Multi City Airline Connections: U.S. East Coast -> Dubrovnik, Venice -> U.S. East Coast

You have lots of moving parts, and no matter what you find, it may change on
you quickly, so you need to be able to know a good fare and book it pretty
quickly after you find it.

Having said that, I would use Google Flights - bring up the map option, specify
your flight parameters, and first try to research the transatlantic open jaw flights.

Google Flights can also show you the intra-Europe options including budget
airlines, but you will need to research things like baggage costs and seat
reservations charges that Easyjet, Ryanair, etc can ding you on.

I would also do a quick scan of destinations served by DBV and VCE airports, so
you know what gateway cities are most likely to have options. The airport
websites can show you that info.

If you book as separate tickets, you need to leave enough time in for delays to
still make the connecting flight.

You could consider Milan as a city to fly out of as opposed to Venice. Milan
is ~2 hours by train from Venice.

How are you getting between Dubrovnik and Venice? Another option might be to
fly RT to Dubrovnik and do the Venice trip as a short DBV-VCE RT inside the Dubrovnik flights.

You can try the big three airlines, none of them fly into Dubrovnik, but their partners, Air France, Lufthansa, and British Airways do, so you can do it all on one ticket. You could also look at flying those partners direct.

The only thing is, you may not be able to, or there will be little price advantage to, downgrading your intra-European flights, the default will be to put you into a comparable class for all flights. You may however be able to upgrade specific legs later, but like I said, the final price will not differ much.

The other option would be to fly to a decent hub, like London or Paris, and find bargain flights between there and Venice/Dubrovnik. The problem with that is needing to allow plenty of time (usually overnight) to change airlines and/or airports. OK if you want some time in London/Paris, but not so much if you have no interest, or are pressed for time.

Dubrovnik airport APERENTLY is in finalising with some US flight company for direct.

Hi there, others have alluded to this but unless you book all of this on a single ticket, you risk losing the next leg of your flight. Example - you fly to FRA on a major US carrier, and have booked a separate ticket to the next destination but your incoming flight is delayed. The second airline has NO obligation to compensate you or to book you onto another flight. Thus the advice from Paul to stay overnight, which also ups the cost. Some others will leave themselves 6 hours transit time, it's going to be a matter of how much you risk if you miss that second flight. AND you will need to pick up your bags if you checked them at that European hub, exit customs & recheck your bag, regardless of whether or not you have the second flight's boarding pass.

On the way back to the US the stakes are much higher - If that 'cheap' ticket causes you to miss your connection to the US, for which you've paid business class, the US carrier has no obligation to put you on another flight. If things worked out, you could keep the airline app handy and scramble to change the booking when you realize you won't make the connection. And by then the return price for a ticket will be much higher. So you will most likely pay much more than simply booking the trip on one ticket. And what I said about checked bags also means picking up your bag on way back to US, blah blah as above. Just some things to consider... Hope that makes sense!

Most of the refundable fares don’t display on the aggregators like google flights, so you might have to search on the individual airline sites.

BDL would probably only be worth the bother if you can get a good price on the Aer Lingus flight, but it’s not daily. (And regular/non-refundable business class fares on it are always crazy expensive.)

Flying into Dubrovnik so we can rent a car (one way for 11 days) and go up the coast ending in Zagrab. Then a train to Ljubljana where we will rent a car for 14 day and return it in Ljubljana.

Then a train or bus to Trieste for an overnight, and on to Venice for 5 nights.s

Why insist on a refundable fare? If you really want business class, that will be VERY expensive (unless you can book with miles). You could instead get trip insurance to cover cancellation in terms of illness or other insured reason. Or you could pay extra for “cancel for any reason”, but that usually does not provide full reimbursement.

Just for comparison, I priced your itinerary for a 6-week trip starting in mid-May on British Airways. For the simple and straightforward itinerary Boston-London-Dubrovnik and return Venice-London-Boston, the total in Business Class is $4023 for regular fares.

If I make the tickets “flexible” instead, the price came to over $16,000.

I guess in regards to refundable tickets, I guess examine what you really want. I can only speak to Delta, but since they eliminated change fees, if I needed to cancel a "non-refundable ticket", I simply get an e-credit to use on future flights (I think you do need Main Cabin or higher, not Basic Economy). For me, I plan to keep flying, so no need to be concerned about a cash refund.

I have a trip planned in April, we have had to "rebook" it at least once, at no cost, and in past trips, I have rebooked to save $$ due to sales.

You can try the big three airlines, none of them fly into Dubrovnik

Actually, United now has a seasonal non-stop flight between Newark and Dubrovnik. It doesn’t start until late May. They also have a seasonal non-stop between Newark and Venice so if you are willing to fly out of Newark you might start there.

I don’t quite understand why you are buying separate tickets. I would be searching for a multi-city ticket BOS to DBV returning VCE to BOS. However if you are going to buy separate tickets then the most obvious choice would be a RT flight to London as London is often an less expensive city to fly to and it has many discount flights to other cities in Europe. I often do this, but I always spend time in London before I fly to a different city. There are 4 airports in the London area, so you really need to spend at least a night between flights to reduce risk of a missed connection.

Have you tried British Airways from Boston? I always use BA andHeathrow Terminal 5 as my transfer airport. So…Boston to Heathrow to final stop, and then reverse from my exit city. I am on my cell so I am not checking BA hits those two cities, but you easily can. Use the multi city vs round trip button to separate the flights.

Wray, I priced the British Airways multi-city flights ( into Dubrovnik and back from Venice, from Boston) for them above. With one stop at Heathrow in each direction (or if they choose Iberia it would be Madrid), it is around $4000 round trip for Business class, which is a very good price, but that is not for the refundable fare.

Lola, I have to admit I have never studied refundable fairs, so I wouldn't have a clue what was a good rate. I've been happy self insuring (for an Evoucher) or getting trip insurance (only more recently). So maybe I shouldn't have posted on this one... LOL...but somedays it is hard to resist. I just thought as he/she is used to flying out of Boston, I'd post my routine. It works for me.

Great feedback from all ...

I'll update this thread when we have decided how to travel.

Paul,

RE:I can only speak to Delta, but since they eliminated change fees, if I needed to cancel a "non-refundable ticket", I simply get an e-credit to use on future flights

I went to the Delta website and. found the following:

Changing a Non-Refundable Ticket
With a non-refundable ticket, you can change your flight when you pay a change fee of $0-$400, depending on your travel route, plus the price difference. As a reminder, Basic Economy tickets are non-refundable and non-changeable in most cases, but may be canceled for a partial eCredit.

Where did you find out your information?