New York to Tahiti (or Laos or Nairobi) Without Spending a Fortune

Or, maybe just give up and stay home?

Regarding the San Francisco flight, I have read multiple horror stories about immigration lines at SFO lately (waits up to three hours at peak times) so unless you had Global Entry, you would really need to pad your connection if you took the flight recommended by the author.

After reading this article I got a headache very confusing, think I would rather stay home.

Did Norwegian for $169 one way to Europe out of JFK via a Delta airline change originating in Atlanta. Just had to make sure to allow enough time for the security, luggage retrieval and intentional check in. 3 hours was more than sufficient.

The safety record of major USA airlines lulls Americans into projecting that same safety record on the rest world. FAA regulation, which is a backbone of safety has no say over carriers that fly outside the USA. Low cost airlines use low cost pilots and low cost maintenance, and those that are struggling to stay in business may cut corners. For example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_Air_Flight_610 which flew after having had serious unaddressed mechanical problems on the previous flight. Wikipedia makes it easy to look at an airline's history of accidents that we have never hear about because there were no fatalities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_Air#Incidents_and_accidents

I was in Luang Prabang back in December 2017. It was part of a package 29-day package tour that cost a little over $3,000. All internal airfares and train and other modes of transportation were included. Time should be always valued over trying to save money. I can't see myself doing that three intermediaries stops via Shanghai just to get to Luang Prabang.

If climate change is such an important issue shouldn't it be crucial to do every possible thing to prevent it? Changing politics is a long play but using other means of transportation than planes is the most effective way to reduce the personal carbon footprint. It is counterproductive for the future of our planet to fly as much as we in the developoed countries used to do. The US is such an amazing country, there should be enough destinations. If you really want to fly than compensate your carbon dioxide emissions e. g. here: https://www.atmosfair.de/en/

All great ideas. When traveling to lesser-frequented Asian destinations, I would also recommend going through a major Chinese city. You can stay in China without a visa for 72 hours, and Chinese airline fares to Asia are cheaper than direct flights from the U.S. https://www.travelchinaguide.com/embassy/visa/free-72hour/ https://www.trip.com/flights/from-bjs/airfares-bjs/ If you are adventurous, you may even be able to buy your Asian-leg ticket at the airport when you reach China to save even more. (You can generally use U.S. credit cards or find cash machines.)

The Bangkok to Luang Prabang flight mentioned is operated by Thai Air Asia, not Air Asia X. Air Asia X operates mostly long haul flights from Kuala Lumpur and is a different company. Also, the Chinese city of Kunming was wrongly spelled “Kunmin”.

Did the author consider which of these airlines have a SAFE flying record?

When traveling in Europe, find the cheapest landing point on the continent and take trains from there. By the time you get to the airport (time, expense), go through check-in and security in plenty of time for your flight (time, hassle, unpleasantness), flight delay (more time), baggage fees (expense), cramped seating, getting into town from tge destination airport, .... You are really better off on the train: you see more, it is more comfortable, less hassle, more on time, and you arrive in the city center. Book early for best fares. For Asia, the best hubs are Hong Kong, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur. Find the bsst fare to one of those, and the rest of yoir flights are negligible. Trajns and buses are even cheaper, but you must have the time. And when you get to Luang Prabang, just relax. Don't try to "do" it in 2 days. Give it 5 days. Relax. It is a wonderful place! There is a series of 5 articles in Luang Prabang here to give you some ideas: http://useful-delicious.com/2017/09/24/luang-prabang-laos-part-1/

Reading sad articles on the adverse effects of excessive numbers of tourists visiting the most popular European cities (Venice, Barcelona, etc) has reinforced our choices to visit less visited destinations. In order to visit these places (such as Sardinia) you pretty much have to use European airlines such as EasyJet and buy two sets of tickets. However, the rewards for this extra work are many (no hordes of tourists), and the locals will be more appreciative as well.

Another tip for Africa: if flying to a smaller destination via a larger city (eg Nairobi), sometimes it is the same price to book to the final destination on the same airline, but other times you will save a lot of money to buy the local leg separately. I have had different experiences with Delta on this one, but it is good to keep your eye on it to see which is the better choice.

