One of my best friends just got a job in France and invited me to come stay with her. I figure I can head over during spring break which would be near the end of March. I see a lot of offers for student travels (which I am) but I’m wary of dropping money on a website I don’t know. Any suggestions both online or off? I don’t mind spending a couple hundred extra to fly on a more comfortable airline, but I don’t want to pay $3000 I see some places are asking. I live in Orange County and I can fly out of LAX or John Wayne and she is in Strasbourg, France. I’d prefer not to make her travel to meet me, but I am willing to consider flying into other cities in France.
www.traveocity.com and www.expedia.com are the most common travel sites. You don’t need to be wary of buying from them unless you shun all online vendors. You just buy your ticket and have it mailed or just print an e-ticket receipt. You have a while so you can just search fares for a while to see what is going on before you commit.
You seem flexible so another option is your Sunday paper. There are often great deals if you are willing to snap them up. I would just do that kind of casual research for a while. I doubt this is the low point for fares in the foreseeable future.
One more thing. Make sure you have your passport stuff straightened out now. They are good for ten years so there is no need to wait. Some people jump through incredible hoops to get to go on their trip at all because they waited too long to make it through the conventional process.
To go truly cheaply, you can fly from LAX to Paris for $250 each way or Dusseldorf round-trip for $500 via Air-Hitch. I’ve used it and it’s fine, but you obviously lack a certain certaincy. You can probably assume on the order of $120 train fare from either to Strasbourg.
How many times have you used it hksj? Thanks for the link, I’ll be using it to travel to Hawaii next time I go. Sunspace, I have a friend in Toronto who wants me to come visit, but when I looked at the prices from there to France, they seemed to be the same as leaving from LAX.
If you’re a student, you have some pretty cheap options open to you - try www.statravel.com (I’ve used them in the past, they’re reputable), or you may even have a travel agency on your school’s campus that can give you some great deals.
Otherwise, I just use www.kayak.com, it’s an engine that searches a bunch of travel sites at once. You don’t buy from Kayak, though, they just point you in the direction of the deal.
You must be picking some odd dates and such. I just checked Expedia for round-trip LAX-CDG on March 23 returning April 1, and seeing scads of flights $900-$1050. Either that or I do not understand your projected itinerary.
I would definitely fly to Paris and take the train to Strasbourg. There are so many reasons to do so, mainly flexibility of flights, cheapness of airfare, and the fact that the French trains run pretty well and aren’t that dear.
Flying into Frankfurt is even better. It’s about half the distance from Frankfurt to Strasbourg as Strasbourg to Paris. And if you can get to Stuttgart or Zurich, it’s even closer, but it should be cheaper to fly to Frankfurt as it’s a hub.
I, too, am curious how you’re finding $3000 airfares. Unless you’re travelling the middle of summer, I’ve never paid more than $800 for a round trip ticket to Europe (usually Budapest from Chicago), and I’ve been back and forth at least two dozen times.
Doing the same search as Una Persson to Frankfurt on Travelocity, I’m finding prices starting at $683 roundtrip with air, taxes, and fees. Average seems to be about $750 for flights.
Oh, wow, if you fly into Stuttgart (which is only 2 hours from Strasbourg, as opposed to 3 from Frankfurt and over 6 from Paris), prices start at $625, and there’s 11 flights available at the $665 level.
If I were you, I would just fly into Stuttgart. It’s an easy airport, the rail is easy to find, and you’ll be able to get a train to Strasbourg with little hassle. Rail in Europe is an enjoyable experience, so I highly recommend it.
Don’t bother flying directly into Strasbourg. It’s just as easy and much cheaper to hit either Frankfurt or Stuttgart and take the rail the rest of the way.
pulykamell, I can not sleep on airplanes and I am worried about becoming disoriented when I arrive so I’d prefer to have as few hassles to deal with after I land. Are the trains really easy to figure out even for an exhaused American?
Are you looking at LAX-SXB tickets? If so you will well get mugged on the interline tickets to the tune of $3K. As others have said, get a cheap ticket to some other hub and then either a cheap no-frills flight or a train.
FRA or CDG are probably your best bets, I’d personally go for FRA since CDG is a shitty airport. Just glancing at expedia with travel dates of 30 March and 13 April, I get $621 for United/Lufthansa connecting in DFW (but a 14-hour trip each way).
A quick skim of the web shows Frankfurt Airport Railway Station to Strasbourg as about 2-3 hours, costing about €45 one way. Deutsche Bahn website. If you work out which train and so on, it’s pretty easy to figure out - arrive, go downstairs, look for train details on board, go to platform, get on. The airport information people are also pretty helpful.
I live in Frankfurt most of the time, and I’ll second slaphead’s comment that the train is easy to find at the Frankfurt Airport (just follow the signs). They run a heavy schedule, so chances are you won’t have to wait long for the train. It will take a while to retrieve luggage and such though, so make sure you leave enough time between your flight arrival and the train departure.
One other piece of advice - avoid the smoking car(s) at all costs. I have made the mistake of booking a seat in one of these cars, and even though I’m a smoker it was horrible in there.
Yes. Extremely so. In fact, considering the time taken waiting for a layover at another airport, it’s probably going to be just as fast if not faster to take the train.
And it’s only 31 Euro each way if you go from Stuttgart.
Using your dates, there a flight available for $557 (!!!) from LAX to Stuttgart via London. That one has a bit of a layover in London (like 6 hours). There’s one for $698 with a normal layover (2 hours).
I still say, go to Stuttgart, and take the train. If you don’t care about the long layover, the whole shebang will cost you less than $650. If the long layover bothers you, you can still do it for under $800.
Trust me, navigating the public transportation in Germany is not difficult. Just check the schedules beforehand using the site linked to. And there’s certainly plenty of English speakers around to help travel-weary passengers like you.
You have been very helpful. Thanks for all the advice offered! I just talked to my friend again and she said she is thinking of spending her spring break in Amsterdam and wants me to come join her there. It looks like flying into Germany is now the best idea.
Zoom Airlines is offering a return exonomy fare from Toronto (Pearson) to Paris (Charles de Gaulle) at the end of March for CAD 647 (USD 572; this includes all taxes and surcharges–$250 worth of taxes and surcharges!).
I’m sure you can find an ‘inexpensive’ economy flight from LAX to Toronto; Air Canada offers one for USD 645.48 and Westjet offers almost exactly the same price, but you have to connect through Calgary. There are a LOT of US airlines who go to Toronto, but you may need to go through their hub in the States.
What are the prices for direct flichts from LAX to Paris or Germany?
Oh, and if you don’t have your passport, get it NOW. I understand that the US will require passports for all incoming air travelers as of January, even those from Canada. There may be a rush on them in December.
As for the train from Paris to Strasbourg, SNCF (French Railways) is offering fully-exchangeable and refundable return tickets from Paris Est station to Strasbourg for EUR 107.50 (USD 135; cheaper ones are abailable).