Any Albertans flown NWA?

[chimo2u]

Hello,
I am trying to find a good flight for our Sept 2009 trip. I saw NWA had the schecule posted up for Sept 09, and the schedule was pretty good... Edmonton to Orlando 8am depart and arrive by 5:17pm through Minneapolis. I was wondering if anyone has flown this airline and this route, and if so, what where your feelings on the airline, service and connections? Also, do they offer in-flight entertainment? as this is important to our family... we have 2 boys who will be 17 and 13 at time of travel.... they do NOT want to go on another 7 1/2 hour flight like UNITED last year, with no entertainment! It was long and boring to say the least. We were not too thrilled with United service. Any opinions would be greatly appreciated. One last thought, with gas prices falling, I am wondering if I should book now or wait a little bit. Right now, the 4 of us can fly for around $2,800.00.... not overly bad, but I am wondering if it may get a little better as time goes on.
Marie

 

[Chickkypoo]

I haven't flown NWA from Edmonton, but have from Regina. I usually fly NWA down to the states, and find they usually have the best schedules and rates, especially when I was living out west. I will be flying them again next month out of Toronto. I usually paid $650-$750 for my tickets out of Regina. NWA did not have on-board entertainment on their domestic flights the last time I flew domestic (but I know they did when I flew overseas). I found the flight wasn't so bad though because of the stopover in Minneapolis. I usually bring an MP3 player, and a book, it makes the time fly by.

 

[tiggerrr]

Hello,
I am trying to find a good flight for our Sept 2009 trip. I saw NWA had the schecule posted up for Sept 09, and the schedule was pretty good... Edmonton to Orlando 8am depart and arrive by 5:17pm through Minneapolis. I was wondering if anyone has flown this airline and this route, and if so, what where your feelings on the airline, service and connections? Also, do they offer in-flight entertainment? as this is important to our family... we have 2 boys who will be 17 and 13 at time of travel.... they do NOT want to go on another 7 1/2 hour flight like UNITED last year, with no entertainment! It was long and boring to say the least. We were not too thrilled with United service. Any opinions would be greatly appreciated. One last thought, with gas prices falling, I am wondering if I should book now or wait a little bit. Right now, the 4 of us can fly for around $2,800.00.... not overly bad, but I am wondering if it may get a little better as time goes on.
Marie

I fly NWA regularly for both business and vacation from Edmonton and I try to fly them as often as possible. They've never lost my luggage and I have always found their flight attendants to be among the most cheerful. Also, I do like the fact that their hub is in MSP, which from Edmonton, is almost always exactly halfway between here and most east coast destinations. I hate flying and breaking up the flight right in the middle works for me. Plus, MSP doesn't seem to have the flight delays that I've experience flying United through Chicago. They also still fly larger planes out of Edmonton, unlike United/Air Canada that fly the much smaller regional jets.

The down side is that there is no in-flight entertainment. The only US carrier that has this out of Edmonton is US Airways (and even then I've gotten a plane without the TV screens). The problem with US airways is that they have a longer flying times because their hub is in Phoenix. Westjet also has in-flight entertainment, but the only way to Orlando is through Toronto or Calgary and the experience of having to clear customs partway through your trip (and collect ALL your luggage to go through customs and then re-check it) is painful.

The point of all this rambling is that I consider NWA to be my first option when flying to the US out of Edmonton. A good airline, a good flight schedule, good aircraft, a good hub location. No onboard entertainment. Bring your own.

Edit: I forgot to answer the other part of your question about cost. We used to be able to get $400-500 airfare regularly by waiting for seat sales. I think that those prices will be rarer, but I do think it is likely that $600 airfare is possible. My brother and his wife just got NWA tickets to Orlando from Calgary for a January trip for $550 this week. Fuel costs are only one of the reasons that airlines were unprofitable and a drop in fuel prices may not mean the return of really cheap airfare. I don't know what your tolerance is for flight prices, but I would personally be inclined to wait until the new year to see what might happen. I'm the kind of person that sets my target price and then checks a couple of times a week until it shows up. Then I book it and never look back at what it might have gone down to later.

 

[dis_guy]

First of all, thanks to all for posting in this thread as it is a topic that interests me a great deal, since we are going back down to WDW for Christmas 2009.

I've been monitoring fares for dates as far out as possible for awhile now, and things seem to be getting a bit better, depending on where you look.

NWA has fares to mid Sept. posted and they're better than I've seen in awhile. Yes, I know they will be higher over Christmas.

Thanks tiggerr for your review of NWA. It encouraged me to look closer at what they offer and I really like the 08:00 AM departure with the 5:17 PM arrival at MCO. They have some nice later-day departures that get to YEG at a respectable hour, too.

It'll make for interesting watching over the next few months, that's for sure.