore several continents, make 8-12 stops, and fulfill romantic travel dreams.  I see it as a way to follow in the footsteps of aviation pioneers.

Mary views RTW travel as one Atlantic crossing, one Pacific crossing, and many stops along the way.  Something like New York to Africa to Europe to India to Southern Asia to New Zealand to Polynesia, then back home.  Airline alliances sell tickets for these travels (Star Alliance, oneworld, Sky Team) that give you a certain number of segments and miles flown for a fixed price.  They can be a very good value, especially if you are going on some expensive flights.  The websites are also a fun way to play at work.  Airlines also offer RTW tickets with miles, but they offer far less.  United for example allows 5 stops (but unlimited segments) and 24,000 miles flown on their RTW ticket.  The pricing is also steep, 200,000 miles in coach, 300,000 in business, and 400,000 in first.  There are award seat limitations like a normal round trip.  Depending on your trip, it may be cheaper to assemble a collection of one way award tickets.  The ease, flight availability, and value provided from the Star Alliance RTW ticket makes paying cash look very tempting. 

My view of RTW travel is based on the International Air Sports Federation, FAI, the final authority on setting aviation records.  They define Round the World as a course beginning and ending in the same location, the course must be a minimum distance of 27,000 kilometers (16,778 miles), and the course must cross all meridians.  I can accomplish that in a few days using a few airline miles, 90,000 US Airways Dividend Miles for business class actually.  Mary decided she would not want to travel in my style and lost interest in my idea, but not before laughing after thinking of me as an aviation pioneer, wearing goggles flying over a corn field.

US Airways charges 90,000 miles to fly business class from North America to North Asia (Japan, China, Korea, and some -stan countries).  They will let you fly via the Atlantic on one leg and Pacific on the other.  You also get a free stopover at a Star Alliance hub.  This award will meet the FAI requirements, be a fun way to see two cities, and a chance to experience different business class products.

I’m thinking of Tokyo and Warsaw can be my stops.  I was booked to go to Tokyo last year, but my trip was to start the morning after the earthquake, so I took United’s refund offer (the ticket was only $700 round trip from Denver through ORD, unmatched since).  My second stop has to be a Star Alliance hub and I’d like it to be in Europe (Star’s Europe hubs are Ljubljana, Athens, Thessaloniki, Heraklion, Rhodes, Larnaca, Vienna, Helsinki, London Heathrow, Brussels, Zagreb, Warsaw, Frankfurt, Munich, Duesseldorf, Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm, Zurich, Geneva, Basel, Lisbon, Porto, Istanbul, Ankara).  I’ve already seen a few of the cities listed and want to go somewhere new.  Warsaw works well because LOT has quite a few flights into North America with outstanding business class availability.  Austrian Airlines has good availability from Japan and to North America, but I’ve already been to Vienna (It’s amazing and I recommend it to all).  Istanbul is tempting too with almost 100% business class availability from NRT to IST, but almost nothing onward to North America (United announced a new EWR-IST flight, but no business awards yet). 

I’m using Continental’s website to find availability and piece this trip together.  Once I find the flights, I’ll need to call up US Airways to book it.  I’ve heard that I should allot an hour for that call.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Travel Tip - How to Turn Off Your TV on the Plane

Personal TV's are becoming more and more common on airplanes, great news for most, but an annoyance for some.  Let me explain.  United / Continental has personal TVs in most of their 737 fleet and charge coach passengers $4 (flights less than 2 hours) or $6 (flights greater than 2 hours) for the service.  Some people who don't buy want to turn them off and sleep.  Most people do this by pushing and holding the OFF button, lower left in the picture (it also adjusts the brightness).  Some people on my last flight didn't know about that button and tried to cover the screen up with airsick bags, notebook paper, or safety cards.  Others were staring at a Lincoln car commercial run in a loop for three hours. There is an easier way.

