Hey guys,
Never travelled overseas before but want to go from Melbourne to San Fran In mid January, come back mid Feb. Just wondering where you think the cheapest place to get flights would be, or whether it wold be worth for example, flying to LA then bussing to San Fran for about $50?
Cheers
Sorry to say this but you're a day late - Melbourne to Los Angeles return for $750ish on Air NZ (https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/163243) plus a return flight up to San Francisco would've given you a pretty good price. There's always a chance that Air NZ will have a San Francisco sale in the near future but it is a bit of a gamble to wait since there's only 3 months left.
It looks like Delta/Virgin Australia and United both have fares at $1450 or so right now. If you're a student, also try STA Travel for student fares.
EDIT: Just note that if you book return flights to Los Angeles and separate return tickets to SFO, make sure to leave plenty of time for transit! Your SFO ticket may be forfeited if you miss the flight.
The January fares weren't discounted for Air NZ unfortunately. Looking at the prices, I think January is still peak time to fly.
From memory the sale covered outbound dates after 12 Jan or something from Melbourne, which makes sense since that's around the time people would generally start making their way back. For shoulder season tickets, those flights were a great price.
January certainly was discounted. there was many sub $800 flights departing from 2nd week of Jan.
Ah. My mistake. Thanks for posting that btw.
most airline have peak season for departures from around 10 or 11 Dec to 15 Jan.
Other airlines have same fares year round & specials in low season.
They control pricing by inventory control.
Explained simply every airlines has price buckets.
Some many have as many as 20 different fares/price buckets on a single route.
eg. 3 or 4 business class, & 16 or more economy class.
In peak season, very few if any of the cheapest fares are even loaded.
If they are, might only be 10 or less for a 400 seater aircraft.
If there are say 5 & you search for 6, none will show up in online search engine, but travel agents can see every price bucket (they can't see how many seats in each though) up to 9 in each.
So if an agent looks for 6, sees 5, he/she can sell 5 of the cheapest & one at next cheapest, which an online search engine can never ever do.
Might have missed the sale, but AirNZ is usually pretty competitive.
…but why bother going to LA, then adding a return to SF? AirNZ flies direct from Auckland to SF, no need for a domestic tag flight. Usually the same price as their flights to LA too.
No discount, Air NZ hold a monopoly on the SF route from both Australia and NZ. That is why the route was (until retirement recently) a 747, lots of business and premium economy. When your company is paying for your flight you can either fly united (from Sydney only) in one of the most cramped Business classes flying today, transfer at LAX (shudder) or have a well timed 1 hour transfer in Auckland, with a business class topping that most other trans pacific airlines.
got in the sale. Cheers legends
I m looking around same date as well, will update u if find any cheaper
Try air NZ, got in sub $1000. You arent from melb uni are you? going for consulting subject
thanks and nope ( no UNI)
A couple of advice from my past experiences:
Do not take Greyhound bus , unless you want to travel overnight by bus and save on the hotel room overnight.
Take one of those cheaper Vietnamese or Chinese run buses .
I used this 2 years ago a few times:
http://www.lowfarebus.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=…
Not bad. Faster than Greyhound. Even got a bottle and a free yummy Vietnamese sandwich from them.
2.
I use this search engine for airfares:
http://adioso.com/au/perth-to-singapore-return-between-7-and…
Cheers Ndiddy. You beat me by a whisker :)
Cheers legends got in for 960
so no airline flys MEL/SFO nonstop, so either have to change at SYD, LAX, YVR, AKL or few options via Asia.
It never ceases to amaze us, how little people take into a/c frequent flyer points/miles that can be earned, UNTIL their next trip, when they could have used them, but too late to claim.
Also some airports like SYD are bloody awful to change at.
Actually, United is unique in it's Melbourne-SFO route. The flight actually leaves from the International terminal in Melbourne and arrives at International in Sydney. Very easy.
My flight got cancelled last time while I was at the gate to go from Melbourne - Sydney - LAX. Had to be escorted out, then had to get passport stamped, collect bags and go through customs. Very strange experience as I hadn't even left the airport.
United generally has the cheapest flights to San Francisco.