The flight from JFK to Luang Prabang can be easily and comfortably taken in economy class via Bangkok in about 24 hours door to door for about $1200 RT on the middle eastern airlines (with a short connection to LP) in July. Well worth the trip and destination.

You do not mention the issue of code sharing and of how the airline shown on your ticket may not be the one you fly with. On the NYC-Nairobi itinerary (and quite possitbly on others, but I'm less familiar with these routes), the "Delta" roundtrip you mention is almost certainly operated by Kenya Airways (Delta does not fly into Nairobi, though that may come), whereas the return flight on the Lufthansa fare would be (at least on the Nairobi-Addis Abeba segment, and perhaps even onward to Frankfurt, depending on the time of the connection) on Ethiopian Airlines. No problems with either of those airlines. which are both fine (it appears more and more certain that ET's recent fatal crash was largely due to malpractice on Boeing's part), but passengers should always be made aware prior to purchase of who they'll actually be flying with.

Please when talking about leisure travel never mention that most people will easily double or triple their yearly contribution to global warming by taking a couple of these overseas trips. It could spoil their day and sadden your advertisers.

Ah yes, encouraging the ever downward spiral of the air travel experience by focusing on cost, cost, cost. Why not go on 8 comfortable trips instead of 10 in miserable, cramped ones?

I’d love it if every article about air travel mentioned its terrible environmental impact, as well as the importance of considering offsets. Obviously not everyone can afford the additional cost of offsets, but many people could if they only knew more about it. And while they aren’t a silver bullet, they do make a difference and are better than nothing. Saving money is great, saving our planet is more important. Just like the Guardian is changing its language about our climate crisis/emergency, it’s time for environmental impacts to be discussed at all relevant points, not just in the Climate & Environment section.

Spending a night connecting is usually not worth it unless your time is really cheap and the extra 12ish hours were going to be wasted anyway. Connecting multiple airline also involves retrieving checked luggage before checking in with the other airline which adds an additional half a hour to the time needed for connection.

Very often the deep discount fares advertised by low cost carriers end up costing about the same or more than what a customer would pay on a well run and highly rated airline for flights to convenient airports, at convenient times, after adding the fees the low cost carriers charge for unbundled necessities. This unbundling amounts to trickery in some cases, such as when required 'administrative fees' are not included in the advertised costs. For flights between Asia and the USA, Google can give a basic idea of who flies where and from there, I just pick the three or four most reputable airlines, go to their websites, and see what they can do. A month ago, the best deal between SE Asia and hubs on the US West Coast was on Singapore Airlines, followed by Cathay and ANA; any one of which offers far better service than the LCCs.

If you are using different airlines, you could also run into the problem of one of your flights' getting in late, causing you to miss your connecting flight. Because your trip is not all on one airline's ticket, the late airline is under no obligation to help you in any way, nor is the airline whose flight you missed. As cheap flights are usually non-refundable and non-transferable, you could find yourself trapped mid-trip and forced to pay for a new onward flight--often for considerably more than your original cheap flight.

From this article, I deduce that nobody has yet written code that integrates available flights and fares on a global basis. A market niche for the first one to do so...

We find Air Canada the best prices for flights to Asia. Especially if you purchase your flight to Canada separately from the Canada round trip fare.

It's easy to find cheap consolidated flights to nearly anywhere. The article didn't pay enough attention to what is arguably the biggest headache with such itineraries: self-transfers. Many of these flight combinations force you to collect your baggage at the intermediate airports and recheck it yourself, a tiring process that can even force you to go through immigration. Southeast Asia is especially bad for that. The transfer times may be too tight for this procedure and you could miss your onward flight. Beware of consolidated tickets involving two or more stops.

Some great advice. However, when piecing together flights or even when using 'hacker' fares on sites like Kayak.com, you might have to pay separate baggage fees for each leg. On international flights, these fees add up fast. For example, even when flying on Air Asia (or its subsidiaries), you might have to claim your bag at your first stop, then re-check AND pay another bag fee.