In Flight DirecTV control on Continental 737

Travel Tip - ITA Matrix Airfare Search

Booking a trip is sometimes the most difficult part of the journey.  Luckily, Google has the solution, not Google Flight Search. The best Google travel  product is ITA Software's matrix airfare search tool:  http://matrix.itasoftware.com/?showPricePerMile=true.  This tool has more options than anything else on the web.  I love the feature that allows you to search and airport within 2,000 miles of your selected airport (a great way to find cheap flights to Europe with only one search).  You can also hand enter any number of airport codes in the search box.  It can even sort fares by price per mile.  The month long search lets you check fares of a 30 day period with several different trip duration.  The one downside is you need to book somewhere else, sometimes a challenge to reproduce the routing online, but most United agents can do it (to avoid the $25 fee, use a paper voucher or a gift certificate) and United.com works 80% of the time.

Some advanced routing codes:  (these will work with any airline code)
UA,UA+   2 or more flights on United
AA  Single flight on American
AS,UA  First on Alaska, second on United

ITA Matrix Airfare Month Long Search Example

UPDATE 6/23/13

I usually use Expedia to buy flights found on ITA Matrix.  The trick is to just be specific with departure time and airline preference in the advanced search function.  If that fails, I use Hipmunk to book a fare rather Expedia or Travelocity.  Hipmunk doesn't 100% of the time either.  Sometimes the airlines just won't sell it to you.

When doing a mileage run (trip just for miles) search like the one pictured, be sure to uncheck the Allow Airport Changes field.  Also set the Length of Stay field to 0 so you don't need a hotel; a 0 length of stay will include overnight flights in the results.

Sunrise At EWR

My favorite time at an airport is sunrise.  I spent Monday mornings at ORD watching the sunrise for about a year and was enthralled every time.  While doing some miles flying this weekend, I caught a great view of airport operations with New York City in the background.  Always nice to find a positive aspect to a flight before 7am.

Sunrise over the United Airlines jets at EWR

Travel Tip - Priority Club Points

Never pay more than $30 for 5,000 Priority Club points or more than $150 (cost of 25,000 points) for a Holiday Inn.  Priority club lets you buy 10,000 points for $60 when using their cash and points option.  If you cancel the reservation, the points stay in your account and can be used on any other stay.  Simple as that, I've been told.  I've never done this myself, but read successful accounts of this process online.  I have enough points now that I don't need to buy them, but it is great to have a simple cost equation available on when to spend money or points.

Cash & Points Option

Parenting Tips

I flew from DEN-LAX the other night and had a unpleasant and slightly uncomfortable experience thanks to the family sitting in front of me.  There was Mom, Dad, and 3ish year old daughter.  Their performance led me to create this list of tips for family flying:

• Sit in the back of the plane.  Noise travels for about 5 rows, if there aren't any rows behind you, that is 30 fewer people who hear a screaming kid.  Also, you are closer to the bathrooms and you can get up and walk around the back of the rear galley area while boarding and deplaining to keep them occupied.  
• Use your 6 inch voice.  This goes for kids, parents, and everyone else.  Talking louder to a loud kid will make them want to be even louder.  The cycle will repeat until you are both screaming.
• Parents should explain that kids need to be quiet and respectful to others.  Over the course of the flight, Mom and Dad never told the kid to be quiet, stop it, or settle down.
• Don't try ignoring your kid until they are quiet.  Three consecutive cries for DADDY should mean its time to try parenting.
• Don't get mad at the kid.  This was uncomfortable for me and the person sitting next to me.  Dad reprimanded the kid for spilling her water and he sounded very angry.
• Don't try tell the kid to scream for mommy instead of daddy.  You aren't solving the problem.
• Don't make the flight attendant be a parent.  You should have them buckled up when the seat belt sign is on.  If the cabin crew comes by to say settle down, that's a bad mark on the parents more than the kid.  
• Frontier will give them a cookie no matter how well they behave.  Make a deal with the kid that they only get the cookie is they behave.  Bribes work well at all ages.
• Don't make sex jokes to your wife.  That's just creepy for everyone.
• If they start screaming during decent and landing, give them gum or a drink to help pop their ears.  Telling them to stop making a fit is not the best way to solve that problem.

I've flown on many flights with little kids and there are many very good kid travelers out there.  This bad example was the worst I've seen in a while.