Business Class award availability from Europe to Brazil during the 2014 World Cup is almost non-existing. Being creative with your routing, can provide some alternatives.
Flying from Frankfurt to Buenos Aires to Sao Paulo is a great example of an alternative routing. A standard award search on United.com or ExpertFlyer doesn’t show business class availably between Frankfurt and Buenos Aires. However, Lufthansa Miles & More members do have the possibility to book business class awards on flights LH510 and LH511. Add Turkish Airlines fifth freedom flights TK15 and TK16 (Buenos Aires – Sao Paulo) and your itinerary is complete. Surprisingly, Turkish Airlines has plenty of business class award availability on the EZE-GRU segments.
Pic: From Brussels (BRU) to Frankfurt (FRA) to Buenos Aires (EZE) to Sao Paulo (GRU)
I called my Miles & More service center and made a tentative booking BRU-FRA-EZE-GRU-EZE-FRA-BRU with all segments in business class and stopover in EZE. I wanted to make sure the itinerary would price & ticket correctly, and it did. But at 135K miles and 663€ taxes & fees (!!) it didn’t really feel as a great award booking. Adding the fact flights LH510/LH511 between Frankfurt and Buenos Aires would be operated by B747-400 aircraft (high chance of having the old business class cabin), and my initial excitement was gone. Anyway, this was just a first attempt. I’m sure there are more opportunities for alternative routings out there. Do you know them? Please share! Thanks.
Hat tip: MileAdventures
