Airfare from Middle America to Europe

[PsylockeSmythe]

We live on the east coast and the price was still outrageous for us to fly direct from Charlotte to Barcelona. I could have saved about 1/3 the price if we had flown from Charlotte to NY and then NY to Barcelona. But doing so would have meant we left close to 8am in the morning out of Charlotte; and then spent 10 hours in NY waiting on the connecting flight and then another almost 10 hours flying into Barcelona. For a total travel time of 26 hours from when we left Charlotte. With the return trip being just about as bad.

So as others have stated; trying checking for flights going to a major east coast hub and then from there to Europe.

Psy

 

[mmmears]

West Coast here. We used points for the flights since we had them. People on our cruise are using Iceland Air because it's so much cheaper that it's worth flying to one of their departure cities to catch a flight. Norwegian Air is also quite popular, but another member mentioned that it might not be around by next year. Also, I found out too late (20/20 hindsight here) it's cheap to fly inside Europe, so you might look into a RT flight to London and then adding on the short flight to CPH. CPH was much harder for us to find a flight to, whereas it's easy to find flights to London. Hope this helps!

Also, people on our cruise waited until somewhere around 10 months out (I think) to find the better deals.

 

[DCSWO]

I went through this exercise over a year ago to book flights for our upcoming northern European cruise out of Copenhagen - flying from Austin. I looked at the driving options to go to San Antonio, Houston or DFW and moved the departure/return dates around a little. While there may have been a small savings in some cases, after you factor in the driving time, gas, possible hotel stay the night before (or after), it wasn't worth the extra trouble to me - especially a 3-4 hour drive home at the end of vacation. We will not have the extra days available, so I didn't price out flying into London or some other European city, spending the night or 2 or 3, then taking a "local" flight from there to Copenhagen. Again, after you factor in expensive European hotels, transportation, meals, etc., you really have to do the math to see if you are saving any money. I also only looked at 1-stop flights and total travel time (a big thing for me) because the more stops you have, the more likely something can go wrong. So, all of that being said, I paid almost $1400/ticket to fly BA from Austin to London, to Copenhagen. Multiply that times 4 and I could have booked another cruise for the cost - but then I wouldn't get to cruise the Baltic Good luck.

 

[DCSWO]

One more items of note: I booked flights as early as I possibly could - with a little hesitation that prices might drop. I set up price notifications on them, and the prices on my flights only went up over time - until they sold out.

 

[BuzzLightyearInTampa]

Yes, I will consider driving to Dallas or Houston, each of which are 3-4 hours away. The deal would have to be pretty sweet to tempt me to that, as such long, boring drives are unpleasant bookends to a vacation. They can even be dangerous: once I drove back from Dallas after a flight through a vicious summer thunderstorm. (I had to get home to my toddler son, whose father's patience was too limited for me to stop and spend the night at a hotel.) It was such a fierce and ubstructive storm that driving through it was scary, visibility was minimal, and I know that I was lucky to make it home in one piece. That was over 10 years ago, and I've chosen not to travel to another city to save on airfare since then.

Any drive further than Dallas or Houston is something I'm not really willing to do. I'd be ready to ditch the cruise at that point. My vacation shouldn't be harder than my day job.

I don't mean to be too personal here, but your toddler's father sounds like a real jerk. I wouldn't want to force ANYONE to drive in dangerous conditions like that, let alone the mother of my child.

That being said, the last line of your post has just become my new mantra when it comes to vacations!

 

[Shanti]

I don't mean to be too personal here, but you toddler's father sounds like a real jerk. I wouldn't want to force ANYONE to drive in dangerous conditions like that, let alone the mother of my child.

Well, yes, that's why I now refer to him only as "my son's father"...

 

[tink1970]

@Shanti- I feel your pain, too. We live in the Panhandle of Fl and it's always crazy pricing (example: it cost HALF as much for my one way flight to Barcelona from Atlanta than from our home airport). For that, I did add in an extra night at ATL at a hotel and used miles for the one way to ATL (that was very low). I know playing the miles/credit card game can be a headache, but can be helpful in cases like ours when we need to take "positioning flights" to big airports. One night in the airport cost MUCH less than $2,400 extra (for DH and myself) to fly from home.

