Flights arranged by Oceania

[Croooser]

Correction: The Flight Ease flights on Seabourn are the route over a 17hr TPA-EWR-CPH-ATH on UAL/SAS. The return is an excellent UAL with a good connection in IAD. Not ideal but doable. And a big $ savings while still in BIZ.

 

Hoping we like Seabourn.

 

Edited September 21, 2023 by Croooser

[Vineyard View]

7 hours ago, mr_reiter said:

Vineyard View (Terri?),

I recognize your moniker from the roll call.  We're on the same cruise.  

I also was astonished by the pricing.  I found a reasonable business class fare from RDU on Air Canada via Toronto (to BCN; return from FCO).  It may not be pertinent to you, but you might want to look at them and maybe even consider breaking it into two separate flights.  

Best of luck!

Mark

Hi Mark!  Yes, same cruise. Great itinerary. Thanks for this suggestion. I  looked at Air Canada.  Best out of SFO right now BC is $9,665.  I am flexible each way by a day+ but absolutely want to arrive nlt the 17Th. We don’t fly in the day off. We almost always have one stop from the West Coast. I would even consider two, which Air Canada had on return with that price. I will keep looking, but paying more for airfare than the cruise is crazy. 
 

I also looked at miles with two airlines. One wanted 1 million for BC. Two years ago the same airline wanted 195k for similar. 
 

I will keep looking as will our TA. Maybe once Fall hits there will be some breaks. 
 

Thanks for reaching out! 
 

Terri

[Vineyard View]

5 hours ago, Croooser said:

Correction: The Flight Ease flights on Seabourn are the route over a 17hr TPA-EWR-CPH-ATH on UAL/SAS. The return is an excellent UAL with a good connection in IAD. Not ideal but doable. And a big $ savings while still in BIZ.

 

Hoping we like Seabourn.

 

I believe that you will. We sailed them this year. Haven’t yet sailed Oceania, but several Viking trips, and SB was a much better product than V. I will say though that Viking shines in a few areas, but overall we liked the SB product better.

 

Their Flight Ease air is very attractive. So much so, as you said, that it can really level  the playing field out in pricing. I didn’t realize how much so until this experience. 

[Vineyard View]

6 hours ago, LHT28 said:

Do you use ITA matrix to look for the flights ?

 

 I see A/C   for about 2500 PP   BIZ  May 15     Lie flat  seats 

 Restricted fare   & 8:50 am flight  outbound   but a good deal 

 

 

You could  do PE on the return to save some $$

 

 

Hi LHT28. Thank you for this suggestion. I have not used this specific matrix. I did look at Google flights, but will explore this further tomorrow. Thanks again. I am hopeful that something will work out. 

[LHT28]

8 minutes ago, Vineyard View said:

Hi LHT28. Thank you for this suggestion. I have not used this specific matrix. I did look at Google flights, but will explore this further tomorrow. Thanks again. I am hopeful that something will work out. 

Check the Air Canada  site

they have  full price BIZ 😲  & the cheaper restricted fare  15th  16th are the cheapest  for 1 stop  that I see

 

[Vineyard View]

4 minutes ago, LHT28 said:

Check the Air Canada  site

they have  full price BIZ 😲  & the cheaper restricted fare  15th  16th are the cheapest  for 1 stop  that I see

 

Thanks much! I have no problem with booking restricted fares. I will just add them to our travel insurance.

Those are my preferred travel dates.  

[FlyerTalker]

In the absence of getting actual dates, I plugged in a number of random ones in May.

 

You can easily find round-trip business class from SFO to BCN and back from FCO on Turkish for under $3000 pp.  On the return, you have a long overnight connection, but TK will give business class passengers a free hotel night for their connection.  Or, you can take advantage of their free stopover program to spend a day or two or three in Istanbul along the way.

 

Full wide-body service on all legs, with lie-flat seats on the 787 in/out of SFO, and an A330 on the intra-Europe flights.

 

And, of course, it is customary for folks to indicate if the prices being quoted are one-way or round-trip.  I have not found any Air Canada round trips for those 2500 price points.

[Vineyard View]

24 minutes ago, FlyerTalker said:

In the absence of getting actual dates, I plugged in a number of random ones in May.

 

You can easily find round-trip business class from SFO to BCN and back from FCO on Turkish for under $3000 pp.  On the return, you have a long overnight connection, but TK will give business class passengers a free hotel night for their connection.  Or, you can take advantage of their free stopover program to spend a day or two or three in Istanbul along the way.

 

Full wide-body service on all legs, with lie-flat seats on the 787 in/out of SFO, and an A330 on the intra-Europe flights.

 

And, of course, it is customary for folks to indicate if the prices being quoted are one-way or round-trip.  I have not found any Air Canada round trips for those 2500 price points.

