I did it again - as the time to redeem a three stop Aeroplan ticket counted down, I pulled the trigger on another epic trip around the world with Aeroplan points. The first trip took my parents in business class to all 6 inhabited continents, but this time I decided to slow down and only stop in five continents! Although I wish I was able to take the time to do an epic trip of my own, it just didn’t make sense to do that with where I am in my career at this time. Instead, I was able to help my parents reach destinations that they could only imagine a few years back.

The Trip

This trip came together in less than 24 hours, which is a pretty impressive accomplishment. It helps when booking an award trip to be flexible and open to new destinations, and my parents are retired and open to checking out new places. My parents also wanted to check out some bucket list planes: fly the 747 in the bubble and their first time on a A380. The only solid date that I had to abide by was that my parents had a fixed date that they had to be in Auckland for a cruise that they had booked.

Stop 1 - Nairobi

Starting from Toronto in the middle of January, they will be headed to Nairobi on Swiss. Making their way in the morning to Montreal, they will then fly to Zurich on Swiss, a flight they took on their last Aeroplan trip last year around the world. They have just under three hours to connect in Zurich before continuing on to Nairobi. They will have seven nights in Kenya where they hope to head to Maasai Mara National Park (Let me know if you have any recommendations!), exploring the city and potentially touring in Tanzania.

Stop 2 - Bangkok

They will then continue on to Bangkok via Addis Ababa and Dubai - timed to get almost full days in both cities. They will arrive in Addis Ababa at 7:15 am on Ethiopian Airlines to enjoy the full day in Ethiopia. I had a full day layover in Addis a few years back and it was phenomenal, the people were friendly and the cuisine was unexpectedly delicious. If you’re ever connecting in Bole International Airport, make sure you grab some coffee. Even though Ethiopian Airlines was in the news after the 737 Max accident, I still believe they are one of the safest airlines in Africa and I wouldn’t hesitate to take them again.

They will be continuing on to Dubai in Ethiopian’s new A350 for the four and a half hour journey. Arriving at 2:30 in the morning after a long day, I expect that they will sleep in for a bit before spending the next day exploring Dubai before leaving for the seven hour red-eye on Thai Airways new A350. They spent some time in Bangkok during their last trip, so they will be using Bangkok as a base to explore Vietnam and Cambodia for two weeks. I’ve been to Vietnam twice before, but never during the Tet holiday, so I think I’ll have to book many of their hotels within the next few weeks to ensure availability.

Stop 3 - Perth

Continuing on from Bangkok I only had one destination that would fit this routing, Perth, the same destination as their previous Aeroplan mRTW. Unfortunately, after piecing together my itinerary quickly, when I was booking the flight I ran into phantom award availability on the Singapore-Perth segment. Although United showed plenty of space on the route, unfortunately, once I took a look at ExpertFlyer, I could see that this wasn’t the case.

I eventually found a day that I could get to Perth, although it means that my parents will have to hop on a transcontinental flight to Auckland the same morning that they arrive in Perth. My parents will spend two weeks cruising around New Zealand before docking in Sydney and returning to Perth using Avios miles.

The Journey Home

The journey home is an #avgeeks dream. They will get to try the Airbus A350 back to Singapore where they will spend another day exploring the city. They will then take Thai’s Boeing 777 to Bangkok where they will be connecting to TG658, expected to be operated by the Queen of the skies, the 747.

After a 6 hour layover in Korea, my parents will officially get to one up the 747 by flying on Asiana’s A380 service to Los Angeles, their first time on an A380 will be on the upper deck no less!

They will spend the day exploring Venice Beach and Santa Monica in LA before catching the Air Canada redeye directly back to Toronto.

The Value of the Trip

In the world of award travel, everyone is obsessed with cents per point (CPP), and I’m very much guilty of this. While it’s not necessarily fair to price out each flight segment by segment, that is how I booked this flight, so that’s how I priced it out (Edit: Comments pointed out that this is a ridiculous way to value the flight, while I agree, it’s still an interesting comparison. A star alliance RTW would cost ~10K). As you can see, at $30,000 Canadian total, I got almost 19 cents per Aeroplan mile, which a phenomenal return considering some of the best credit cards return 2 Aeroplan miles per dollar spent. The taxes on this journey were higher than last time at around $585 Canadian, but it’s still a steal considering the amount of flights that they will be taking.

The Bottom Line

While I’m sad that it won’t be me taking this wild trip around the world, I’m still thrilled I was able to book this for my parents. I can’t wait to string together these 13 flights into another epic vacation!

Have suggestions for my parents trip - please let me know in the comments!