Want to use ff to go to India (almost any city) Business Class over Christmas/New Years. Anybody have any success doing this?? Kinda flexible on dates..ie, could go before 12/14 and leave after 1/8

I think its possible. I know Continental flies direct from Newark but that one might be difficult. If you have Star Alliance miles - you could fly United/Lufthansa via Frankfort. India is considered "Central Asia" however so the cost in miles is steep. Another thing to try is going via Bangkok on Thai - a bit longer but you may get a break on the mileage cost. I believe American flies direct from Chicago if you belong to their program.

When we went the JFK-BKK flight did not exist - we flew on upgraded tickets from Hartford to Chicago to Tokyo to Bangkok on United and then onward to Delhi on purchased business class tickets (not expensive) on Air India with good connections all of the way - arrived at a decent hour too. The trip was horribly long though.

Which airline alliance do you have ff miles with? I would think most alliances could get you to India. The issue may be ff seats being taken by now.

Thanks Craig and Kathie. I am just beginning to think about 2008. I know we want to go to India and just need to think about our ff points for our trips this year so we can have enough for India. This year we had to PURCHASE our business tickets to South Africa on AF! Hope not to do that two years in a row. We have points on Continental and Amex and now Air France plus a good bit on BA. Nothing much on AA. Plan to go Business to France in September so will use whatever airline whose points most useful.

Not sure I understand your question, but I think you are asking what US airlines and European airlines fly to India. Most US airlines tend to fly to just Delhi and Mumbai. Same with European airlines, but some like British Air also fly into commercial hubs like Chennai. Air France flies to these Delhi and Mumbai as well as Chennai, Bangalore and Hyderabad.

Personally, for a first time tourist, Chennai may not be top of the list. It has some interesting colonial bits left. There is a very nice drive down the coast of Chennai and you could see other parts of south India, all of which would be quite nice in December, I am just not sure what your itinerary is and how long you have. Also, I don’t know if free flights permits “open jaw tickets” and if not, this means your international flights will be in and out of Chennai, then you will have to fly back and forth, eating into your itinerary. (However, if you can get a totally free flight there, it is worth considering, but this means you can probably get a free flight elsewhere in India for the same points.)

Hyderabad is a very interesting city in south India with a large Muslim population and great history, but again, I am not sure it would be on the list for a first-time visitor. There is good air service from Hyderabad to other cities, so it would not be hard to get around to north India from Hyderabad, but again, travel time would eat into your itinerary. Bangalore is a very pleasant commercial city, with very little for the tourist. Other than going to Mysore (which is worth a visit about 3 hours away), you would almost immediately get on a plane to go elsewhere. Bangalore has very good air service to elsewhere in India, so again not a bad choice but not really a first choice and no reason to fly here for “free” if you can fly for free to Delhi or Mumbai.

So, try to stick to Delhi and Mumbai. Again, generally for a first-time tourist Delhi is frankly going to be preferred; there is more to see and as you most likely want to go to Agra (the Taj) and Rajasthan is more convenient to that area. In December, Mumbai is convenient if you wanted to go to a beach area like Goa or Kerala, but you can do that from Delhi too, so IMO it’s not really a huge advantage.

Continental, BA and Air France all fly to Delhi. Continental has a non-stop from Newark which would IMO be a very good flight for you, as I believe you are from the NYC area. Between your existing CO miles and your Amex card, you may be able to accrue enough miles for seats. I use CO mileage to go back to the States about once a year. For flights to India in business class, once you have 200,000 points you can take virtually any flight you want using “Easy Pass”, it’s like buying the seat, you can choose any date you want and are guaranteed a seat (that 400,000 for 2 people, so that is admittedly quite a few points; for flights with only a Business/First section its 250,000 points each). For 120,000 miles you have to use “Standard” rewards which means they restrict the number of seats which are available on each flight for mileage passengers. The way I have worked that is to have a flexible 1- week window on either end of a proposed trip and then ask CO what flights during those weeks are open. This means that rather than trying to get a flight on a specific date, I see what seats are open on any CO flights during those weeks This has worked for me. This sounds like what you could do, as you indicate that you’re flexible on your dates. This may mean you might have 14, 21 or 28 days in India depending on what flights you get.

Based on this, I would take CO for your trip to France to build up your mileage. But you should look at Air France’s program as well as BA and see how many points you have/need for their flights versus CO’s flight.

December and January are the highest season in India, so I agree you may need to book soon unless you can use the EasyPass class seats on CO.