dennisr said:
May wish to consider checked baggage allowance when selecting an airline. Believe all US airlines to Argentina now allow only one free checked bag. LAN is about the only airline allowing two free checked bags from CONUS to Argentina.
If you have status with a US airline they give you a greater baggage allowance, on UA,CO, or Copa I get 3 70lbs bags for free even when traveling in coach.
There used to be a way to trick Copa fares and take off around $560, but that closed about a month ago, just flew my last tricked fare on them to the US at around $500 rt, and got upgraded on all 4 legs to Executive class for free. There is still one airline that can be substantially tricked from BA to the US, but there base fares are to high to make it worthwhile.
What I am starting to do now for travel to the US is a combination of using miles, and creative routing to combine two trips for one price One example would buying a ticket from BA to Europe, and then Europe to the US, which can be had for under $800 with no tricks, and gets me(with elite bonuses) up to 30,000 RDM's(redeemable miles), and then using those miles (20,000-30,000 depending on the airline) for an award ticket back to BA.
Here is a trip just completed,
EZE-JFK(stopover)JFK-HKG(stopover(J))HKG-IST(Stopover(CC))IST-OTP(stopover(Travelled back to IST by train))IST-LAX(Stopover(CC(driving between LAX and SFO)))SFO-ORD(stopover)ORD-MIA(stopover)MIA-EZE
The total cost for all the flights was right around $1,500(and 1 upgrade certificate), which I don't consider to bad a deal for a 4 continent trip over 6 weeks, also the trip will netted me about 65,000 redeemable miles(enough for a free EZE-USA r/t), and 40,000 medallion qualifying miles.
(J) denotes the flight is in Business class, (CC) denotes the flight is in Comfort Class which is Turkish Airways premium economy product, like a US domestic first seat but better, the other flights are in economy but are upgrade eligible(except IST-OTP), and I cleared all the upgrades at no additional cost to me.
I am still building my next trip which is little more complicated than the last, as it has tie in's to the trip after it, but here is what it is starting to look like,
EZE-LON(stopover(J))LON-MIA(stopover(J))MIA-SAN(Stopover)SAN-SFO(stopover)SFO-SEA(stopover)SEA-PEK(Stopover)PEK-PVG(Stopover)PVG-NRT(Stopover)NRT-BKK(Stopover)BKK-SGN(stopover)SGN-LAX(Stopover(J))LAX-IAD(Stopover)IAD-EZE(Stopover(J))
The total net cost of the trip will be around $2,200, and will net me approximately 90,000 redeemable miles.
