Yesterday, I posted about getting free stopovers on American Airlines awards outside the USA. Hopefully I opened a few eyes, and I certainly caused some confusion. So I'll give a concrete example of getting a free stopover outside the USA on an AA award with screen shots.

This award will go from Los Angeles to Shanghai with a stopover in Tokyo.

There is a trick that can be used to get free stopovers outside the USA on American Airlines awards in certain situations, and I don't just mean 23 hour layovers. Most people probably think that's impossible, since one of the four rules all AA stopovers must comply with is:
1) Stopovers must occur at the North American International Gateway City.

Anatomy of an Award: Booking this Trip

AA First Class: Los Angeles to Tampa

BA Business Class: Tampa to London (LGW)

A Day in London: Gatwick to London to Heathrow to Paris

When booking an award with AA miles, you cannot select your seats on BA planes until 24 hours before departure. About 21 hours before departure, I logged into BA.com and gave my six digit confirmation code. Almost all the seats had been selected, but I still had some choice.

I checked the seatguru map for the plane I was flying, a 3-class Boeing 777.

Edit: Thanks to the commenters who checked the Membership Rewards site ad found that the ability to transfer between MR and Avios has returned at a 1:1 transfer ratio.

Just now at 10:40 AM Paris time, 4:40 AM ET, and 1:40 AM PT, I logged into Membership Rewards to see if the 50% transfer bonus between Membership Rewards and Avios had really ended.

Check out the similar lists I made for Los Angeles and New York City.

Below is a list of every oneworld alliance flight from Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW) flown by British Airways, American Airlines, Iberia, Japan Airlines, and Qantas. I have also included non-oneworld partners on which you can book flights with Avios, in this case only Alaska Airlines.

The list is divided into International routes, Hawaii routes, and Domestic routes. Within each group, the routes are listed from most Avios required to fewest.

This is another post in my Anatomy of an Award series, in which I take a real award I've booked and break it down step-by-step to elucidate the award booking process. If you have a real award you'd like to write up in a similar post, please contact me, and you can write a guest post.

My brother and I are going to Australia in January 2013 for the Australian Open tennis tournament in Melbourne. He's got about ten days, and we decided to see Sydney, The Great Barrier Reef via Cairns, and Melbourne.

Hey there, you're reading an outdated post! The updated series from April 2015 can be found here.

This is the nineteenth post in a monthlong series. Each post will take about two minutes to read and may include an action item that takes the reader another two minutes to complete. I am writing this for an audience of people who know nothing about frequent flier miles, and my goal is that by the end, you know enough to fly for free anywhere you want to go.

Here are the basics of using aa.com for award bookings.

Do you subscribe to the Top 20 from Travelzoo? I recommend it because each week there are a few truly incredible deals. Let's take a look at a few from this week.

1) Fly nonstop from LAX-Puerto Vallarta for $313 r/t or Cabo for $333 r/t. Flights from SFO are slightly more. I have no doubt this is a good cash price, and the page says these prices are $200 off the normal price.  But for me, this deal just highlights how valuable Avios are.

Below is a list of every oneworld alliance flight from New York City flown by British Airways, American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, LAN, Iberia, Japan Airlines, and Qantas. I have also included non-oneworld partners on which you can book flights with Avios miles-- Alaska Airlines, Aer Lingus, and airberlin. Routes only operated by Alaska Airlines, Aer Lingus, or airberlin have an * because they can only be booked over the phone (800-AIRWAYS), which will incur a $25 fee.

The list is divided into International routes and Domestic routes.

Below is a list of every oneworld alliance flight from Los Angeles flown by British Airways, American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, LAN, Iberia, Japan Airlines, and Qantas. I have also included non-oneworld partners on which you can book flights with Avios miles-- Alaska Airlines and airberlin. Routes only operated by Alaska or airberlin have an * because they can only be booked over the phone (800-AIRWAYS), which will incur a $25 fee.

The list is divided into International routes, Hawaii routes, and Domestic routes. Within each group, the routes are listed from most Avios required to fewest.