I have a question about flying… maybe someone will know the answer, since all of y’all are so amazingly smart and helpful.
I’m going to Las Vegas at the end of next July, and I really, really want to visit a grad school in Encinitas, CA (north of San Diego) while I’m there. My keratoconjunctivis sicca problem has a way of acting up if I have to do a lot of driving, though (they’re about five hours apart.) So is there any way to fly into one airport (Nashville to Las Vegas) and then out of another (San Diego to Nashville)? Avoiding the extra driving could make all the difference for me between having a flareup and not having one!
Is this worth it, or does it cost so much extra that it’s really not? What if I did it way in advance (right now, for instance)? Would that make a difference?
The formula for determining if it’s worth it includes your own bank acount and your own sense of comfort. No one can tell you that. But plan on paying plenty. One way trips are expensive - way more expensive than one half a round trip. Go on line to Expedia or Orbitz or one of those and check out one way fares on each of those trips and then compare then with the cost of a round trip the same dates. Then, plug in the numbers for your bank account and your level of distress with your eye disorder, and you’ll get your answer.
You can fly that way. I believe it is called a multi-destination ticket and they are generally much more expensive than your standard round-trip ticket. I believe that the major online ticket sites like Expedia, Travelocity, and Orbitz let you price and book them online. You can give it a try to see if it is worth it to you.
I looked it up on Expedia and was very surprised… flying into Las Vegas and then out of San Diego is exactly the same price as just flying round-trip to Las Vegas in the first place. So that’s good to know. I don’t know why it was so different from what I (and everyone else) expected… maybe because it’s so far in advance??
At this moment, booking “multi-destination” round-trip is more expensive than a string of one-way flights.
For your routing of BNA-LAS-SAN-BNA, on a hypothetical set of dates leaving BNA on July 14, going LAS-SAN on the 17th and returning to BNA on the 19th comes up for $391.
One-way flights came up as $150 for BNA-LAS, $75 for LAS-SAN and $160 for SAN-BNA on the same dates, for a total of $385.
Moral of the story? Ain’t one! Airline pricing is unpredictable. Especially seven months in advance.
Depending on time of year and day of the week there are also pretty good deals for round trip flights between major CA cities and LV. Cyn and I hop a flight on Alleigant air out for fresno, usually $99-$129 round trip and takes about an hour gate to gate. Beats the hell out of a 5-6 hour drive. If you had to rent a car for that drive it would prolly end up costing you a good protion of that between rental and fuel.
What you’re talking about, Anise, is an “open gap” ticket.
They are allowed, and most major airlines do not price them as discrete one way tickets.
As you noted in your example, sometimes the fare is no more than a ticket from A to B back to A. Sometimes, it’s a bit more.
But it’s very definately doable. You just have to check the routes and fares to see how it prices out for you.
I’ve done this several times myself, and the only difficulty may come if you’re renting a car. Renting a Hertzmobile at one location and dropping it off at another can sometimes incur a big surcharge, so watch this.
