Photonic Torpedoes

The opportunity has risen lately for me to receive a partially subsidized trip to visit Singapore. The city-state is on the other side of the planet from where I live, almost as far as you can go and still be on land. During Eastern Daylight Time, when it’s 6 am in Atlanta, it’s 6 pm in Singapore.

Given the bipolar nature of the destination, I think it’s a keen idea to be able to fly there and, rather than “bouncing back” to the States, continue in the same direction on my return journey. I mean, how many people can say they’ve circumscribed the globe, literally traveled around the world? The flight distances on the major routes going east or west are not that different (~10,600 miles going west; ~11,000 miles going east), so you’d think one would be able to easily plan a trip that goes only east or only west.

Well, I’ve been playing with Kayak.com’s fare search for multiple cities to see what comes up for my dates (early April) and man is it hard to find an itinerary that actually does what I’d like. It’s freakin’ absurd at times. Get this itinerary, which is just an example of the ridiculousness I’m facing:

Atlanta -> Paris -> Singapore -> Tokyo -> Atlanta

The idea here is to fly east over the Atlantic Ocean from the U.S. to visit Paris for a couple days. Then, continue over Europe and Asia to Singapore, the actual raison d’etre for the trip. When finished there, spend a few days in Tokyo. Finally, proceed over the Pacific and the continental United States back to Atlanta. Assuming non-stop flights for all points, that’s ~21,700 miles.

Here’s what the flight itinerary actually provided:

Atlanta -> Paris (nonstop)
Paris -> Singapore (nonstop)
Singapore -> Hong Kong -> Tokyo (1 layover)
Tokyo -> Paris -> Atlanta (1 layover)

A total of ~25,000 miles (3,300 more) and it still doesn’t get me around the world.

It’s clear that the online sites are not up to the task of a trip this complex. So, it seems a visit to AAA might be in order.