Sheri - you can't book air yet - it's usually 330 days ahead of time, so May '05 will be the time to start thinking about it for real. Especially true if trying to use miles - call the first day availability opens up - they will hold your outbound, then when the return date opens up, call back and grab that.

SAA has best schedule, I think - get it over with with one flight. The downside is that I doubt you can upgrade using Star Alliance miles - usually you can only upgrade on the flights operated by the carrier on which you have the miles. But you can use the miles for "free" tickets. For those with Platinum AMEX - SAA is in the 2 for 1 international air program.