Back in February, I wrote a post about how to prioritize your airline miles. The one thing you can be sure of in the miles & points game is that it’s always changing. Devaluations happen. Unexpected miles earning opportunities happen. Things happen in your normal everyday life. That is why it is a good idea to revisit your travel goals, note your progress and how have any changes affected you. I will show you how I do this as an example of how you should be assessing your own goals.
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SETTING TRAVEL GOALS
I will break this down into long-haul and short-haul from Australia as this affects which airline’s miles I choose to use. I need to prioritize long-haul trips as they are the most vulnerable to devaluations and also the most physically demanding and I am not getting any younger! The biggest challenge is that eco-tourism can add a lot of cash cost to your trip such as guided birding trips which we will need on the Africa & South America trips. We also have flights in Tahiti that can only be paid with cash. So it’s not just earn & burn miles, it’s also save up cash too!
LONG-HAUL (TOP PRIORITY)
1. Spain for World Parrot Congress with stopover enroute in Israel and a Mediterranean Cruise on the way back. Late 2014, no flexibility as conference is fixed and so is the cruise I booked afterwards. I already have the short-haul intra-Europe/Israel flights booked. I used United for TLV-NCE, Iberia Avios for NCE-TFN and TFN-VCE, all in economy as these are short segments. We can still access lounges using Priority Pass. I will be using US Airways miles for the main long-haul in business class since I got the miles cheaply with Grand Slam and I don’t trust them to not devalue their program before I could use any left over miles if I booked economy and with such long flights I would like to get some good sleep!
2. The “Mother of all African Adventures” as I blogged about in more detail. Sometime between Aug-Oct 2015, have flexibility on dates. These are more long-haul segments using Star Alliance partners and United miles.
I will be taking advantage of a stop-over and open jaw. BNE-ACC, ACC-JRO (Thai & Ethiopian) and JNB-BNE (South African & Thai or Singapore). I will need Flying Blue miles for JRO-TNR on Kenya Airways, may also possibly use them on Air Mauritius for TNR-MRU. For MRU-JNB I can use either United or Avios on South African or Comair.
United just devalued their program and while economy flights for Australia – Central/South Africa stayed the same at 50k each way or 100k round-trip, business class flights went up from 75k each way/150k round-trip to 85k each way or 170k round trip. This isn’t as bad as some other devaluations and it is unlikely United will devalue again before I can book these seats in late 2014 so I can work with these numbers. I do have enough miles for the economy seats. If we are going to travel in business, I need to somehow source an extra 140k in either Chase Ultimate Rewards or United Mileage Plus. I *may* be able to pull off 70k to upgrade the Thai & Ethiopian segments as far as Kilimanjaro but unless there is a major promo, I don’t think I can get 140k. Chase only barely approved my Ink a few months ago so I don’t think they will give me any more cards so I need to work on category bonuses as best I can from Australia. But the trip is secured as I do have enough for economy so it’s not a matter of not going it’s a matter of what class. This trip will use up my Mileage Plus balance in any case since I will use any extra miles to upgrade rather than leave them to possibly devalue further.
3. Peru, Bolivia & Chile. This will be a revisit of Tambopata since I love that place so much, plus adding on Manu Biosphere and several places in Bolivia including the Blue-throated Macaw reserve with a side trip to the Patagonian Conures in Chile. I need American AAdvantage miles for this trip using a combination of Qantas & LAN for BNE-SYD-SCL-LIM-CUZ and a return originating somewhere in Chile back to SYD, then BNE. There will be a few short hops between PEM, CUZ, LIM, VVI & SCL which I can use Avios & Avianca Lifemiles on.
The cash components of this trip won’t be cheap so I need time to save up money so I can’t do this trip before 2016, but we have complete flexibility as to when we do it. It would be booked in 2015. By then, either AA & US will have merged or remained separate. If a devaluation happens, it will probably go the same way as United with economy being left alone and increases to business class. Business class is extremely difficult to get so I figure we will be going in economy. We need 77.5k each for economy or 115k each in business. An unexpected windfall courtesy of churned Citi cards has brought enough miles to do this trip in business class at current prices with a few thousand left over. I have no idea how hard it will be to get business class awards in late 2015 so we also have the option of traveling via the USA in economy to South America for roughly the same price. This trip is secure, just need the cash now!
SHORT-HAUL TRIPS (SECONDARY PRIORITY)
Since short-haul trips require fewer miles, they are less vulnerable to devaluations. Also, as my husband & I get older we won’t want to be on super-long flights so we are saving these easy trips for after the long-hauls are done.
1. Tahiti for Ua Huka, Marquesas & Rimatara to see the lorikeets. Can use Air New Zealand with left-over US Airways miles (if I keep the Mastercard one more year for the anniversary bonus) and also thanks to the rebate promo. I brought a trip to India & Sri Lanka forward because the rebate basically gives us a free trip to any Pacific Island. There are other options using Krisflyer on NZ or American AAdvantage on Qantas & Air Tahiti Nui. The bad news is the flights to the Marquesas & Rimatara are very expensive and can’t be bought with miles so that is why this trip is on hold. I have the miles already, need the cash.
2. Indonesia (Maluku) – will probably use Qantas points acquired slowly over the years from grocery shopping & similar. Alternatively, I need to watch Garuda & Sky Team for possible miles-earning opportunities.
3. Rarotonga – my husband’s home country and also home to some gorgeous lorikeets! Can use Virgin Velocity points built up slowly as above.
4. South-East Asia (Vietnam, Laos) for birding – not yet on the planning stages but possible due to proximity to Australia and cheaper awards.
5. Fiji with visits to several islands that have parrot populations. Good candidate for either Qantas or Flybuys.
6. New Zealand south island for Kakapo, Kea, Kaka & Kakariki. Good candidate for Flybuys as there are usually cheap fares bewteen Australia & NZ.
DETERMINING MY GOALS & PRIORITIES
Now that I know where we want to go and which trips I have the miles already, I know where to concentrate my efforts. I am the only one who can get credit cards since my husband is not American so I need to put the miles in my accounts and redeem for us both. For long-haul, all trips are secure in economy and the Spain trip & South America trip are secure in business class if space is available and no devaluations happen before I can book them. I would like to do at least half the Africa trip in business (those are loooong flights) so I need to prioritize earning United Miles. Despite the devaluation, no other program will get us THAT itinerary for THAT price and the devaluation has only cost us 40,000 extra miles if we do it in business class.
For short-haul, the Tahiti trip is secure and based on my grocery spending patterns the Rarotonga one is too since it won’t happen for awhile. I’d like to explore Garuda more once it joins Sky Team and hopefully they will offer a credit card in Australia seeing as they have a lot of flights here!
Next, I will look at how to achieve these goals using mileage earning strategies for both Americans & Australians.