Airfare to Barcelona

[kimwhitt93]

We booked another cruise from Barcelona in August but after getting home and looking at airfare for a family of 5, I'm not sure we will make it. Anyone found any good deals or alternate routes? We will travel from Houston,TX.

 

[Luv2Diz]

The $1,500 or so airfare from Barcelona is what kept us from booking the TA cruise. Checked air from Paris and London and it cost even more!

 

[carpenta]

We were suppose to cruise inJune on the Magic but cancelled for the high price of airfare. Oh we'll stay cations are good too.

 

[sayhello]

It's all going to be bad, but check out Iberia Airlines. It's a Spanish airline. I flew them to Barcelona, and the price was *relatively* reasonable. The flight from JFK to Madrid was great; the flight from Madrid to Barcelona less so, but it's less than an hour. I'd fly them again.

Sayhello

 

[kcashner]

I was looking yesterday and US air had a $960 round trip special with no refunds, no adjustments. That's the best I've seen so far.

Icelandic air has some interesting rates, but their flights to US cities are limited and I couldn't figure out if they did a code share to get to other cities.

 

[carmie3377]

What gets me is one way is so much higher than RT. I was pricing it just this week and priced out quite a few dates. In all cases, one way was higher, sometimes more than double! I would love a transatlantic but the airfare is super crazy.

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[kcashner]

In 2010, I did both EBTA and WBTA....bought one round trip air ticket from/to BCN to cover both cruises. THAT was a good deal.

Now, DCL needs to decide to offer a WBTA this year (no, I'm not expecting it).

 

[rossjen2]

i would suggest downloading some fare watcher apps to your phone (or other devices).

we are travelling from Denver to Barcelona in June to sail on the Magic. Back when I was obsessively watching rates, they seemed to hover around 1,300 RT from Denver. I was able to purchase them for just over 900, thanks to the the apps catching the change in fare.

I found that "skyscanner" and "on the fly (ita by google)" were the two apps that did the best, for me, at catching the fare drop.

 

[bzzelady]

I was looking yesterday and US air had a $960 round trip special with no refunds, no adjustments. That's the best I've seen so far.

Icelandic air has some interesting rates, but their flights to US cities are limited and I couldn't figure out if they did a code share to get to other cities.

I don't think they codeshare....but I have flown them before and really like them. They stop in Iceland on all transatlantics-nice chance to stretch your legs and I particularly like to pick up nice woolens at the airport store there

Once in Europe, I have used Air Berlin for short haul flights...very reasonably priced and reliable.

 

[SleepyDeb]

I had an absolutely terrible experience on Air Iberia and will never fly them again. It was 100% the the airlines fault, not weather or anything else out of their control. Desk staff were rude and unhelpful. Flight attendants were awful. Flight was delayed both way for many (like 8) hours for maintenance issues and they acted like it was the passengers fault. Flight attendant smoked in the bathroom. Plane dripped water every 30 seconds on me starting somewhere about 1 hour out the entire way from Spain to NYC. Flight attendant acted like I was unreasonable for asking for another seat. Flight was full. I didn't know that, it was a 747. Ok, flight full. How about something to catch water in so I stop getting wet. Huff, sigh. Ask several more times. Finally get a small cup.

There were 200 people together on this trip. Several different flights, all had trouble. Our TA wrote a letter to president of airline. No response.

Never, ever, again.

 

[canadakath]

I just booked our flights for our June Med cruise. Had planned on the direct flight Toronto to Barcelona on Air Canada, but prices were staying around $1400/person. Checking with kayak.com showed a deal with Air France. Managed to get Toronto to BCN through CDG (I know, not a good airport to connect through, but we have time plus flights later in the day if we miss), then BCN back to CDG for a 4 night stay in Paris before direct back to Toronto all for $950/person. Of course we are now going to blow any airfare savings by staying post-cruise in Paris instead of Barcelona...but it's one of my favourite cities so I'm on

 

[Eleblanc]

What gets me is one way is so much higher than RT. I was pricing it just this week and priced out quite a few dates. In all cases, one way was higher, sometimes more than double! I would love a transatlantic but the airfare is super crazy.

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

We have to fly one way for a trans atlantic flight and the one way is more than double, so we booked a round trip and just did not take the second flight back. I will never understand why they do it that way.

 

[carmie3377]

We have to fly one way for a trans atlantic flight and the one way is more than double, so we booked a round trip and just did not take the second flight back. I will never understand why they do it that way.

I thought about that and mentioned it here a couple years ago. Someone mentioned that airlines can charge you the difference if you don't show up for the second leg. Wonder how often that happens???

