We have heard it's possible to purchase airline tickets for round the world travel - with 10 or so stops within a year as long as you're headed in the same direction. We've searched the web and can only find info out of UK and Europe. Would appreciate any ideas on whether this can be done from the U.S. We'd look to leave from the East coast, visit Europe, SE Asia, Australia and S. Pacific, then up through the west coast US and home.

Thanksfor any info you can provide!

It can be done from the U.S. on either the Star Alliance (United Airlines and partners) or the OneWorld Alliance (American Airlines and partners). It is difficult to find any info online, but each airline has a special desk that deals with these types of tickets. If you call the direct reservations number, they should be able to connect you.

For what you are planning on, you may be better off with the OneWorld Alliance, which includes American, British Air, Qantas, and Cathay Pacific.

Just FYI - If the first leg of your RTW ticket is out of Canada, there are significant savings on OneWorld (but not Star); so much so that you can fly Business Class for only slightly more than you would pay for a coach ticket out of the US.

I haven't used them myself, but I found this agency through www.onetravel.com who I have purchased tickets from before.
http://www.airtreks.com

You may have better luck posting this question at either the Asia or Europe forum.

John - I am also starting to plan a RTW trip for next spring. You mention cheaper fares if you start out from Canada. I have looked at Air Treks and entered several different starting cities. They do not seem cheaper from Canada.

How do I find out about those cheaper Canadian fares - through One World airlines home pages or are there other sites or consolidators? Thanks.

Pick up a copy of the New York Times and check out their travel section. There are a number of ads for RTW tickets. We did this about 6 years ago with our kids. It was kind of scarey going with an unkown agency, but we paid with an AX card, with an additional 3% charge and were very happy with the service and the price. The only advice I would give is to avoid Garuda Airlines. Old planes, bad food, marginal landings (all of the stuff in all of the over-head bins fell out due to an extremely hard landing). Also on the same airline, there is no warning to stay in your seat after landing and as soon as the wheels touched down everyone immediately stood up and then fell all over as the plane turned off the runway and made several manuvers on taxi-ways. This happened on each of 4 flights on this airline. Have fun.

PS I think one of the big companies is called Circle something.

On "around the world " tickets, the important thing to keep in mind is to travel in the same direction. You cannot backtrack ..and one must use the same airline travel partners. This works if you really do plan on going around the world. If you are only doing Europe and the UK you might consider flying into one city , and out of another. Foreign flagged carriers like BA and Lufthansa have inter europe fares for cheap. Call BA or Lufthansa for more info.

Call the Round the World desk at American Airlines. I used to work in reservations and they have some very senior agents who really know their stuff. A lot of fares are directional.
I will never forget a call that I had one time about 2 years ago. Gentleman wanted to go back to Great Britain and he was in South America. His fare was directional. He had to go back over Pacific to go home. Know what you are buying and write things down if you do not understand. It can get complicated at times. I think also purchasing inter-European flights is also a great idea and time saver. Good luck on your planning.