Best way to fly open jaw from Seville or Granada Spain back to SFO

Tanya, This board is not monitored by Europe through the Back Door staff ... just read by other travelers like you. I had a similar challenge returning last year when I was ending in Sevilla (although I was returning to DC). All my flight options out of Sevilla either left at the crack of dawn or had 2 stops. I ended up taking the train back to Madrid, spending my last night there, and flying out of Madrid where the flight options were much better. The train from Seville to Madrid was only 2.5 hours; even though I had to backtrack, this ended up being a much better option for me.

That is because Seville and Granada are not considered international airport with direct flights to the US. You might consider taking the bus from Granada to Malaga which is an international airport with direct flights back to the US, Last year we flew into Madrid and came home from Malaga. It was direct to New York and a connecting flight to Denver. It will be hard to find direct flights to SF from Europe other than a couple of major international centers.

If you fly from either Sevilla or Granada you will have a stop in either Madrid or Barcelona. Why not arrange your itinerary so you finish in Sevilla, then take the AVE train back to Madrid for your flight? The train is 2.5 hours, and you need time to move to the airport bus and another 45 minutes to get to the airport. So you would need a late afternoon flight from Madrid for this to work. You can also check the flight times from Malaga as Frank suggests, but I think most of these flights from Malaga will go to the UK. That is fine if you can find a direct flight to SFO from the UK.

Why don't you fly from SFO to Granada and then fly back to SFO out of Madrid? Expedia is showing flight time out of SFO at 9:20 am connecting thru Chicago and Madrid and arriving Granada at 12:50 the next day. For return you can get a flight out of Madrid at 1:10 pm connecting in Dallas and arriving back at SFO at 8:55 pm. There were also return flights leaving Madrid at 7 am and arriving back in San Francisco at 5 pm if you wanted to get home earlier. I don't see any way to get around having to make 2 connections unless you want to fly in and out of Madrid.

Thank you everyone for the suggestions. It's my first posting on the Helpline and very surprised by the responses. Much appreciate it!

Last June we flew into Barcelona and out of Malaga. Lots of Open Jaw options. The trip by car between Granada an Malaga is only an hour and half. ( we drove) You can even get a taxi for around $160 EU. The $10 bus bus takes a little over 2 + hrs. http://granadainfo.com/granadatravel.htm We stayed overnight in Malaga and enjoyed our evening in rthe neat old town section.

We thought it might be practical to fly home through Heathrow, leaving from Santiago de Compostella. Bad Idea. Heathrow was worse than a Spanish airport! Seriously, give another thought to Madrid-Madrid, especially if you can get near California from there. It's a great city, even for just one additional day, and has really cheap subway connections to the airport-don't forget to pay the small airport supplemental fare. A train back to Madrid might be cheaper than some connecting flights. Trains in Spain are much better than they used to be, if not cheaper. Churros and chocolate are a nice way to say goodbye.