tooshy said:Thank you for explaining and oooh making it sound so tempting. Good luck on your travels. But really we need to be retired before we go on one of those trips. What's stressful is the planning and scheduling before a trip. So I've found a way around it...just schedule the soonest flight out!! We did that last year and that was the best trip ever. Don't know if you can do that for RTW jaunts, must take a lot of planning huh? Like how long you'll be in each of countries 3 - 6!!

Countries 3 - 6 are easy. The initial plan called for 46 countries over 20 months. We've narrowed it down to 25 countries in 12 months. Realisitically, that number will probably drop to 18 - 20 countries, including the brief stopovers (<7 days).

We're a long way from retirement. My grandfather died < two months before he was scheduled to retire - I don't take any chances.

tooshy said:46 COUNTRIES!! <faint>

All I can say is...if undefined says Delta miles is good to save, who are we to argue? You've motivated me to keep saving FF miles.

Thanks, although I won't be using miles to travel RTW. My trip exceeds the limits for reward travel by a pretty good margin. I use miles to keep my sanity - quick dive trip to Honduras, quick R&R to rain forest in Costa Rica, etc.

tooshy said:
But when you have some time, can you share how you manage double digit countries...do you just see where it takes you and book a few days ahead?

Growing up in Europe took care of the majority of those countries (Germany, Holland, Lichtenstein, France, UK, Spain, Belgium, Luxemburg, Italy, Austria, Switzerland). The rest I have seen since living in the U.S. (Jamaica, British Virgin Islands, Mexico, Honduras, Costa Rica, Canada). I guess I'm up to 18 now. The best way to see the world is to make a simple rule - if it doesn't require a passport, it doesn't count as vacation/travel/holiday.

I normally book 4 - 6 weeks ahead. I speak 1 - 2 weeks researching in my free time where I want to go, then book the tickets and hotel. I never go through tour companies or have real set-in-stone plans. Language barrier is never considered - the majority of people understand some English, all people understand 'dollar'.

The only other rule is that I do not travel to countries that have an active conflict (war, genocide, rebels, etc.)

itsmetamim said:Delta is a waste of time...and investment

10 posts and complaining about Delta is one of them. Who said anything about investing in Delta? The only purpose of this thread is to share an offer that allows you to gain more Skymiles using a card you already have. If you don't fly Delta, that's fine. Can you tell me what to do with the 40k United miles I've got that seem to be completely worthless as United never has flights available?

I have about 750k miles with Delta and have no intentions of stopping collecting or using them. Thanks OP for the link, I got a postcard as well yesterday announcing the offer.

I actually booked a SkySaver ticket to Hawaii about 4 days prior to my departure. One thing I learned from this experience is that their online SkyMile ticket inventory is not complete or something, because for the longest time, I couldn't find a ticket searching online. But I heard someone was calling twice a day to see if anything opened up, so I tried and got the ticket. Even thought there was some extra fees (15 for phone booking, and 50 for booking 1 week(?) within departure), I was still happy.

One more thing I learned from this trip is that there's something about you can change airport you are flying from if the other airport is within 100 miles. I booked a ticket to fly out from Maui, because they didn't have anything from Honolulu which is where I was staying. But at the Honolulu airport, I asked one of the Delta representative, and she mumbled something about 100 miles and was able to change the flight for me to leave from Honolulu so I can be on the same flight with a friend. There was a $15 fee because the seat she got for me wasn't a SkySaver seat, and I thought that was pretty good that it didn't even have to be a SkySaver seat. I have never heard of this before, and I was wondering if anyone know about it and have more details on it.

So I spent $80 in fees and wasted a one way inter-island flight in Hawaii, but I got my Hawaii trip. It was fun.

EDIT: Forgot to Thank OP for the 25% bonus miles, so THANKS!!!

Not eligible for double miles in oct.

I would miss out on so many offers without FW.
Thank you.