one way air to Rome before TA

[montu6]

I'm counting on all of the Princess experts out there to give me some good advice. My DH and I are considering the TA on the Ocean that starts in Rome and ends in Fort Lauderdale. What do people do about the one way air? It is too early for the rates to be out, but doing ghost bookings for earlier dates proves to be very expensive. Princess doesn't have rates out yet. Can you get an open jaw to Rome, then home from Fort Lauderdale? What would be a ball park amount to expect. Our other option is a Holland cruise in Oct. that starts in Rome and ends in Barcelona.

 

Also what can we expect for weather in the Med in Dec?

 

Any advice will be greatly appreciated!!!

[Pam in CA]

I've taken several Europe-to-US T/A cruises and usually use FF miles to book open jaw air but when I don't, I sometimes use cruise line air as it's often less-expensive. You can search for, and book, 1-way air on most if not all airlines. I book to Europe completely separately from my return air.

 

FYI, when booking air home from FLL, allow extra time to disembark the ship. Often, passengers have more careful screening than a round-trip cruise out of FLL and there are often delays. I wouldn't book a flight out of FLL earlier than Noon.

Edited December 28, 2013 by Pam in CA

[caribill]

I usually find one way TA airfare to be less with Princess EZAir than directly with the airlines.

 

In fact, buying roundtrip with the airlines and throwing away the return is usually less expensive than one way TA.

 

Above is with the traditional airlines (United, American, Delta and their European equivalents.) Discount airlines such as Icelandic Air do offer decent one way TA pricing, but be sure to take into account having to change planes along the way and the extra costs such as paying for the first checked bag.

Edited December 28, 2013 by caribill

[Hlitner]

There are a few strategies we have used so here goes. As Pam mentioned, you should certainly check-out the pricing that is offered by Princess EZ Air. Once you have your cruised booked you can simply login on the Princess site and access EZ Air where you can look at different scenarios. Another option is to fly Aer Lingus, which offers one-way fares that are half of round trip. With Aer Lingus you would have to change planes in Dublin (Shannon is sometimes another option). Aer Lingus also will allow you to stop-over in Ireland for a few days (at no additional cost). We have, twice, taken advantage of the Aer Lingus free stop-overs to extend our European trips with driving trips in Ireland.

 

A third option is our favorite. We simply book a round trip fare....and in your case you could book the return air from nearly any European city back to the USA. Since you can book air up to 330 days in advance, we use the return fare to simply connect to another TA cruise at a later date. So you use the first half of your ticket for your Rome to Ft Lauderdale cruise....and you plan another TA (about 6 months later) from the US to Europe...and use the 2nd part of that round trip air to get you home. So one round trip fare covers two TAs.

 

As to getting to Ft Lauderdale our preference is to use Southwest or JetBlue (they both have one way fares). We will even drive 2 hours to get to a Southwest airport since we like their non-stop flights and the free luggage.

 

Hank

[cherylandtk]

Open jaw does not apply as the open leg of the trip must be the shortest of the legs, which is usually FLL to home. But as Pam said, just compare Princess air fare with one way and make your choice when they are available. You can reserve refundable Princess air and wait to see if a better individual price comes along. LBNL, some folks books round trip air a season apart and fly over in the fall, TA back, take another TA over in the spring, then fly back home on the other half of the ticket. And on that sort of trip you could book open jaw to or from just about any European port.

[montu6]

Lots of great ideas! Unfortunately we do not have enough ff miles for the trip. I will look into the other suggestions. Thanks!

[Azjack]

I'm counting on all of the Princess experts out there to give me some good advice. My DH and I are considering the TA on the Ocean that starts in Rome and ends in Fort Lauderdale. What do people do about the one way air? It is too early for the rates to be out, but doing ghost bookings for earlier dates proves to be very expensive. Princess doesn't have rates out yet. Can you get an open jaw to Rome, then home from Fort Lauderdale? What would be a ball park amount to expect. Our other option is a Holland cruise in Oct. that starts in Rome and ends in Barcelona.

