Cheap One-Way Flight: Frankfurt to Berlin

Google flights
Skyscanner

Hi Alexandra:

This past October I flew from Seattle to Frankfort on Condor Airlines, and from Frankfort to Berlin on Air Berlin. I believe that the airfare to Berlin was reasonable. However, a few weeks before the flight Air Berlin declared bankruptcy and cancelled all international flights though domestic flights were still available. If Air Berlin is still flying I would consider using them. I didn't have a sense that they tried to squeeze every cent possible from its passengers like some of the discount airlines.

Update: looks like they are out of business: international and domestic.

You can take a train(s) from Frankfurt airport to Berlin in 4 1/4 to 4 3/4 hours. With the logistics of taking a short-haul flight that lands at Tegel, then a bus or taxi into the city, the train seems competitive. If you fly with an airline that has RailandFly, like Condor, you can pay a small fee ($35 to $45) and take any train once you land and get your luggage and walk to the airport train station.

There are a few direct trains for the Airport train station, but lots with a connections at Frankfurt Hbf, and some that connect in Hanover or Erfurt.

Hi,

If he wants to fly to Berlin from Calif non-stop, from where he is, ie Bakersfield, how about going to LAX? Check on flights going from LAX to Berlin. Or, aside from changing planes in Frankfurt to Berlin, what LAX to Düsseldorf (DUS)?

Although the exact return date may matter, a quick look at Google Flights shows that round-trips from LAX to many cities in Germany are under $800, just about half the cost from Bakersfield. I did not fiddle around with multi-city routings, which I've found are sometimes quite a lot higher, though not always. This price difference would seem to justify two one-way car rentals (if the nephew is old enough to rent), but there may also be some form of shuttle service available from Bakersfield to LAX.

Make sure you are looking at multi-city flights (also called open jaw), from Bakersfield to Berlin and from Hamburg to Bakersfield, all on one ticket. As acraven says, this may or may not be more expensive than a round trip to Frankfurt (or Hamburg).

To find flights, use Kayak or Google Flights or Skyscanner (but try to book directly with the airline). To find train schedules, use the Bahn (German Rail) website http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en, following Rick's tutorial: http://www.ricksteves.com/travel-tips/transportation/trains/online-schedules.

Thanks for all the suggestions. He ended up using Google flights to get a decent deal.