Hopefully you'll find a solution-I hate Dallas and Houston traffic so the idea of driving either way makes me

 

[tink1970]

Well, yes, that's why I now refer to him only as "my son's father"...

LOL! I do the same with DD's father. It's what I can say that's G-rated

 

[pjacobi]

1. Fly Southwest, JetBlue, or another domestic carrier to get to the east coast first.

I would not recommend this method. If your Southwest domestic flight is late, you would be considered a no-show for the overseas flight with no refund.

If you book with one airline and your domestic flight is late, the airline will get you to your overseas destination on the next available flight.


-Paul

 

[KatieKepic]

We're in SA. Our original plan was to fly Iceland Air from Dallas (4-4.5 hour drive for us) as they had the most affordable airfare and we had the added bonus of adding a stopover in Iceland for no additional cost. However, British Airways just added a new nonstop flight from Austin and they have very completive fares right now. A coworker just booked for April. The summer fares aren't out yet but I'm going to price the two options and see which is more affordable for us. We will also be flying 4 to London.

 

[hubbard53]

I'm in Atlanta - a Delta hub - and prices are still outrageous here..

same. after moving here, i too thought it would be more economic flying out of ATL - but no, it's outrageous. I was planning a trip to Paris several months ago and it was hundreds of dollars cheaper to fly from JFK to PAR instead of ATL. It was cheaper for us to take a SW flight from ATL to JFK and then Delta to Paris. . . i think it was $500 cheaper but the logisitics/timing of flights didnt work out. . . I put that trip on the backburner. Maybe I'm turning into my grandpa but I remember when flights to Europe were $500-800

 

[DCSWO]

We're in SA. Our original plan was to fly Iceland Air from Dallas (4-4.5 hour drive for us) as they had the most affordable airfare and we had the added bonus of adding a stopover in Iceland for no additional cost. However, British Airways just added a new nonstop flight from Austin and they have very completive fares right now. A coworker just booked for April. The summer fares aren't out yet but I'm going to price the two options and see which is more affordable for us. We will also be flying 4 to London.

Actually, that daily non-stop has been around since March 2014. It made news earlier this year because they changed planes from the 787 Dreamliner to the 747.

 

[KatieKepic]

I had no idea. My coworker had mentioned they were running specials due to the new flights so I looked they had round trip flights for about $500-700/person depending on dates which I thought was really good. We don't go until August 2019 so I couldn't check for us yet.

 

[Dznypal]

when we fly international we take a bus shuttle (coach USA) to Chicago which is about a 90 minute ride for us

price is cheaper-even with the bus which actually is pretty cheap

its a lot cheaper then flying from MKE to Europe ( we had to fly into London once and Barcelona ) to catch our ship plus there non stop from Chicago

otherwise some of the flights wed have to fly MKE to ORD which is about a half hr flight

so I would check into driving to a different airport

 

[hubbard53]

Kayak.com is a good place to find cheap flights - was just playing around and it looks like November is when the fares to europe drop drastically. Was seeing fares <$500 to barcelona from JFK ($775 from ATL )

 

[GuardMusic]

No real answers, will just share what I've done so far. (I very much appreciate this "misery loves company" post.) I've been looking ahead as far as possible for the weeks leading up to Barcelona RT DCL May 2019. This was the only way I could start getting a sense for the fares. FYI I would likely never use Disney air, as I'm a control freak!

I thought we would use miles too, but my expectations were off. I've flown into Paris, Heathrow (3x), & Rome (2x) and have learned I'm just not a good eastbound flyer (read: JET LAG!) I both need to sleep and have back issues (some times). So roll your eyes now, my last work flight (to Rome) I paid the difference to upgrade to business class, which was a very worthwhile decision.

