Travel back to the USA advice

I'd make the decision based on the costs and travel times of the options I found on Google Flights. For my trip this year, which begins in Andalucía, I found flying into Madrid so much cheaper (over $300) that the decision was clear. However, that's the situation from my airport; Seattle may be different. And I'm retired, so spending a day in Madrid for jetlag recovery doesn't really affect how much I can cover during my trip.

Perhaps we have some Pacific Northwest residents here who can make specific suggestions based on experience.

Hi Laurie, I’m from the Seattle area. We have Delta miles and originally were booked in 2017 to fly Seattle-to-Madrid and then return as Malaga-to-Seattle. Before that trip occurred, they dropped the Malaga flight option using miles, so we just took the train from Malaga and flew home the next day from Madrid. The train from Malaga was fast (2.5 hours).

Malaga has the most flight options from that area of Spain.
We flew into Madrid and out of there two month ago on the way back to the USA.

Madrid always seems to have the cheaper flights even though in our case we did not want to go there.

Unfortunately, nobody can answer this - it's all "it depends" and your preferences/priorities.

What's most important to you? The absolute lowest price, with no other considerations at all (in that case, get ready for 3+ stops and a long slog)? Or are you trying to balance cost along with efficient routing/timings, number of layovers/connections, seat comfort (or lack thereof) etc.?

You probably could start from any major or minor airport, but that probably would add at least one more connecting airport.

Personally, I always try to minimize the number of stops/layovers, and maximize the long transatlantic flight. AFAIK there are no nonstops between Seattle and anyplace in Europe, so you will be connecting at least once, maybe twice (hopefully not more than twice - I'd try to avoid that).

You will need to check to see what flights work best (or least bad) for you depending on your preferences.

There are several nonstop flight options between Seattle and Europe (Ryekjavik, Dublin, London, Amsterdam, Paris, Frankfurt), but not to Spain, which might be what David meant. Several of those gateways work for one-stop options departing from Malaga, or Madrid, or (fewer) from Seville. Try www.skyscanner.com, for starters. But beware the combination of EasyJet + Norwegian Airlines via Gatwick. This may be the cheapest option, but it's an "unprotected" connection.

I ran an itinerary on Google Flights, the best I could see is to fly out of Malaga thru Heathrow to Seattle on BA. However, there are more flights options out of Madrid. In looking at the train options you can travel from either Seville or Malaga to Madrid by train in about 2.5 hours. My wife and I would be looking at Madrid, if we were planning this trip.

There are several nonstop flight options between Seattle and Europe (Ryekjavik, Dublin, London, Amsterdam, Paris, Frankfurt), but not to Spain, which might be what David meant...

Indeed! There are some nonstops from SEA to various points around Europe (and I love it when I can make one of them work) but none AFAIK to Spain (which is indeed what I had thought I had typed...multitasking...).

I would look at:

1) What city is the connection in? I HATE Heathrow and avoid it like the plague for connections. If it’s your only option give yourself at least 3 hours to connect.

2) Price. I watched prices daily for routes from PDX and central Oregon into Madrid, Sevilla, Malaga and Barcelona. Finally got a great deal into Madrid with decent connections. But the fares changed by up to $700 between these cities from day to day.

If flight price is a consideration, factor in the expense of getting from one city to the other. As well as the travel time.

Air France has direct flights to Paris. We’re flying that route and continuing to Madrid. I know they fly that route on Wednesdays, and maybe one other day. Our flights through Delta/Air France for less that $640, into Madrid and returning from Paris.