 

Also what can we expect for weather in the Med in Dec?

 

Any advice will be greatly appreciated!!!

 

Ez Air may be your best bet. But try the consolidators too. We booked a very convenient one way flight from Phoenix to Rome thru Chicago for about $750 pp next October. American Airlines. Last year we got a slightly better price to Venice on an American (operated by BA) thru Heathrow. Both times, we used 1800flyeurope.

 

Shop around, get the best deal you can and don't look back.

 

Jack

[rdsqrl]

If you don't have sufficient frequent flyer miles, for one-way I would recommend looking into Icelandair or Aer Lingus. Also Turkish Air generally has cheap fares, and this December, Aeroflot had some good rates, too -- and with only one connection in Moscow. Start your search at Orbitz or another site like that with a matrix where you can see at a glance who has the cheapest. It might mean two stops, depending on where you're coming from.

 

I would strongly caution against consolidator tickets. In fact, I'm not comfortable even with Princess Air, which is just another consolidator. They sell non-endorseable, non-transferable tickets, so if your flight is cancelled or there's some other irregularity, you're the last in line to be accommodated and those types of tickets can not be endorsed over to another carrier. Lots of people use Princess Air and have no problem, but you should be aware of what you're buying and in that case, definitely pad an extra day or two onto your trip.

 

[baldercash]

This won't be of much help to those in the US but for Canadians West Jet fly's out of Europe on Saturdays so you usually have to stay a week after disembarkation.

We did Rome to Toronto this spring for $340.00CDN and the previous fall we flew from Barcelona to Toronto for $320.00CDN both flights were none stop.

At those prices you can afford an apartment for a week and save on the air.

[diverward]

This won't be of much help to those in the US but for Canadians West Jet fly's out of Europe on Saturdays so you usually have to stay a week after disembarkation.

We did Rome to Toronto this spring for $340.00CDN and the previous fall we flew from Barcelona to Toronto for $320.00CDN both flights were none stop.

At those prices you can afford an apartment for a week and save on the air.

 

Are you sure it is WestJet? They will only be flying to Dublin starting June 2014. I think it is Air Transat you are talking about. And Air Transat flies to Gatwick every day and you can get connections to anywhere in Europe fairly cheap from there.

[EightFurryPaws]

I always wanted to try booking a RT and only using the first half of ticket.

Do you just not show up for the second half?

[Times Prince]

I usually find one way TA airfare to be less with Princess EZAir than directly with the airlines.

 

In fact, buying roundtrip with the airlines and throwing away the return is usually less expensive than one way TA.

 

Above is with the traditional airlines (United, American, Delta and their European equivalents.) Discount airlines such as Icelandic Air do offer decent one way TA pricing, but be sure to take into account having to change planes along the way and the extra costs such as paying for the first checked bag.

I have also found that booking through Princess EZair gets the best prices. For our transatlantic from Galveston to Southampton in April the air cost was less than half of the cost booking directly with airlines.

 

We have family in Europe and are always looking for the least expensive air travel. Most of the airlines mentioned above won't even discount for one way on their websites, even when using airline miles, and the cost is pretty close to round trip.

 

We also have found that the first checked bag on an international flight between the USA and Europe is included in the price, and not extra (on American, United)

[ccrain]

Airfare -

 

Start haunting the airfare search engines to get a feel for rates between your preferred point of origin and Rome. I use Kayak and Matrix ITA, both free. Matrix ITA gives you the ability to search between multiple points of origin and your destination.

 

Keep in mind the more competition, the lower the prices are. So don't leave out the possibility of flying to a major international hub, like NYC, IAD (Dulles), ORD (Chicago), IAH (Houston), ATL (Atlanta) or DFW (Dallas Fort Worth) on a first leg to get a good price.

 

As others have stated, Aer Lingus and Icelandair can get you to LHR (London Heathrow) pretty inexpensively, and then intra-Europe fares are typically cheaper. The cheaper overseas connection hub will be LHR, but don't ignore Istanbul, Portugal or Warsaw. Also, if you don't mind traveling, you could also look into trains as your final leg. The Italian train system, sans strikes, does provide relatively inexpensive travel if you were to find a cheap flight to Milan and had to get to Rome by train.