So BFF and I agreed business on the way over and economy on the way home. (Many sites don't allow for such a search and two one-ways are WAY more expensive.) The business mile requirement was MUCH more than I expected (United). FYI I do NOT love United, but have some miles that have been building.

So cash consideration it is. I was flabbergasted our flight would cost more than our DCL! (From a placeholder & booked 14 months in advance! The cruise now seemed reasonable!) So I figured looking at Ohare or Cincy (instead of home in Indianapolis & we have a family member who could drive us) would be the solution. Nope. Either the exact same price or more! Then I looked into flying into Madrid (& then take the train). Nope. Same price!

Looking at Delta, Indy & Cincy both have two stops each way (and no return from Barcelona after 10am), which we were trying & needed to avoid. Same price range.

So at this point I'm just waiting for our dates to actually publish on United. The two single benefits are only have one stop each way, and for the outbound, having access to the new Polaris Lounge. I was able to experience the first one in Chicago soon after it opened and felt it made a world of difference, as I was able to take my traditional evening shower and grab dinner (heavy appetizers) complimentary.

Yet I do have a limit I simply cannot exceed, so hopefully BFF and I do not have to have a disappointing conversation. The only real savings will be using points to stay in Barcelona.

UGH. How depressing!

 

[Shanti]

FYI I would likely never use Disney air, as I'm a control freak!

Heads up that you can now choose your exact flights & seats when flying via DCL Air.

 

[owensamo]

Check out Wow (https://wowair.us/) or Norwegian Air (https://www.norwegian.com/us/). Wow has $279 one-way fares from Dallas to London this summer. Norwegian doesn't appear to fly from Texas, but if you can catch a cheap flight to Orlando, they also have similar fares from there. Both also fly out of Copenhagen, so you could do 2 1-way fares. Note that I have found on these airlines that flights *to* Europe are significantly less expensive than the flight back to the US. Also London is an expensive place to fly into and out of due to taxes and fees - if you can fly round-trip to Copenhagen and then get back to London, you might save some money.

 

[Intr3pid]

I would not recommend this method. If your Southwest domestic flight is late, you would be considered a no-show for the overseas flight with no refund.

If you book with one airline and your domestic flight is late, the airline will get you to your overseas destination on the next available flight.


-Paul

If you can't provide enough time between connections and/or pull together trip interruption/cancellation coverage, you need to pay up. Can't have the cake and eat it too!

 

[Girl of the South]

I'm in Nashville and always use Southwest to a gateway city. Usually I spend the night at an airport hotel IN CASE Southwest cancels but for the most part they are pretty good and there are usually a lot of flights in case that happens.

BUT I did look at the dates for your cruise THIS year (because you can't look more than a year in advance). I used Google Flights and with the drop down menu, use MULTI CITY instead of one way or round trip. Looking and July and August THIS year I found a fare of $1748 on British Air out of Houston. That's into London and out of Copenhagen. Should be cheaper if you grab it longer than 2 months out (ie you are looking at 2019, right?) It's called an OPEN JAW flight.

As has previously been mentioned WOW flies out of Dallas. A RT Dallas to London would cost about $1000 RT with one checked bag and one carry on per person, which should be enough?

And I looked up a flight from Copenhagen to London on August 2nd of THIS year and they are pretty cheap.
Ryanair $15
Easyjet $54
SAS $55
British Air $68

Not sure about the baggage fees but pretty reasonable. So I'd just get a RT to London and then a one way from Copenhagen to London.

Are you adventurous? You can take a train from Copenhagen to London! (https://www.seat61.com/Denmark.htm) $150 and 15 hours!!

I am not sure about Norwegian Air. I flew them in April and they were fine BUT they have cancelled a lot of flights lately and there is talk of them looking for a buyer. I would NOT book them a year in advance.

PS. I am taking a day flight from EWR to LHR in September for my cruise. I'll let you know if its easier on the body than the night flights. I fly United, too. You can always sign up for one of their credit cards. There is an offer on now where you get 50,000 miles if you spend $3,000 in the first 3 months. Get the card and charge the flights on it!