WOW! I did a Mediteranean cruise in the Greek Isles in February in and out of Athens. Gorgeous! I also spent a week in Valencia, Spain on the Med last month. You will have such a blast!
Regarding the ID9x passes...
Although, I made CDG look so bad, be sure to check the flights anyway. I have flown through CDG on a few occasions when the flight was wide open. If all the flights look good, give it a stab.
I'm not sure what your plans are for getting to FCO, but generally FCO is a really hard city to non-rev in the summer. I went last month and it was 42 overbooked in coach a week out! I flew into ZRH (Zurich) and caught an Alitalia flight onto FCO. The advantage you have going to Rome is that you can check all the DL flights over to Europe and pick the most open one. Since Rome is Alitalia's hub, you can go non-stop from almost all DL European cities to Rome.
As far as your question on ID9x, they are standby, but they allow you fly on other carriers to get to another city to connect with a DL flight across the Atlantic. They are generally much cheaper than a positive space revenue tkt. As long as you are in a DL served city, then don't buy the ticket until you need it at the DL counter. Just keep in mind that the Europe DL airport tkt counters are generally only open from like 9am - noon.
Until recently we as DL non-revs could fly on SkyTeam codeshare flights with free paper passes as long as the flight had a codeshare DL flight number also. We can no longer do this. You must pay the ID95/96 on Skyteam carriers if they operate the flight regardless if the flight has a DL flight no. Keep in mind also that European carriers do not overbook flights as bad as US carriers. Non-reving (generally...this is a blanket statement) is easier within Europe.
One last note...on your return trip, keep in mind that we have a nonstop DL flight from Nice (NCE) to New York (JFK). Check that first. Also...NICE rocks too!!
Let me know if you need any further assistance or clarification on this. Please post a trip report when you get back!!
Ps.
Consider heavily the loads before using an S2 on the trans-atlantic flight. When travelling internationally, you automatically use an S3 international day. If you upgrade to S2, you use an S2 domestic day on top of the S3-TO (Trans-Oceanic) day.
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