update (post 22) - it's official - indirect via south america (for only £60 more)

[disneyholic family]

It's like being stuck in the 1970's Or in a doctor's waiting room - for 9 hours!

 

[disneyholic family]

so the tickets were issued yesterday, DS and DDIL are going to chile!!!!

and amazingly, it's only costing an extra £60 per person!!!

is that crazy or what?

of course, their original tickets were very expensive, since we're flying in super high season and we didn't buy the tickets sufficiently in advance...

so their original flights were £1300 per person (Tel Aviv - Orlando indirect via NYC)

their new flights are £1360 per person (TA - Chile - Orlando - TA)

there are a lot of stops along the way, a very indirect route, but can you believe it's only an extra £60 to add on Santiago, Chile? deep down in south america?
that's amazing to me!!!

my daughter in law is so excited, she hasn't been able to sleep since i found the flights for them...she finally called her uncles and aunts in chile last night to tell them they're coming....it's wonderful to see how happy and excited she is!!!! i'm excited for them too!!!!!

and what is the very indirect route?
to get from TA to Chile takes 3 legs:
--TA to Paris (5 hour flight)
--Paris to JFK (8.5 hour flight)
--JFK to Chile (11 hour flight)

then 10 days later, to get from chile to orlando (where they meet us) takes 2 legs:
--Chile to JFK (11 hour flight)
--JFK to Orlando (2.5. hour flight)

then 2 weeks later, the flight home takes 3 legs:
--Orlando to JFK (2.5 hour flight)
--JFK to Zurich (8 hour flight)
--Zurich to TA (4 hour flight)

and of course there are layovers at each airport, some longer than others..
the total time, flight and layover to get from TA to chile is 33 hours...and that doesn't include the travel to the airport at the beginning...
hopefully, they'll be able to sleep on board a bit...
but they're young and it's an ADVENTURE!!! (i'm saying that like robin williams on the DQ elevator)...

in any case, the whole thing is only costing £60 per person extra!!!! how cool is that????

 

[cherjp]

wow , thats an experience if nothing else !

 

[disneyholic family]

i should add that there are a lot more direct routes than what they're flying, but at a lot more money...
they could go non-stop from TA to Sao Paolo Brazil, then continuing from brazil to chile....that's a much shorter trip...but it would cost at least £1,000 more...

and they could fly with fewer stops via Air Canada -
TA-Toronto-Chile
Chile-Toronto-Orlando
Orlando-Toronto-TA
but that one is about £600 more....(and those are non-refundable tickets - the ones i bought are refundable)...

so they'll go the long circuitous route...

did you know that every time you enter the US, even if you're just on a connecting flight to leave the US, you still have to go through immigration and customs?

even though they're just crosing through JFK on the way to chile, they have to do all that nonsense - immigration, baggage claim, customs, give back luggage, get on next plane (to chile).
what a complete waste of time..
in most countries, you're just held in a transit area without crossing immigration/customs..
why does the US have to make everything difficult?
just asking...

 

[Disneymadhouse]

All I can say is wow!

Remind me never to take a 2 centre holiday in Tel Aviv and Chile!!

Glad you got it all sorted out

Claire

 

[disneyholic family]

All I can say is wow!

Remind me never to take a 2 centre holiday in Tel Aviv and Chile!!

Glad you got it all sorted out

Claire

but it's a great deal..
if they were to take two separate trips, one to orlando and the other to chile, it would cost twice as much..
the fact that it's only costing an additional £60 to do the whole thing in one trip is amazing to me....so really it's a saving of a ton of money!!!!

when DS asked if they could go to chile (we're paying for the family trip to orlando), i figured it would cost a lot more...
basically they're getting the chile add-on for free....
and i'm thrilled about that!!

 

[2Tiggies]

Oh well done Beth!! I can't believe it is only £60 extra after all that - at the expense of time. Although it sounds like your family may be inclined to treat that as part of the adventure

Was this the result of countless hours of trawling the internet?

However you managed it, you are sure to be the most popular MIL on the face of the planet right now

 

[disneyholic family]

Oh well done Beth!! I can't believe it is only £60 extra after all that - at the expense of time. Although it sounds like your family may be inclined to treat that as part of the adventure

Was this the result of countless hours of trawling the internet?

However you managed it, you are sure to be the most popular MIL on the face of the planet right now

well i did spend hours and hours on the internet....every website i oculd think of: kayak.com, expedia, air canada, delta, lufthansa, BA, KLM, iberia, lan, tam, copa, etc etc

it turns out the best website for what i was looking for was American Airlines...
AA has a far more powerful flight search engine than any of the other airlines i tried...

we ended up buying the tickets from American (through our travel agent)...
but the flights are with American, LAN, and El Al...

it's possible that had we bought these tickets 6 months ago, other airlines would have had competitive prices (like AC, Iberia and Lufthansa), but this is pretty late in the game for booking august tickets...i mean, all of europe picks up and goes on vacation in august - so cheap trans-atlantic seats are pretty rare at this point...