Expert: Stephen Tanenbaum - 7/15/2008

Question
I am planning a RTW trip through Africa, Europe, Asia and New Zealand.  There will be two (at times we will be joined by our daughter so possibly three) travelers.  Our schedule will be flexible, how do I get connected to free air travel?

Answer
Hi Andi:

On one hand easy. I can call 1-882-8880 and ask for two free RTW tickets to for example: Nairobi, Paris, Bangkok and Auckland and a few minutes later I would have those tickets in hand....

But not that easy for anyone who is leaving the starting gate so to speak and who wishes to 'get connected' which I take to mean you are not presently using free airline travel.

Nuts and bolts: The above sample itinerary matches  your Europe, Africa, Asia, New Zealand plan. I used Chicago as the departure city. RTW tickets are available for 140,000 miles each. We and many of our readers have such miles in reserve. This does not work for those who are just getting 'started.'

I will plug you into our newsletters and my article on FREE global travel. Getting 'connected' does not mean waiting long periods before exotic free travel is available. Our newsletter article on the great current Citibank give-a-way permits everyone, like you and your wife, to simply do a few keystrokes, obtain two FREE Citibank credit cards (yearly fee is waived on all cards) and INSTANTLY receive about 40,000 American Airlines miles good for instant FREE RT tickets to any Hawaiian island, Mexico or Central America.

Of course you could keep those miles and follow our advice to obtain more and more miles until you reach your goal. However, given the fact you are now planning the trip it is not likely you can reach the RTW goal in time for the planned trip.

Here is my recent answer on the subject of RTW AirBroker tickets which you may find helpful. The answer also includes all the LINKS to our free newsletters and my free travel article. Everything you will need to get connected to the fun world of free global travel:
___________________________________________________________________
When we early retired in '99 one of our first three month trips was Around the World air broker tickets from:

http://www.airbrokers.com/

Worked like a charm. As I recall $1,599 for SFO-Hong Kong- Thailand-Greece- Paris- London- SFO  JUST AWESOME!

Just checked their web site and they still note that most
sets of such tickets are good for up to ONE YEAR. So it may be perfect for you IF it fits within the air broker ticket time frame. Read on...

All major airlines like Cathay Pacific, British Airways etc. ANd with one call you can change dates (not destinations) with no penatly or fee.

Since your teaching assignment is somewhere between 10 and 12 months this can be a problem if tickets do not extend beyond one year. ex. one year in Taiwan, 6 weeks Paris, Hawaii etc. and you may have closer to 15 months or more.

In the meantime perhaps you can use FREE airline tickets which should be easy given your departure is not until the Summer. I just answered a question re: FREE airline travel. Here is a copy of that fairly long answer:

I took a few minutes to Google and came up with this ‘current’ offer from United Airlines. Obtain this FREE credit card with a few keystrokes and United will GIVE YOU YOUR FREE RT TICKET TO ANYWHERE IN THE LOWER 48. That is to say United will give you 25,000 FREE Bonus miles good for a FREE RT United ticket anywhere in the continental U.S.

Any catches? Not really. There is the single requirement the you must spend $250 using the card which takes most of us a matter of days weeks or a month at most. Then you get the miles good for your free flight. And as mentioned this offer waives the fee for the card to the FREE RT ticket is 100% FREE.

As noted I did this off the cuff. You can learn all you need to know about free travel, how to set up your FREE United Airlines and other free airline frequent flyer accounts (that is where your miles will go till used) in my FREE newsletter. I also wrote an article on FREE airline travel so that I can easily share the info with you and others.
Here are the all important LINKS:

Check out my fun promo YouTube video for my FREE online
newsletter:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=VZ0zl1jVhPI

If for any reason the above address does not work then go to www.YouTube.com and in the search box type the name of my video:

Free Global Travel 4 You

The text, to the right of the video, has all the important LINKS to our recent newsletters including the Citibank give-a-way and my free travel article. All ARE FREE.

Just in case you will find my my FREE Travel Article at:

http://ctnsummer2007ed.blogspot.com

Read all of these and welcome to the world of FREE AIRLINE travel.

As you read NOTE my discussion of the SECOND free flight.

Ex. Fly free to MAUI and then get a free second flight from Maui to San Francisco and then the free flight home. That would cost you 35,000 miles which you can do with two Citibank credit cards offering 15,000 and 20,000   OR with the 25,000 you can fly to any TWO US cities example. If you lived in NY you could fly FREE to SF them FREE to Miami and then home all for the 25,000.

Good luck and HAPPY TRAVELS

STEVE T.