Whats the most amount of flights you took to reach your destination

[Lawrage]

With awards flights in the pointy end of the plane becoming a bit harder to redeem these days I am curious to the longest, craziest routes you have taken to reach your destination.

IE - Instead of taking economy from Perth to London you might go business Perth - Kuala Lumpur - Dubai - London.

 

[Mattg]

I've certainly seem some crazy itineraries that people have taken in order to get business class seats using their Qantas points, especially when booking last minute. E.g. I've seen things like PER-MEL-SYD-HND-NGO-HEL-LHR-EDI.

Earlier this year, a friend of mine needed to get to Argentina and flew SYD-KUL-LHR-GRU-EZE. The return was via MAD, DOH and MEL.

Personally, I have done CBR-BNE-DPS-KUL-HKG-FRA-HAM and CBR-MEL-KUL-SIN-CMB-LHR to get to Europe (both without long stopovers), but that was using combinations of one-way airfares, not points.

 

[Lawrage]

I've certainly seem some crazy itineraries that people have taken in order to get business class seats using their Qantas points, especially when booking last minute. E.g. I've seen things like PER-MEL-SYD-HND-NGO-HEL-LHR-EDI.

Earlier this year, a friend of mine needed to get to Argentina and flew SYD-KUL-LHR-GRU-EZE. The return was via MAD, DOH and MEL.

Personally, I have done CBR-BNE-DPS-KUL-HKG-FRA-HAM and CBR-MEL-KUL-SIN-CMB-LHR to get to Europe (both without long stopovers), but that was using combinations of one-way airfares, not points.

Those are some crazy ones. I just imagine in my head a delay on flight 1 or 2, trying to arrange the rest.

 

[Mattg]

Those are some crazy ones. I just imagine in my head a delay on flight 1 or 2, trying to arrange the rest.

I did generally try to allow at least an overnight stop between flights on separate tickets! Although some of the breaks between tickets were only ~7 hours during the daytime. Thankfully all went well in my case, but I wouldn't attempt this in 2022 on separate tickets.

 

[Muppet501st]

people thought i was crazy - TSV-CNS via BNE, would have been quicker to drive.

 

[blackcat20]

MEL-SYD-HKG-TPE-NRT-ORD to get to Chicago for Christmas, then ORD-RSW-DFW-NRT-TPE-HKG-SIN-SYD-MEL to get home.

 

[NM]

I had to get to North Carolina for a course the week following the Sydney Olympics. It was reasonably short notice compared to all the games attendees who wanted to go over the Pacific that week. I could not get a seat trans-Pacific. So the best option we could find was a LONE4 fare routing BNE-SYD-SIN-FRA-LGW-RDU. Was 44 hours travel time, 9 consecutive meals were airline economy meals. And during the 5 hours transit at LGW I was asked ti interview a candidate for a job in Australia. The return was much quicker, being RDU-DFW-LAX-AKL-BNE.

And my UK colleague who was also attending the same course, and had different travel policy to the Aussie organisation, was traveling LGW-RDU-LGW and booked in business class. I could have booked a DONE4 for about the same as his return fare, but that was not permitted by company policy at the time.

 

[flyingfan]

Great topic and replies! I’ve yet to do a OW award and my F/J redemptions so far have been very direct. Not counting status runs of course.
The most I’ve had was on awards did HKG-PER-MEL and SYD-LAX-DFW-EZE vv, all Y.

 

[Must...Fly!]

I don't know if it really qualifies. But I was between jobs several years ago and was in Melbourne for a few weeks. Needed to get back to Perth for a family wedding, no problem I thought, I won't book anything in case some work comes up, prices won't be too bad. Of course I failed to factor in the fact it was Easter, so when I finally did some searching about two weeks out, it was going to cost about $600 just for MEL-PER!!

Since I had nothing better to do I started searching. Ended up with MEL-xSYD-xLAX-DFW//DFW-xLAX-xSYD-PER for $964 and had 10 days in Texas "on the way home".

 

[UP4014]

Most in one day at least, 5 flights from Sydney to Gold Coast via Mildura.

 

[aus_flyer]

Back in the day when AA oneworld awards were calculated based on Origin-Destination (provided you only transitted, no stopovers) I once flew from Brisbane to Sydney...

But I flew... BNE-MEL-SIN-HKG-SFO-JFK-MCO-LAX-SYD.

All in F for the same number of points as if it was just BNE-SYD.

 

[Denali]

I think my most was SYD>LA>ATL>SCL (Chile)>IPC (Easter Island), all J (thankfully).

 

[Ade]

CBR-MEL-SYD-SIN-CMB-MAA and return MAA-CMB-SIN-BNE-SYD-CBR - to utilise DSC. A variation to this route sometimes include HKG (pre-CoVID) or KUL and BLR (after QF started BLR-SYD)

I remember doing SYD-AKL-MEL-SYD instead of SYD-MEL direct during the ANZAC Day holiday, just because SYD-MEL direct was expensive (around $700ish), but the leg I did was only $750-ish.

 

[antycbr]

CBR-MEL (26 hour QF delay) - SYD (due crew hours, 2 hour delay) - LAX - LIM - CUZ.

 

[MDC]

This is giving me flashbacks from early in my career. What started as a simple work trip turned into "while you're there, can you go to this office" and "we have a project in the UK we want you to be part of for a few weeks". My return journey home compounded into this monster due to already paid return legs... all Y, no stop overs, mostly different airlines.

LGW-MCO-DFW-LAX-AKL-SYD-BNE

 

[Warks]

In the early 90s I did IST-ATH-MUC-SIN-MEL-SYD-BNE. Never again. I had a sinus infection for the last couple of flights and the pain is seared into my memory.

 

[Scarlett]

Earlier this year we were heading to Cyprus for a holiday, so used this routing: CGK-IST-CPH-ARN-LHR-FRA-LCA.

This was on a combination of two flights on each of three seperate tickets: TK, SK and then LH and was done for two reasons:
1. because it was Mrs Scarlett’s b’day and I had teed up (unbeknownst to her) a drink with her cousin who lives near LHR during an overnight transit at that point.
2. I wanted to requal *Gold.

The five hour transit in CPH was fine as TK flights were on time and the break between the SK and LH tickets was overnight at LHR. First time flying on SK and LH as well. TK J was excellent as usual; SAS Plus was good; LH Eurobusiness was a joke and I won’t be paying for that again.

 

[JohnK]

Is this just awards?

It took me 13 flights from Australia to get to BKK but that also included a transit in BKK.

You do some silly things when you're bored.

 

[dajop]

Earlier this year, a friend of mine needed to get to Argentina and flew SYD-KUL-LHR-GRU-EZE. The return was via MAD, DOH and MEL.

I needed to get to EZE from MEL (over 15 years ago) at late notice. The routing there was MEL-HKG-LHR-TXL-MAD-EZE (although I did stop in TXL for about 23 hrs). Return was much more straightforward EZE-MIA-DFW-LAX-MEL.

 

[camperdown9]

I once had a client who didn't drive and refused to take trains she needed to get from Belfast to Cork 261 miles/420 km. So she flew BFS-LHR-ORK-LHR-BFS.
I know this doesn't include lots of sectors but for such a short journey seemed crazy.

We used to get staff fares with QF and my boss at the time wanted to go to a friends wedding in Sydney. He didn't have much leave left. He worked on Thursday and then went to LHR after work, flew to SYD so arrived on Saturday morning. Went to the wedding, stayed one night. Sunday he flew to London and arrived London Monday morning and came straight to work. So he only used one days leave.