American has had really poor saver award availability recently, especially for international premium classes, which means British Airways is often the only
transatlantic award option.
Not exact matches
If availability for this flight were to dry up between now and when Elena books, looking at flights to JFK, MIA, DFW or ORD instead of all the way to MSP would again be a good
option, opting to pay a very small amount for a domestic one - way as opposed to skipping out on the
transatlantic award altogether.
Option (2) was viable but relied on American Airlines opening up
transatlantic award space — that's not happening very often anymore and I didn't fancy our chances of getting all 3 of us upgraded.
Using AA off - peak to Europe and going from there, a Flying Blue promo
award, using the ANA
award but with doing the
transatlantic leg on United metal to keep the YQ low, taking advantage of the awesome Alaska
options (especially the chance to do a RTW
option with Cathay and stopping in HKG)-- my head hurts.