RTW planning & airfare

wrote in message
...
You folks are really a wealth of information. Thank you.

If I have this right:

1 - EgyptAir is not yet a member of Star Alliance, and (most likely)
won't be by April 2008. So toss that out.
2 - I could, however, fly with EgyptAir on my own dime, and then
resume my Star Alliance RTW. The EgyptAir miles would somehow count
for my total RTW mileage as "overland" miles.
3 - This is ridiculous in retrospect, but just because an airline
"serves" airport A and airport B, that doesn't mean there's a flight
from A to B. At all.
4 - Travel agencies can get RTW tickets for you; they're not mutually
exclusive. Of course, they'll tack on their fee.
5 - Three-letter codes are airports; two-letter codes are airlines;
one-letter stuff refers to classes.
6 - Airfare for the kind of travel I'm planning will likely be in the
$4000-$5000 range (economy class).
7 - If I get an RTW, it may be cheaper to pop up to Canada (I'm in
Chicago) and start the trip from there.
8 - When comparing ticket prices, don't forget taxes. Apparently they
can be hefty.
9 - Given my itinerary (no Americas, no Europe), Star Alliance is my
best bet for an alliance RTW.

Thanks again.
-Jake

An example.

When my son left university he bought himself a oneWorld RTW from STA in
London. It was issued on a BA ticket. The routing was

LHR/SIN overland HKG/TPE/TYO/MEL overland SYD/AKL/LAX/SFO overland
CHI/LHR

He got to Singapore, took the train up through Malaysia to Bangkok (with
various stops on the way) where he was supposed to join a tour to Hanoi.
That got cancelled so he bought a local plane ticket to Hanoi where he
picked up a second tour through southern China to Hong Kong. In HKG he got
a second China visa and went back to Guangzho to visit a friend for
Christmas. In the new year he picked up his flights again until he got to
Australia. When he got there he went to reconfirm his flight and the
person in Qantas said "do you know you can have some flights in Australia
for a nominal fee?". So they reissued his ticket and I forget the precise
routing but he went to Ayres Rock, the Great Barrier Reef and Brisbane.
Back on the original routing he got to the US having spent a month in NZ
took the train from Oakland up to Vancouver (Canada), met a friend and they
travelled together all the way to Halifax. He then had a couple of weeks
to kill because he wanted to be in Chicago on a specific date. This time
he went to American who reissued his ticket again to fly
YHZ/NYC/DFW/Chihuaua/DFW/ORD and again there was a cost but not too high.
He went for a ride on the Copper Canyon railway. The day he was due to fly
home from Chicago BA went on strike and he ended up on an AA flight back to
London.

Took him nine months.

Enjoy yourself.

"Henry" wrote in message
.. .
Graham Harrison wrote:

wrote in message

2 - I could, however, fly with EgyptAir on my own dime, and then
resume my Star Alliance RTW.

Graham Yes

The EgyptAir miles would somehow count
for my total RTW mileage as "overland" miles.

Graham No. It is a separate ticket. The Star ticket has its' [sic]
own
mileage. Any ticket you buy on any other airline is a completely
separate
deal.

Actually, Jake is exactly right. Say you wanted your world-round to
include ...-FRA-ADD-CAI-SIN-... . Since there is no *A service bertween
Ethiopia and Egypt, ADD-CAI would have to be on a separate ticket,
without regard to the RTW. But, for RTW mileage purposes, the ADD-CAI
sector IS counted, as an 'intermediate surface segment'. *A doesn't know
or doesn't care how you get from ADD to CAI; all they know is that your
RTW paused with a stopover in ADD and resumes with a departure from CAI,
and according to the rules the distance between those points must be
included in the total count of the RTW.

cheers,

Henry

You're right. I hadn't looked at the rules. In addition, both CAI and
ADD will be considered as a stopover against the maximum number allowed.

