air fares: shop around!

[airplanegeek]

unless you have something against saving money, do some research.

in early 2003, when BA had their annual $198 roundtrip fare from any US gateway to LON, i took advantage. LON is almost always the cheapest and easiest european destination to get to.

once you book travel to LON, consider easyjet, ryanair, or any other no-frill carrier for flying beyond LON. you'll most likely need to transfer via car, bus, or train to get to STN, LTN, or LGW. after spending a week in england, we flew STN-EDI on go (now easyjet), two days later EDI-DUB on ryanair, two days later DUB-LTN, next day LHR-PHX. cheap cheap cheap! when you can fly those routes for 1GBP-20GBP (plus tax) with no advance purchase, why not! my best trip so far.

[u2o]

cheap cheap cheap! when you can fly those routes for 1GBP-20GBP (plus tax) with no advance purchase, why not! my best trip so far.

yeh, but just be warned, earlier you book the cheaper the flights are, so you can be paying really high fares that are much more expensive than BA or BMI if you dont book at right time. bmi offers good fares especially if you book online, i actually saved about 50GBP by flying bmi on LHR to EDI return, instead of choosing easyJet.

ryanair offers very cheap fares, just look out for which dates that they are eligible, and also that ryanair flies to crappy airports that can cost loads just to get into city centre!

so just look around, on both low cost and non-low costs.

[srbmod]

One thing to also look at is the flight times. When I was looking for flights out to LAS from ATL, the cheapest ones were the last flights of the day to LAS and the red eyes to ATL. I decided not to do those as I would end up spending more money in regards to car rental (I would have had to book an extra day's rental which was more than I had originally planned), and the savings that I would have had on airfare would have been eaten up by the extra day's rental and additional meals I would have had that day. I found a good fare ATL-DFW-LAS on FL ($95 each way), but I really did not like the schedule as I would have gotten into Vegas during the check in rush hour @ the hotels and would have had to get up really early and rushed to check out and return the car so to catch the return flight LAS-DFW-LAS.

[yul_airplane_freak]

when are the best times to book for flights to Europe leaving from Canada/US?

[matt1168]

It's kinda hard out of ACY... Spirit virtually runs a monopoly out of here.

[FlyCharlestonSC]

It's kinda hard out of ACY... Spirit virtually runs a monopoly out of here.

don't complain--it's a monopoly of low fares


I would trade US, NW, UA, and CO for Spirit any day!

Also, DL flies to almost every airport I have been to from CVG! :lol:

[Cubana]

cheap cheap cheap! when you can fly those routes for 1GBP-20GBP (plus tax) with no advance purchase, why not! my best trip so far.

yeh, but just be warned, earlier you book the cheaper the flights are, so you can be paying really high fares that are much more expensive than BA or BMI if you dont book at right time. bmi offers good fares especially if you book online, i actually saved about 50GBP by flying bmi on LHR to EDI return, instead of choosing easyJet.

ryanair offers very cheap fares, just look out for which dates that they are eligible, and also that ryanair flies to crappy airports that can cost loads just to get into city centre!

so just look around, on both low cost and non-low costs.

I got to agree there. Last January when I booked a flight from Amsterdam to London, bmi turned to be €10 more expensive than easyJet. The difference is that BD arrives to Heathrow, while EZY lands at Luton or Gatwick. That means you still have to catch a train or a bus, which certainly is more expensive than €10 (remember £1 = €1.60 or so). From Heathrow you have the Piccadilly subway line.

Same goes for Ryanair. The case I know the most is the Netherlands, where they depart from Groningen and Eindhoven. Even though the airplane ticket may be very cheap, the train is not. Also, Groningen is located 200 km far from Amsterdam. Going from A'dam to Eindhoven will take you, at least, 1:20.

So beware. A cheap airplane ticket doesn't mean getting from the city to the airport is not expensive at all. Especially with these fields in the middle of nowhere where some low-costs fly to...

[matt1168]

It's kinda hard out of ACY... Spirit virtually runs a monopoly out of here.

don't complain--it's a monopoly of low fares


I would trade US, NW, UA, and CO for Spirit any day!

Also, DL flies to almost every airport I have been to from CVG! :lol:

You'd be surprised. Spirit may be an LCC, but they can charge whatever they want out of ACY... try $790 r/t to PBI. DL's fares through CVG beat many of NK's.

[airplanegeek]

when are the best times to book for flights to Europe leaving from Canada/US?


september and october seem to always be the best months to buy europe travel. keep in mind that cheap seats to europe are usually off-peak travel.