A family of 5 intends to spend just before Christmas 2016 to Late Jan 2017 in Europe. They'll have a car and willing to drive so not overly fussed where they arrive or depart - within a day (say 8-10 hours) drive of the nort-west: London, Paris, Amsterdam, Copenhagen - even as east as Berlin. The arrival and departure can be in different cities.
Can anyone hep with what destinations/carriers are normally the best priced? Preferably decently reputable carriers of course.
TIA.
Perth to Amsterdam in june for $1100 return
OP is looking for flights in the peak time before Christmas. Airlines almost never have sales for travel around Christmas/New Year. However they can have cheap fares for late January.
I usually fly Air France when I go to that part of the world. A return flight costs around $2000 during Christmas time.
Just bring some flares if you want to avoid the SAMs while flying over the middle-east unless the planes travel in the south-east direction from Australia.
I fly home (Sydney -> London) in early December every year, and return just after Christmas / before NYE.
If I get in early (6months+) the cheapest I can generally get is around $1650, the closer it gets to travel the higher the price. Booking in November/December will see you pay closer to the $2000 mark and higher.
'Cheapest' flights are like Chinese Southern Airlines - the airline's okay but transferring in China is like pulling teeth because they're so unorganised, same goes for Vietnam Airlines (avoid).
I never see Emirates < $2000 =(
I flew from Perth to Amsterdam in june for $1100 return.
Booked through Byojet and flew with KLM. Byojet has cashback with cashrewards.
I flew with Malaysian & Etihad as part of their codesharing arangement and they were both much better than flights I had with KLM, which still did the job, much better than any budget airline in Australia.
They still had the deals on flights going long after I came back, but I haven't checked for a while. I saw an Emirates sale recently that was 2 for 1 which was $2500-$3000 for a flight from most Australian cities (I'm pretty sure).
I wouldn't really rush into anything as you still have plenty of time. Just keep checking ozbargain and jump on a deal when it pops up, you would want to book the flights at least 3 months before your date of departure.