3 - This is ridiculous in retrospect, but just because an airline
"serves" airport A and airport B, that doesn't mean there's a flight
from A to B. At all.

Graham Yes, but not ridiculous.
--------------
I meant my thought was ridiculous (that there would be a nonstop
flight from A to B). EgyptAir isn't part of *A, but I saw that
Lufthansa serves both TLV and CAI. Of course, to get from TLV to CAI
on Lufthansa means going via Frankfurt...

Okay, one more general question for now:
If I have a *A RTW, and I'm having such a blast in Delhi that I want
to push the next flight back five days, how do I do that? I call the
carrier for that leg and see what happens?

If instead, I'm on a travel agent's hodgepodge of one-way tickets,
what then? Do I have to call my travel agent in America?

And thank you all particularly for the jargon lessons. It's tough to
even phrase a question appropriately without knowing the difference
between, say, "nonstop" and "direct," or the difference between an
airport code and a carrier code.

best,
Jake

wrote in message
...
3 - This is ridiculous in retrospect, but just because an airline
"serves" airport A and airport B, that doesn't mean there's a flight
from A to B. At all.

Graham Yes, but not ridiculous.
--------------
I meant my thought was ridiculous (that there would be a nonstop
flight from A to B). EgyptAir isn't part of *A, but I saw that
Lufthansa serves both TLV and CAI. Of course, to get from TLV to CAI
on Lufthansa means going via Frankfurt...

Okay, one more general question for now:
If I have a *A RTW, and I'm having such a blast in Delhi that I want
to push the next flight back five days, how do I do that? I call the
carrier for that leg and see what happens? Graham you can either call
the carrier with whom you already hold a reservation or, if there is
another star carrier serving the route (e.g. both UA and LH serve CHI-FRA)
call the carrier you want to travel on or call the carrier whose ticket
you bought. It's worth noting that even though you are buying a "star"
ticket the ticket is actually sold by one member airline (even if you buy
it from an agency). That airline then passes the money to each of the
other carriers when they actually take you from A to B. If you read my
post about my son you'll see that he started with a BA oneWorld ticket
which then metamorphosed into a Qantas oneWorld ticket which then turned
into an American oneWorld ticket. Each time he changed his routing the
carrier he was then talking to accepted his previous ticket as part
payment for the new ticket. It's one of the real boons of dealing with
the mainstream carriers rather than Ryanair, Southwest, Jet Blue, Easyjet
and all. The mainstream/legacy carriers, even across alliances, accept
one anothers' tickets (within certain limitations -one of which is that
the RTW tickets have to stay within the alliance).

If instead, I'm on a travel agent's hodgepodge of one-way tickets,
what then? Do I have to call my travel agent in America? Graham ask the
agency. I suspect that calling back to the US will probably be the best
way forward but that's a guess on my part.

And thank you all particularly for the jargon lessons. It's tough to
even phrase a question appropriately without knowing the difference
between, say, "nonstop" and "direct," or the difference between an
airport code and a carrier code.

best,
Jake

" wrote:

Okay, one more general question for now:
If I have a *A RTW, and I'm having such a blast in Delhi that I want
to push the next flight back five days, how do I do that? I call the
carrier for that leg and see what happens?

Yep. They reissue the ticket and you enjoy the extra days in Delhi...

On Dec 24, 7:46 pm, Rick Blaine wrote:
" wrote:
Okay, one more general question for now:
If I have a *A RTW, and I'm having such a blast in Delhi that I want
to push the next flight back five days, how do I do that? I call the
carrier for that leg and see what happens?

Yep. They reissue the ticket and you enjoy the extra days in Delhi...

Thank you all. Very informative stuff. Time for me to start pegging
down the itinerary, and then I'll call either the travel agent (still
debating what the agent can offer that I can't do myself) or call
United (first leg carrier). Then I may have more specific questions,
but for now, I feel much better informed.

Thanks again all. Safe travels.

-Jake