How about a cruise? To where? Maybe Asia? That sounded like a great plan. A two week cruise to Asia in December, when the weather at home is frightful. That's a significant amount of travel to get there though and who wants to do that in coach? It turns out that with half a million (yes, that's 500,000) Alaska Airlines miles, you can fly Business Class on Emirates from Seattle to Dubai, then First Class from Dubai to Singapore, then Delta One from Hong Kong to Seattle at the end. And that layover in Dubai leaves you just enough time to have dinner at the the underwater restaurant, Ossiano. Though getting dressed up after a 14.5 hour flight might be a challenge.
I'm told everybody should fly Emirates First Class at least once in their life, so this is our one shot. Yes, it's true that they have a shower in First Class.
The cruise itinerary is Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong. We used hotel points to add a night in Singapore before the cruise and a night in Hong Kong before we fly home.
I played around with Google Earth and made a little animation of our trip. Ignore the parts that show the boat route going over land. Animation is not my thing and straight lines are a lot easier than curved ones!
