After all the dealings and hassles with the tickets, we’re going to need to have a break. We thought we’d figured it out, and were going to be able to include Anchorage, Alaska in the itinerary, since we had extra sectors in North America left, but that did not work because none of the airlines in the oneworld alliance flies to Anchorage. This, despite the fact there is a dot in Anchorage signifying it as a oneworld destination.

“Yes, but that was back when Canadian Airlines was part of the alliance” says one Qantas phone centre employee. And how long ago was that? Oh, about 18 months at least. So why does our June 2000 map show the dot to be still on the map? “Guess they must have overlooked it - we hate these oneworld fares because they never go where people want them to”. Hmmm… At least even Qantas employees realise how bad the restrictions are.

Okay, so we can’t go to Alaska with our extra flights. This is a week or so after we’d found out that we could not fly into Beijing unless we wanted to either use it as a fuel stop or fly nowhere else in Asia. Apparently no oneworld partners fly from Beijing to anywhere else but Melbourne. Right, well, there go two destinations out the window.

Aha. Hawaii. It’s part of North America. We have four sectors each left. If we fly Los Angeles - Honolulu - Hilo (Big Island) return, then we only use four sectors, plus get to see all the volcanic activity. Fantastic. No. Wait. Don’t get too excited. We’re not allowed to backtrack, and that is 2500 miles off the west coast. Let’s check the rules again. Hmmm… According to the rules we’re able to read (oneworld does not publish the rules for the general public, even on the website), it would be okay. Not considered backtracking since we are not leaving a continental zone, and we’re not doing a crossing that goes from one coast to the other. Wonderful. We can go to Hawaii then.

Now, let’s check to see if there is a partner that flies there. Yes! American Airlines does. This is going very well indeed. We can go to Hawaii, get within 50 feet of flowing lava, get the sulfur steam in our noses, observe the old lava flows, visit the largest cattle ranch in the US (who would have thought it’d be on Hawaii?) and generally have a good time. I guess this is going too well. We should ring Qantas again.

No. We can’t go to Hawaii. Why not? It’s not backtracking, is it? We are staying within a continental zone and not going from the east coast to the west coast. Ah, backtracking within a continent is permitted. Except for Hawaii and Alaska since you leave the US mainland. So, can we fly to Canada? Yes, even though that leaves the US mainland. So why not Alaska or Hawaii? They’re exceptions to the rule. Bugger. The only way to get to Hawaii is to go there first, which we can’t do due to time and the fact we won’t have all our camping equipment (some sent by mail).

Oh, and we do like the rule prohibiting people from flying to Alaska and back when you can’t fly to Alaska and back anyway. It’s all very frustrating. We have not even gotten on the planes yet - we’re dreading the fun and games that will be “lost luggage” issues at some point in the trip. Probably a restriction on that too, such as “your luggage is not lost so long as there is oxygen in the atmosphere” or at least “we are not responsible for anything that goes in our planes, despite the fact you are paying us to take you and your luggage to the same destination”.

*mutter mutter mutter*

Categories: Travel, Odyssey 2001