How to Fly Business Class to France for Free

Who hasn't dreamed of meandering from cheese shop to bakery to patisserie as they make their way through the French countryside? Or perhaps you're more interested in the wineries or fashion. Whatever the case, you can have that French vacation of a lifetime without spending a lifetime's worth of earnings on it.

Indeed, with the right travel rewards cards, you can easily fly to Paris -- in business class! -- for free, or very nearly so. Here are a few ways to make it happen.

Credit card issuer travel portals

If you want the simple and quick method, simply collect your credit card rewards then use them in your issuer's travel portal. This works for any of the four major programs:

• American Express Membership Rewards
• Capital One Venture Rewards
• Chase Ultimate Rewards
• Citi ThankYou Rewards

You'll generally get about $0.01 per point this way (some specific cards may offer more), and you can use your rewards to cover everything down to the fees.

If you want to get more value out of your points, however, I suggest transferring them to a useful airline partner program. This way, you can turn them into frequent flyer miles and book your flights directly with the airlines. Here are some worth checking out.

United Airlines MileagePlus miles

You'll spend the least amount of cash booking through United. Its website showed decent award availability early next year, and so-so availability later this year, for business class to France from eastern U.S. hubs. The best deals I found cost 88,000 United miles, plus $12.50 to $24.40 in fees. These flights were through Turkish Airlines or TAP Portugal, respectively.

Earning United miles

You're a little more limited with United miles than other currencies on the list, mostly because Chase is the only transfer partner. However, there are also multiple United cobranded airline cards that can help you speed up your miles accrual.

Air Canada Aeroplan points

Although not the first place you might think of, you can get some pretty decent deals booking through Air Canada's Aeroplan program. I found flights from the east coast of the U.S. to Paris for just 70,000 Aeroplan points plus $104 CAD (around $74.62 USD) in fees. Flights are via Swiss International Airlines and Air Baltic.

Earning Air Canada points

Both Amex Membership Rewards and Capital One Venture miles will transfer 1:1 to Air Canada (terms apply). There is also a Chase credit card cobranded with Aeroplan that earns Air Canada points.

AirFrance / KLM Flying Blue miles

France's home team airline has plenty of availability from the eastern U.S. hubs to Paris, but you're paying a little extra to fly d'un avion français. AirFrance award flights cost just 50,000 Flying Blue miles but charge you $202.60 in fees. 

Earning AirFrance rewards

Arguably the best thing about Flying Blue is that you can transfer to it from all four major credit card travel programs at a 1:1 rate. Plus, it has a cobranded credit card with Bank of America. This makes it super duper easy to accrue plenty of Flying Blue miles. 

AirFrance / KLM (via Virgin Atlantic)

Even though Flying Blue miles are easy to get, you may already have a stash of Virgin Atlantic points laying about. In that case, you can book the same AirFrance flights to Paris for 48,500 Virgin Atlantic points plus $276.80 in fees. If you need to top off your points, you can transfer to Virgin Atlantic through Amex, Chase, and Citi.

Who to avoid

Unless you have an irrational surplus of Delta SkyMiles, don't even bother. The best award tickets I could find were a whopping 195,000 miles (plus $5.60) for business class.

What's more, there are many routes where American Airlines proves to be a great place to find award space -- but this isn't one of them. Your low-points options to France are all on British Airways metal with layovers in the U.K. 

Flying to, from, or through the U.K. on an award ticket generally means huge surcharges: I'm talking about more than $750 in surcharges in this case. So while the 57,000-mile price tag may be tempting, just say no to the extra fees.

If you do a bit of digging -- and take advantage of a few airline alliances -- you can find a lot of great ways to make it to France for (mostly) free. You'll need to plan ahead, but that's certainly a price worth paying for the trip (and meals!) of a lifetime.