🎼 Seein' things that I may never see again... And I can't wait to get on the road again... 🎼
So there's been a lot of chatter lately about airline tix... Everybody is starting to look! Some folks have already booked. Some folks have reached out... and we've received a few questions from guests... And of course we always invite you to give us a call if we can help you...
Here's the caveat, we are not travel agents... and we can not buy tix for you... but we'd be happy to try to help you find a few options online, or if you need advice with something like: "is this a good airline" or "is this a good price" or perhaps "is this layover time safe" or "is this a reasonable flight duration" or maybe: "can we fly on one airline into Paris and another home from Marseille?"
Again, we're not travel agents, and we only have the same tools you do... but we do, between the two of us, have an extensive amount of International Air Travel experience, specifically to Europe over the last 40 years...
Personally, we typically start out researching tix on Kayak.com and Google Flights... and when we find something we think might work for us, we go directly to that Airline's website, search for that flight, and buy the tix directly from the Airline. We're not masters at finding the cheapest tix... but we can tell you that the more time you spend researching, the more likely you are to get a good feel for what is a good value!
Terese and I personally tend to stick to the legacy carriers we know & trust; United, Delta, American, Lufthansa, Air France, Emirates, British Airways, etc... We do this because we can't afford to not get there on schedule... If there's a major delay or cancellation, most of these legacy carriers have multiple flights to Europe everyday and they have "codeshares" with multiple airlines and can more easily get us on another flight in a reasonable amount of time... Sometimes, the discount airlines do not have these codeshares and also they usually have very limited flights... (For example: United Airlines & their combined codeshares probably have dozens if not 100's of flights leaving major airports daily into major hubs in Europe... and those airlines would likely have dozens of flights daily going into Marseille. Some discount airlines have only one or two flights a day from the US and no codeshares at all... and some of these discount airlines have only 1 or two flights a week)
We also look at Flight Duration and # of stops... If flying from the US into Marseille, you likely have at least one stop... We try never to book a flight with more than 1 stop... Two stops / or connections double the possibility of either us, or our luggage, not making the connection... But with that in mind you'll usually find that the flights with the shortest duration sometimes have the shortest layovers.. and short layovers can again possibly mean either you or your luggage not making the connection... So it's a fine line.... and of course there's always an element of risk... For those of you flying into Paris for a few days; most of those flights will be direct nonstop.
Yet another thing to keep in mind is that these days many airlines have a lot of different levels of "Economy" tix... and often the lowest level of basic economy (read: least expensive) of these tix have more restrictions... Often these tix are not changeable or upgradeable... And most often they don't include checked luggage... And sometimes they only allow a personal-size carry-on and not a full size carry-on... You should know that if your tix doesn't include a piece of checked luggage, you likely would have to pay $90 to $120 per person to check your bag... and that fee will apply twice per person - once each direction! So your baggage fees if you check just one bag, could be as high as $240 per person round trip...
And lastly: While some guests arrange their flights to arrive the first day of the Tour (Saturday), we usually suggest flying over at least one day earlier and staying in your arrival city in a hotel for at least one night just to be safe in case of cancelled or delayed flights. (this is of course totally your choice) But this does help you adjust more easily to the jet lag / time zone change.
And if you're flying home on the Saturday immediately after your Provence Tour, be careful concerning how early your flight leaves (you'll need to drive to the airport, return your car, get a shuttle from the car return lot to the terminal, and check-in a few hours before your flight departure... all of that can be pretty tough to do if you have a 9 am flight... you may want to consider an afternoon or next day flight.
Lastly, someone has asked about the pros and cons of buying air tickets thru online discounters or an OTA (online travel agency). We personally prefer to deal directly with the airline, but many folks are temped by the prices they see in ads for ticket discounters. So we break these down into two categories; the traditional Online Travel Agencies like Expedia or Orbitz... and the major Ticket Discounters like Cheapo Tickets, CheapFlights, and ASAP Tickets. Usually buying tickets thru a traditional online travel agency is much like walking into a brick and mortar travel agency and they typically sell tickets for the same price as the airlines do directly. But often when buying thru one of the big Ticket Discounters you'll end up with "promotional tickets" that they buy from the airlines in bulk and they sometimes have very few perks or amenities attached. (ie: non-changeable, non-refundable, no checked luggage, etc.) And if you run into a problem while traveling and call your airline, they tell you to call the agency you bought your tickets from... This is sometimes not easy and they often have limited availability to help you... So just be careful; ask questions and read ALL the fine print... for more on this subject click here
Again, if we can help you in any way at all, please reach out to us! We're always happy to help!