Thank you FlyerTalk. I did take a look at TA. I’ve never flown them. The return itineraries that were so long made me turn away from the option, not knowing that they would provide a hotel. I will look closer at this as well. Our sail date is 5/18, return 6/1. I will not fly in day off but prefer 17th arrival as we have spent quite a bit of time in BCN. We also have enjoyed Rome a few times so would prefer to fly out that afternoon. We spent a couple of days in IST before, and so maybe an overnight would be an option on the return. I appreciate this as well! 
 

The suggestions for me on this thread by several are sincerely appreciated. Thank you 

[FlyerTalker]

Here's a possible for your dates.  Cost is $3076 all in round trip.

 

You can also extend your return with some days in IST as well.  Check the TK website for details on their stopover program.

 

 

[Hlitner]

I have a slightly different "take" regarding O air...partially as the result of some advice given by Flatbush Flyer (a big O fan).  We do a lot of International travel (not with O) and cruise many different cruise lines.  We would NEVER consider booking air unless we were able to select the flights/airlines and hardware (type aircraft and seating).  If "O" let us make our own choices, without any extra fees, and offered a lower price, than we would consider using them after we did some comparisons to booking our own air.   Since we only book Business Class or Premium classes, on longer flights, it becomes even more complicated with O.  As an example, if one particular airline offers 2-3-2 seating in Business, we would want to lock-in the two abrest seating.  With some airlines, it is important to do this very far in advance, and that is not always possible with "O" air since they may not ticket until relatively close to the flight day.

 

I should also mention that with other companies (i.e. CCL companies and RCI companies) the ability to book (and choose seating) is much easier (and often a lot cheaper).  That is one reason why we have never cruised with O, until an upcoming Vista cruise (from the USA to Trieste).  And on that particular cruise, we booked our own return air (after spending a few weeks in Europe).

 

Hank

[Woofbite]

18 hours ago, Vineyard View said:

I have been looking at multi city and not one way, but I appreciate this tip. I am out of SFO and includes BCN going, FCO back. 

Luthansa wants $11,828 BC

BA wants $10,918

UA wants $12,985

 

 

 

 

Those seem insane.  Are you looking far in advance of your cruise?  Airlines don't get serious about pricing until 5-6 months before departure.  I'd recommend always asking a legitimate consolidator for a quote.  I use a big one in New York and they beat Flight Ease about half the time.  Reservations are the regular kind and appear immediately on airline websites with normal services and frequent traveler miles.

 

[Vineyard View]

2 hours ago, FlyerTalker said:

Here's a possible for your dates.  Cost is $3076 all in round trip.

 

You can also extend your return with some days in IST as well.  Check the TK website for details on their stopover program.

 

 

Thank you for this. I will look further at TA. We are limited on away time with our dog sitting. The extra days in IST would be awesome otherwise. I will read their stopover program details. I tried to do a multi city on their website yesterday but could only find OW and RT, so will dig deeper there as well. 

[Vineyard View]

52 minutes ago, Woofbite said:

 

Those seem insane.  Are you looking far in advance of your cruise?  Airlines don't get serious about pricing until 5-6 months before departure.  I'd recommend always asking a legitimate consolidator for a quote.  I use a big one in New York and they beat Flight Ease about half the time.  Reservations are the regular kind and appear immediately on airline websites with normal services and frequent traveler miles.

 

Travel is in May. Maybe I am a bit too soon. I am so used to using miles, and that approach is the further out the better. Right now Flying Blue wants one million miles!  TA suggested waiting as well, but I was really hoping to use some miles. 
I reached out to one consolidator and he wasn’t very helpful. Maybe I will also research that a bit more so thanks for that tip. 
 

I remain grateful to all of you jumping in here! 

[slewis7]

On 9/17/2023 at 10:31 AM, ORV said:

Well now wait a minute. Paragraph 1 is if you don't pick flights, but the day. Your flight will still be assigned at about 75 days out and ticketed around 40.

So (assuming you are trying to avoid any deviation fees) how far in advance do you notify Oceania you want to arrive early/depart late for your cruise?  If you have a TA, do you go through them or directly contact Oceania?

[LHT28]

1 minute ago, slewis7 said:

So (assuming you are trying to avoid any deviation fees) how far in advance do you notify Oceania you want to arrive early/depart late for your cruise?  If you have a TA, do you go through them or directly contact Oceania?

when you book the cruise  if you know you want to go early let your TA know

You will not know your flights until 45 to 60 day out  unless you pay a deviation fee

You may get lucky & not have the mail run or you could be stopping in several airports 

JMO

[FlyerTalker]

3 hours ago, Woofbite said:

 

Those seem insane.  Are you looking far in advance of your cruise?  Airlines don't get serious about pricing until 5-6 months before departure.  I'd recommend always asking a legitimate consolidator for a quote.  I use a big one in New York and they beat Flight Ease about half the time.  Reservations are the regular kind and appear immediately on airline websites with normal services and frequent traveler miles.