 

I've had friends use Princess Air and have not had a problem, but if you have good trip insurance, any consolidator ticket issues should be taken care of - but consolidator tickets are cheaper for a reason.

 

But the bottom line is that international travel is really expensive right now.

 

Good Luck...

 

Weather -

 

You are really rolling the dice. We just got off the Ruby and started in Venice on the 24th of October and ended up in FLL on the 14 of December. During the 51 days on the ship, we had maybe 5 or 6 days of really bad weather, a couple of days of really cold weather ashore (almost snowed in Florence) and a couple of rough sea days. But in several cases we missed huge rainstorms by only hours (Athens, Rome, Naples) that would have really made getting ashore very wet.

 

On the other hand, most of your ports are southern med ports and will be much warmer than the northern ports. Rain will be your biggest issue with them. Expect cold weather in the northern Italy, Spain and the French ports.

 

But on the other hand, you have some fantastic ports to visit on that trip and the prices look like they are coming down.

 

Good Luck...

[flamomo]

I have used Princess EZAir several times for cruises around Europe and for TAs out of a European port and have found their pricing to be better than what I can find on my own. And yes, you can book your air to Rome and your air from FLL with EZAir.

 

I am booked for that TA on the Ocean in December 2014, and will be looking at EZAir as soon as it is available. When I booked the cruise, the Princess agent said won't be available about 330 days out.

 

I have been watching the temps in Rome all this month to get an idea of what I might expect, and they have been in the mid-lower 50s. I know that I will packing to allow for layering.

[san diego sue]

Consolidators have the less expensive airfares just flying to Europe.

I was told by one(1 800fly Europe) that coming back they have no deals, only going. In the fall we flew from San Diego to Barcelona for only $560.00 through them. Later on Princess EZair had the same price.

I was planning on doing transatlantic after our first cruise there. Turned out I needed to be home at that time and found myself scrambling for an affordable

one way home from Venice. One way on most airlines was close to $2,000 each. Consolidators couldn't help. So I was able to find a rt ticket home from Venice for approx $1,000 each. Was intending to use the return ticket but wound up throwing it away instead.

Princess EZ air does have good prices. They change prices so you have to catch it right. For us, from San Diego, most of the time it involves too many flights and doesn't work. I can find better routes dealing with the airlines direct then I check the consolidators for their rates.

[baldercash]

Are you sure it is WestJet? They will only be flying to Dublin starting June 2014. I think it is Air Transat you are talking about. And Air Transat flies to Gatwick every day and you can get connections to anywhere in Europe fairly cheap from there.

 

My mistake it was / is Air Transat

[montu6]

Thanks everyone for the great info and advice. I feel much more comfortable booking this cruise now that I know that the airfare will be doable. We just got off the Emerald on the 19th and my FCC has been burning a hole in my pocket.

 

Seriously, my DH and I have wanted to travel to the Med for quite a while now. This looks like a great cruise. We have been in Northern Europe and the Netherlands for a Christmas River cruise out of Paris in November, so the cold won't bother us as long as we dress for it. Rain is a bummer but you always take your chances with that.

 

Flamomo, I'll pop over to the roll call and add our names.We are interested in private tours in the ports when feasable. On our British Isles TA we did private tours almost exclusively and it worked out very well.

 

Again, thanks everyone for taking the time to answer my questions. I can always count on the Cruise Critic community!

[Times Prince]

I've had friends use Princess Air and have not had a problem, but if you have good trip insurance, any consolidator ticket issues should be taken care of - but consolidator tickets are cheaper for a reason.

Keep in mind that Princess EZAir includes trip insurance for the flight, including next port protection. This is especially important if there are flight delays which cause one to miss the cruise sailing, and may not be covered by independent insurance. Of course, there is a charge included in the Princess airfare for this, but it is worth it for the peace of mind IMO.