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

 

[owensamo]

We actually used airline miles to fly American Air home from London after the EBTA in 2011 (after a British Air flight from BCN to LON - though EasyJet would have been far cheaper). We purchased 1 ticket, and managed to get enough miles for the other 2 on our AA credit card. We also purchased miles to buy additional tickets for my in-laws - it was cheaper to buy the miles than the ticket! I think the one-way tickets by purchasing miles came out to ~750 each. You might look into some of the airline mileage programs and see if that works out better than actually booking the flight with cash - as long as there are reward seats available on the flight.

 

[Meghatron]

We actually used airline miles to fly American Air home from London after the EBTA in 2011 (after a British Air flight from BCN to LON - though EasyJet would have been far cheaper). We purchased 1 ticket, and managed to get enough miles for the other 2 on our AA credit card. We also purchased miles to buy additional tickets for my in-laws - it was cheaper to buy the miles than the ticket! I think the one-way tickets by purchasing miles came out to ~750 each. You might look into some of the airline mileage programs and see if that works out better than actually booking the flight with cash - as long as there are reward seats available on the flight.

Using miles still means paying for taxes and fees. Flying four back to LA after the EBTA would have been $1500 on top of our miles. Flying four to Miami for the WBPC was $20. Once the *GT rates were released for the PC cruise, the choice was clear.

 

[lilpooh108]

We actually used airline miles to fly American Air home from London after the EBTA in 2011 (after a British Air flight from BCN to LON - though EasyJet would have been far cheaper). We purchased 1 ticket, and managed to get enough miles for the other 2 on our AA credit card. We also purchased miles to buy additional tickets for my in-laws - it was cheaper to buy the miles than the ticket! I think the one-way tickets by purchasing miles came out to ~750 each. You might look into some of the airline mileage programs and see if that works out better than actually booking the flight with cash - as long as there are reward seats available on the flight.

We did this too, though w/United since AA taxes are insane as they codeshare through BA. We spent 75,000 united miles and $700+ in buying miles to fly 4 of us back from Paris. Not great, but better than "rack" rates.

 

[twopeasonepod]

We are using United miles to fly back to IAH from Barcelona. 30K per person + $74. Much better than $1500, especially when you consider that it is normally 40-80K for a RT domestically.

I think it also depends on how far you are traveling. The same 30K + $74 would've gotten us all the way back to HNL, but we are buying a RT to IAH so we had to "get off" there.

 

[kaseyC]

I posted the following breakdown of our flights using miles on our EBTA meet thread for our European adventure this summer.

We are using United miles for all flights for this trip and even with taxes and fees the savings are substantial especially for a family of 5. We are using 387,500 miles plus $802 in cash for taxes and fees. For our family this is a major savings. This is our breakdown:

3 ORD to IAH - UA Econ-12,500 miles plus $2.50 pp
2 ORD to CPH - LH Business - 50,000 miles plus $35.70 pp
3 BCN to CPH - LH Econ - 12,500 miles plus $48.10 pp
5 CPH to CDG - SAS Econ -12,500 miles plus 27.50 pp
5 CDG to ORD - AC/UA Econ - 30,000 miles plus $88.40 pp

We don't have any funky outrageous connections. As a matter of fact, we have a couple non-stop flights and the others only connect once. I was also able to book so that me and my two youngest DDs will meet DH and DD17 when we all connect in Frankfurt on June 1st. We will all fly to Copenhagen on the same flight.

The good thing is we have a lot of flexibility. We can change or cancel these flights up until the day we fly for no fees with the miles redeposited into DH's account. So I can continue to stalk the website hoping they open up more Saver Awards for a non-stop flight home from Paris.

 

[bibbidibobbidibecky]

Bottom line: international airfare is expensive. If you live near JFK you will get a good deal, but beyond that, expect to pay around $1,000 PP (and for most of us not near a major airport that would be a good deal!).

I did actually find flights out of Chicago for this June for around $800, which was amazing! But the times are a nightmare and with three kids 9 and under I just don't know if I can do that to them.

I use kayak.com and set up an alert there. Good luck!

 

[Bsb1012]

I wish I found great flights. I'm going on the Greece cruise in July and I live in California. We decided to stop for a few days in New York prior to the cruise. We are spending almost $300 for a flight from San Jose, CA to JFK... then $1480 per person from JFK to Barcelona and Barcelona to San Jose. Not to mention there are NO flights that leave Barcelona for San Jose after the time Disney suggested we books flights after, so we are staying in Barcelona after the cruise. We have a early flight out the next morning. Ridiculous!