Introduction - Bula, Kia Ora and G’day!

For this year’s summer vacation, we (I) wanted to counter the trend and spend our summertime in winter. Ok that’s not exactly accurate after six weeks of bopping around in Europe like every other a**hole but still. In order to cleanse the cliché off of #eurosummer, we flew southward over the Pacific Ocean to begin our little Oceania adventure.

Of the major destinations in the Southern Hemisphere, we visited Argentina, Brazil, Australia and South Africa in the past few years. New Zealand had been on my list for the longest time. Naturally, it became the emphasis of this trip. Finding transpacific award flights is no easy task these days, and that’s even more true for flights to/from Australia and New Zealand. Both Qantas and Air New Zealand almost never release any award seats to partners. Your best luck would be trying the US carriers. All three have a pretty robust network to the region, primarily out of California. If you're open to a bit of a detour, Fiji Airways comes in handy, and that’s what we did. Geographically situated between the US and Oceania, Fiji Airways flies to LA, SF, Vancouver and Dallas. After some digging, I was able to book a one-way business class from Miami to Nadi via Dallas for 80,000 AAdvantage miles. AA miles are increasingly hard to use, so I consider that a stellar redemption. Note that the Dallas route is unfortunately being cut as of this month.

From Fiji, it only takes three hours to get to Auckland. I booked us a separate business class ticket from Nadi to Auckland on Fiji Airways, using Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards. The cost is only 15,000 miles plus some taxes. The same flight could be booked on AA for 25,000 miles. We didn’t visit the North Island of New Zealand this time, so from Auckland we just connected onto a Jetstar flight to Queenstown. At the end of the trip, we needed to get to Sydney for a few days and flew with Virgin Australia. We booked last minute, and there were no award flight options. We ended up paying $820 per person for business class on this hop across the Tasman Sea.

On our return, I was extremely lucky to have locked in two award seats on the Qantas flight from Auckland to New York. The cost was also 80,000 AAdvantage miles per person for business class. I know I just said it was practically impossible to redeem miles for Qantas, but this was a rare incident. I don’t expect to find another Qantas long-haul redemption probably ever again. To get to Auckland, it was another easy 15,000 Alaska miles in Qantas B737-800 business class. Overall, I thought it was absolutely unreal that our only cash flights were the ~$800 flight from Queenstown to Sydney and the Jetstar flight.

The hotel front was a different story, as we only stayed at one points hotel. I guess you win some and definitely do lose some. In Fiji, there was really only one place to stay - the Royal Davui. It’s a private island and the only hotel in the Beqa Lagoon, where the famous Fiji shark dive takes place. For our three-night stay, the rate was ~$1,800/night. I appreciate that three meals a day were at least included. Many hotels in the Maldives are also private islands but don’t include a single meal.

In New Zealand, we spent our first part at the Rosewood Matakauri, a 12-key lodge just outside Queenstown. Queenstown is of course known for its skiing, and there are options in town that are more convenient for that purpose, such as Eichardt's Private Hotel. I will say, though, that relaxing at the Rosewood hot tub and sauna while overlooking Lake Wakatipu after a day on the slope was pretty epic and well worth the money. There was a “Stay Four Pay Three” promotion at the Rosewood. The total came out to be ~$5k for four nights - a fantastic deal for a lake view suite. Following Queenstown, we drove up to the Lindis Lodge in the Ahuriri Valley. Our three-night there was ~$4k in total, including all meals. Lastly, we spent a couple nights at the Park Hyatt Sydney, which cost 45,000 Hyatt points per night.

This is going to be a long trip series, given all the movements and the lounges we checked out along the way. The final itinerary is as follows:

Review - Chase Sapphire Lounge by The Club Dallas Fort Worth (DFW)

Review - Fiji Airways Business Class A350-900 Dallas Fort Worth to Nadi

Review - Island Hopper H125 Nadi to Royal Davui Island

Review - Royal Davui Island Resort Fiji

Review - Fiji Airways Premier Lounge (NAN)

Review - Fiji Airways Business Class B737 Max 8 Nadi to Auckland

Review - Jetstar Airways Economy Class A320-200 Auckland to Queenstown

Review - Rosewood Matakauri

Review - The Lindis Lodge

Review - Manaia Lounge Queenstown Airport (ZQN)

Review - Virgin Australia Business Class B737 Max 8 Queenstown to Sydney

Review - Park Hyatt Sydney

Review - Qantas Airways Sydney First Lounge (SYD)

Review - Qantas Airways Business Class B737-800 Sydney to Auckland

Review - Qantas Airways Auckland International Lounge & Platinum Dining (AKL)

Review - Qantas Airways Business Class B787-9 Auckland to New York Kennedy

One thing that we kept saying to each other on this trip was “Gosh, these people are so nice.” From Fiji to OZ, everyone we met was so incredibly genuine and hospitable. Maybe with the exception of the folks at the Lindis Lodge after finding out we were going hunting, but that’s on us for doing that while staying at an ecolodge, oops. It’s still a great and unique property though, so make sure you subscribe and find out!