 

 

HA!!

 

You are undoubtedly getting a highly restrictive consolidator ticket, which is a completely different ticket than what you would get buying from the carrier directly.  But if you think you have a "regular kind" of reservation, take a look at the underlying fare rules and tell me that again.

 

 

[FlyerTalker]

2 hours ago, Vineyard View said:

Travel is in May. Maybe I am a bit too soon. I am so used to using miles, and that approach is the further out the better.

 

That used to be the case.  Most carriers have moved to dynamic pricing of awards, so the old advice of buying right as the flights open up has gone away.

 

FWIW, you can fly SFO-BCN on the 16th for 245,000 United miles.  And return from FCO on the 1st for as low as 100,000 points through Virgin Atlantic.    But when you compare that with paying only $3000 for a round-trip revenue ticket on TK (which would also earn miles), I would not be cashing in points for a lousy redemption value.

 

 

[Woofbite]

20 hours ago, FlyerTalker said:

 

HA!!

 

You are undoubtedly getting a highly restrictive consolidator ticket, which is a completely different ticket than what you would get buying from the carrier directly. 

 

As far as I can tell it is a normal booking. I don't have a ticket at the moment to check but I believe business bookings are usually in class I.  I know I can book seats, get AA, UA and DL miles, order special meals, regular baggage rules apply and following a missed connection in Newark returning from one trip  UA issued hotel and meal vouchers.

I've not noticed any difference between carrier booked or discount booking aside from the fare not being shown in the airline system.

 

 

[Redtravel]

On 9/20/2023 at 9:48 PM, Vineyard View said:

When you say you booked late, how far in advance did you look to book your air?  I am looking at next May and prices are insane

We booked a month before sailing.

[jonthomas]

On 9/21/2023 at 10:43 PM, Vineyard View said:

I believe that you will. We sailed them this year. Haven’t yet sailed Oceania, but several Viking trips, and SB was a much better product than V. I will say though that Viking shines in a few areas, but overall we liked the SB product better.

 

Their Flight Ease air is very attractive. So much so, as you said, that it can really level  the playing field out in pricing. I didn’t realize how much so until this experience. 

Sailed with Viking Ocean this March. Will never sail with them again. V is far below O in every respect.

[Vineyard View]

4 hours ago, jonthomas said:

Sailed with Viking Ocean this March. Will never sail with them again. V is far below O in every respect.

Then they must have deteriorated quite a Bit since several cruises we  took on Viking pre pandemic. I am not suggesting that Oceania is or was less, but rather that Viking was a really good experience on multiple levels. 

[jonthomas]

Yes we did 2 prepandemic and it was OK. Still not at the level of O but not as bad as this past March. 

[Vineyard View]

35 minutes ago, jonthomas said:

Yes we did 2 prepandemic and it was OK. Still not at the level of O but not as bad as this past March. 

Thank you for your feedback. I think that it is  interesting that many can view the same experience through a different lens. I find that on the few main boards that I follow, you can find this similar take away from each  when comparing lines. So those on Viking will argue the same as you feel about Oceania, etc. I truly do believe some of it has to do with the overall brand identity, but some has to also do with individual ships,  on  specific itineraries, with different CD’s and chefs, or even dates, that provides our perceptions for whom we will want to continue to spend time and money on. That runs true with day in and out choices we make. We found Viking Rivers in 2013, then their Oceans in 2015 and afterwards. We found Seabourn this year and felt it was a better product than V.  Nothing was perfect.  On any single cruise we have taken. That is travel. And life.
You clearly have found your simpatico with Oceania. What a good place to be when you find that. 

[jonthomas]

Yes even on our last Viking cruise when we had the restaurant manager, confirm the bad food and make us something edible, there were those who said the food was just fine. But just about all of them had drink packages and never without a drink. Surely they had NO idea or care what the food was like. Also none of them had sailed O. You can't make comparisons if you have not sailed with anyone else.

[Vineyard View]

11 hours ago, jonthomas said:

Yes even on our last Viking cruise when we had the restaurant manager, confirm the bad food and make us something edible, there were those who said the food was just fine. But just about all of them had drink packages and never without a drink. Surely they had NO idea or care what the food was like. Also none of them had sailed O. You can't make comparisons if you have not sailed with anyone else.

Okay. I don’t think I will get into the discussion around how wine can enhance different foods, as you are a non drinker. No judgement, but I find it hard to believe that the food was only good to people who were imbibing heavily. Again, glad you found your place that works for you.