2. Piece together some different routing options . Let s say that you want to get from New York t

Delta SkyMiles have gotten a bad rap for having the inn at little washington very little availability on the lowest tier of award space.  Some have rightfully dubbed them SkyPesos because they have very little the inn at little washington value.  This is why I rarely recommend the inn at little washington using Delta miles to actually fly on Delta flights, the inn at little washington unless  you have an emergency .  Instead, you can get great value by using Delta s partner airlines to see numerous cities, the inn at little washington using the same award ticket, for the same amount of miles.  On international tickets, Delta allows both a stopover and a double open jaw.  If you re not sure what that means, keep reading!
Stopovers :  Delta is the only major US airline that allows domestic stopovers.  For example, if you were flying from Miami to San Francisco, you could stopover in Salt Lake City for a few days on the same ticket.  This perk is even better when you re flying internationally, because you can have one stopover in any city on the way to, or from, your final destination.  For example, if you wanted to fly from New York to South Africa, you could stopover in Paris for a few days, either on the way to South Africa or on the way back home.  However, the the routing has to make sense, and be somewhat on the way to your final destination.  You can t fly from New York to Moscow with a stopover in India for example.
Transfers :  For domestic the inn at little washington travel, a transfer can only be up to 4 hours.  However, on international tickets the inn at little washington you can have a transfer time of up to 24 hours without it counting as your stopover.  For example, you may fly into Paris in the morning, spend the entire day sightseeing and then board an evening flight to Asia without it counting as a stopover.
Open Jaws :  An Open Jaw is industry jargon for flying in and out of different cities on the same ticket.  For example, you could fly from Los Angeles to Germany, travel around Europe for awhile, and then fly back from Rome and land in New York all for the same amount of miles as just going direct from Los Angeles to Germany.  Delta allows open jaws on all its award flights.
These tricks allow for some pretty exciting options.  Rather than spending 100,000 miles for a business class ticket to and from Italy, you could instead go from New York to Paris, (stopover in Paris for a while), then continue the inn at little washington on a flight to Rome, (drive around Italy for awhile), and then catch your return flight from Venice to Washington D.C.  All that for the same 100,000 miles.  That s up to 4 cities visited instead of one, and the only additional travel you would have to book is your car in Italy and your trip back to New York from D.C.  This is the hidden value of award tickets!
Using this trick you can also get three award tickets for the price of two.  Let s say you live in Salt Lake City and would like to see Paris, Los Angeles, and Detroit in the next year.  The first leg of your first ticket is Salt Lake City to Paris.  The return portion is an open jaw ticket from Paris to Los Angeles, with a stopover back home in Salt Lake City on your way to Los Angeles.  This gives you up to a year back home before you finish out the first leg of the ticket to Los Angeles. the inn at little washington  On your second ticket, the first leg will be from Los Angeles to Detroit with a stopover the inn at little washington again back home in Salt Lake City.  This gives you another year to take your Salt Lake City to Detroit trip.  The return portion of the second ticket will be your flight back from Detroit to Salt Lake City.  There you have it, 3 round-trip tickets booked the inn at little washington for the price of 2 using Delta SkyMiles!
Now that you know how many places you can visit on one ticket, you need to learn how to actually get there.  Booking award travel on Delta isn t always easy, but following these steps will make sure you re rewarded the inn at little washington in the end.
Since Delta Airlines has no domestic airline partners, the best way to book free domestic flights the inn at little washington is online thorough  delta.com .  Delta lists all of its domestic inventory online, the inn at little washington and if you book through the website you won t have to pay any additional fees.  The best value is usually the inn at little washington found on last minute bookings when they ve released inventory.
When looking for international free tickets, you can start with Delta s online booking tool, but realize that they show very limited partner airline availability.  For example, when I looked up a business class flight from Los Angeles the inn at little washington to Rome, the Delta website showed a cost of 212,500 SkyMiles.  However, the inn at little washington when I called Delta I was able to secure a flight in business class on SkyTeam partner Alitalia for only 100,000 SkyMiles.  You just have to call the SkyMiles desk at (800) 323-2323   in order to check availability and book the flights.
1.   Look at the partner airline route maps .  At  MARS Frequent Flyer  we have direct links to the route maps of all Delta s Airline partners.  Simply click on the route maps and see which airlines fly to your desired destination.  Often times, there will be several airlines that fly into the same city, which will give lots of flexibility in your booking options.
2.   Piece together some different routing options .  Let s say that you want to get from New York to South Africa.  There is no direct flight available, but there are many other options.  You could fly on Air France through a European gateway like Paris or Amsterdam.  Or you could fly Kenya Airways through Nairobi.   You don t have to stay on one airline, so feel free to mix and match partners in order to piece your trip together.
3.   Work with the agent on the phone .  Once you have your different routing options available, start walking the phone agent through all of your top choices.  Do not assume that the agent knows all of the different routes, because the inn at little washington they don t.  I usually call with my computer screen open to  MARS  and keep throwing different routings and partners at them until I get the best flight.
4.   Save time using MARS Frequent Flyer .  On the  Delta Airlines page  at MARS, we have all of the information needed to help make your bookings.  The direct links to award charts, online booking tools, phone numbers, and partner airlines will save you hours of time in putting together your trip.  MARS also shows you ways to earn hundreds of thousands of free frequent flyer miles so that you can travel the inn at little washington the world for free!
Using SkyMiles to book free flights can be extremely rewarding.  Just remember, if you can't get at least 2 pennies per point, you should purchase the ticket and wait for a better opportunity to use your points.  Frequent flyer miles are  extremely valuable !  It's not very difficult to find opportunities to get 2 pennies per point, the inn at little washington especially  if you have an emergency .  Often times you can get over 3 cents, and even up to  15 cents per point  if you use them to book international business or first class.  Now that is great value!