Planning a trip to Europe in March. Have already done Paris, London and Rome. Looking for advice on the best place to start and best place to end as far as airfare is concerned? Better to start in Amsterdam and end in Barcelona? Germany? Want to start at one end and work our way up, down, left, right, etc to another to maximize our 14 days. Thanks!
Posted by
Chicago
2876 posts
You might want to familiarize yourself with the website farecompare.com. It will identify the least expensive European city to fly to as of a particular date. For example, right now the cheapest March destinations from Seattle are Shannon, Ireland & Brussels, Belgium.
Posted by
St. Louis, MO USA
1976 posts
Also take a look at Kayak.com, which compares fares on a number of different carriers. Play around with it by putting in different arrival and departure cities and see what kinds of fares you can find.
Posted by
Napa, CA
3580 posts
March is still wintery in northern Europe. For 14 days, I'd recommend flying to Spain and staying in that country for the entire two weeks. There's plenty to do there. I think along the Mediterranean would be warmest.
Posted by
NLR, Ar USA
92 posts
Usually Frankfurt, London and Paris are the cheaper in and out of cities from Little Rock, Especially Frankfurt. However, many fares from here are about the same, I was thinking of flying into Manchester and out of Paris or Frankfurt around the month of April and back in May 2011. But most of the fares are running around $800-900 depending on when you go and which airline. A lot of this as you know, depends when you go, and when you come back. I have been in Northern Europe in February, March and April and enjoyed it. However one year,(beginning of March) we landed in Amsterdam and it had the most snow in 25 years and cold. Still had fun, but had to buy a wool cap and gloves. Then went down to Italy,(same month) in Tuscany and there was some snow remaining on the mountains around Arezzo. Have fun whenever you decide to go.
Posted by
Elmwood, IL, USA
362 posts
Amsterdam seems to have the highest taxes and fees to fly into but if you fly out I believe they do not add them on. Chicago's fares for this year were the cheapest going into Paris. For $833 total in November we are flying into Paris-3 nights-flying to Barcelona- 7days- flying to Amsterdam 2 nights then back to Chicago. It was cheaper to book multicities on Air France, even though we are flying KLM back to Chicago from Amsterdam. We didn't plan on Amsterdam but when the connection was at Schiphol from Barcelona we decided to try a few nights stop-off and it was exactly the same price. Check to see what is currently offered from Seattle and different cities in Europe. KLM has announced their winter fares today. So try Zurich, Frankfort or Milan rt first then try multi-cities when you find the cheapest and most appealing city to start your vacation. I used expedia then booked directly with the airlines. FYI: Iberia (Spain airlines) still has 2 free checked bags if you need that, especially for the trip home.