Thanks for the great information. I have found very inexpensive flights within Colombia using Latan or Avianca or other airlines. The trick sometimes is to use the Spanish language in a webpage instead of the English language webpage. On the other hand the same airlines can be quite expensive on longer trips for example between Buenos Aires and Bogota. Thanks for the great information.

In the times of a climate crisis, it would be helpful to rethink air travel. Our old ways need to be changed to help our grandchildren have a better future.

Wow, these are tips I've been giving to friends for years! For far-flung, or just seemingly hard-to-reach smaller or secondary cities, the flight aggregator/consolidator sites are far from ideal. The leisure traveler who prioritizes price is much better served by combining a major airline's trans-continental flight into a hub (with date flexibility, if possible, to avoid getting hosed) with a low-cost airline local to the destination continent to get you from the hub to your final destination. The best tip in the whole piece? Work backward from your destination, looking for low-cost carriers that fly there and then shopping for flights to their hubs. And I'd add an even simpler method to achieve the same result: look up the Wikipedia page of the airport in your final destination, find the table showing "airlines and destinations," and work backward from there on the websites of the listed airlines to link the airport/city you're transferring in, to the airport/city of your destination!

Excellent column. My experience exactly. Also, on multi-leg trips you can save a bundle by booking one-way tickets.

"But the flight schedules don’t align on the outbound trip, meaning you would have to spend a night in London, which would likely eat up some of the savings" Likely? So you think it's possible for all that to be free?

Do your research before booking with European low cost carriers. The luggage restrictions and fees are different than regular carriers and they often use out of the way airports. For example, a few years ago I had a very inexpensive flight from London to Pula, Croatia. However, it left from Stanstead airport so early there were no trains running to get there. The cab fare from London to Stanstead was several times the cost of the flight. Sometimes a bargain turns out to be no bargain.

I have taken similar Lufthansa flights. Great service. If you are flying economy it is far better to rest and walk around in Frankfurt airport or city on your layover than 16 hours in a metal tube.

Good tips, but should emphasise strongly: be prepared for discomfort. The one about flying into London Heathrow, then taking a long coach journey to switch to Luton airport (which regularly wins the worst in UK award) is more like a punishment than a vacation. A lot of people would pay $1-200 to avoid that, myself included.

Here's an new idea, why doesn't someone start a business, and they can call it a travel agency. For a small fee, they can help consumers search for, and book, the best airfare to their destination, instead of us spending hours looking for the best fares, and having to save articles like these for future reference. Oh, wait, that's what they did years ago (and yes, I do remember) in the last century. Where, I wonder, is all the labor cost-saving going to by eliminating the workers that used to perform these and other services (like checking out and bagging groceries) for those of us who would prefer not to spend hours online in the evenings and weekends, and pumping our own gas, and on and on. Love to travel, but hate to plan it.

We've been doing the flight to Europe on one airline and then using EasyJet internally. As long as you pay attention to the luggage allowances (note: a purse, no matter how small is considered a bag -- I had to pack mine into my carryon bag in order not to have to pay an extra fee at the gate), it's a good value. Last year we traveled to/from London on Virgin Air. Chose a fare that took us from LA to Las Vegas after which we got an upgrade in our seating. The way over was a breeze -- stayed at a hotel at Gatwick so we could easily make our 7 a.m. EasyJet flight out to Dubrovnik. Before we left, we had enough time to go into London on the train, traipse around a bit before getting to bed early. On the way back we flew from Split to Gatwick on EasyJet, took the train into London to spend the night -- took in a play, too -- then took the train out to Heathrow the next day for our flight non-stop to LA. Easy peasy getting around and the trains were cheap. Also, I think it's much easier to fly non-stop back to our home location in the states rather than making stops within the US as this causes delays and the potential of missing flights -- not fun when you're jet lagged and exhausted! It's sometimes not easy to make these travel connections work together but I find if I keep an open mind about where I want to fly in/out of and can be flexible on the dates, it can work out nicely. Then again, we're getting older and flying is becoming much more exhausting!

And you better be buying carbon offsets for all this traveling. Factor it into your budget. If you can't afford the carbon offset, you can't afford to go. It's not a cheap flight if you're cashing out the future of the world.