Flying from Canada or US to Dubrovnik

What do you consider a "good deal," and what are your tentative travel dates?

Also, east coast or west coast?
I've priced flights from Seattle to Dubrovnik and most were over $1000. Given that Dubrovnik isn't served by THAT many carriers, it isn't ever going to be cheap. You can look at the airport website to find out who flies there, then check those airline websites.

We flew YVR to London and from there to Dubrovnik (July). Different London airports have airlines that fly to Dubrovnik--we got a very good deal (around $50 pp o/w) with Thompsonfly and made the trip to Luton airport part of the sightseeing and adventure. I think EasyJet might also fly to Split,Croatia--but not to Dubrovnik.

From what I have read on this page in the past, the cheapest way to go to Dubrovnik is to fly to Frankfurt and take a European air line on from there. But you may find cheaper fares from Calgary to another European city. Do a thorough search.

Search for the lowest fare in two separate actions. First from Calgary to Frankfurt. Then from Frankfurt to Dubrovnik.

Be sure to allow a couple of hours for plane change at Fr. If you have too much time there, you will find lots to do in the Fr air terminal.

I feel your frustration - we had the same issues when trying to plan our trip for last March. As Carl indicated, we found the best deal for us was booking a round trip fare from Chicago to Frankfurt (American Airlines), then booking an entirely different round trip ticket to/from Croatia (Croatia Airlines).

First, we determined which airlines service Croatia (Croatia Air is a big one). Next, we researched from which European cities these airlines offered direct flights to Dubrovnik, and found that Frankfurt/DBV and Vienna/DBV were two popular routes. Since American Airlines has frequent flights to Frankfurt from Chicago, we were able to find one for a relatively good deal. Maybe an airline that services Calgary makes regular flights to Frankfurt or Vienna (or another town Croatia Air services direct from DBV)?

Something we found when booking the Croatia leg was that Croatia Airlines had the flights/times we needed, and then found out that Expedia.com was selling those flights for FAR less than booking with Croatia Airlines directly (the difference in price was something around $250-300/person).

The tricky part is coordinating arrival/departure times for the two airlines and allowing yourselves enough time for connections. I would not book one flight until you had triple checked times for the other flight. The other thing to note is that if any of your flights are delayed (causing you to miss the other airline portion), you may have to pay a change fee because they are each separate tickets (instead of one ticket booking you all the way through to Dubrovnik).

Sorry for the novel, but hope you find it helpful!

Keep in mind that if you book each leg separately, you could be out of luck if your first flight gets delayed. If you're on one itinerary, they have to try to put you on another flight if you miss your connection. Not so if you've booked individual legs. So, unless the savings are dramatic, you might want to pay a bit more and have additional peace of mind.

Chelsea,

You didn't say what time of year you would be travelling, so it's difficult to search flight options.

One method you might consider would be to fly Air Transat or Air Canada to Munich, and then travel to Dubrovnik via TUIfly. These would have to be booked as separate flights, as I don't believe that TUIfly is a Star Alliance partner?

Which airline to choose will depend on what time of year you will be travelling. Air Transat only extends their service to Munich for a few months. If you travel by Air Canada, you'll probably have to change planes at Frankfurt.

Good luck!

I flew from Detroit to London on Northwest and then flew to Dubrovnik from London on British Airways. It was $350 open-jaw London->Dubronik->overland-> Budapest->London on British Airways two years ago. Back then, a round-trip Detroit->Dubrovnik->Detroit was $1600 (too much for me), so the awkward airline switch was much better. This was the last trip I had a travel agent help with, but it was worth it.

Chelsea,

Given the date range you provided, the method I'd probably consider would be to use Air Canada to Munich via Frankfurt (airport codes YYC / FRA / MUC). Using an arbitrary date of 27 April (arriving on the 28th) there are several flight combinations shown, with prices as low as $414 (one way). I'd probably use the AC9200 / AC9110 combo, due to the time of arrival in Munich. An alternative would be to choose a flight that arrives earlier in the morning - store your bags and have a brief look around Munich via the S-8.

From Munich use TUIfly to Dubrovnik (DBV). One flight that I found that day departs Munich at 19:30, arriving Dubrovnik 21:00. Price shown was 85.46€ but of course that will increase as the flight books up.

I normally try to minimize the number of flights to a particular destination (I always prefer direct flights), but I suspect that three flights is about the minimum to Dubrovnik for those of us in this part of the world. It makes for a long travel "day" though! I have no information on the specifics of the rest of your trip or the return date, but you could certainly use the reverse method to fly home.

Be sure that you review the terms & conditions of booking on the budget airlines, so that you'll have a clear idea of the costs. Pay special attention to checked and carry-on baggage limits, and the charges which apply to these. In some cases the tickets are not refundable so be careful when you book.

One other note regarding baggage. I believe that since your flight with TUIflly is not connected with AC in a "partner arrangement", you'll need to collect your checked baggage from the carousel and re-check it for the flight to Dubrovnik.

Hope this has helped with your trip planning.

Happy travels!

Check Lufthansa flights via Frankfurt and Austrian Air via Vienna. Also check different days of the week. For example, last year I had better choices departing on Monday rather than Sunday because some of the flights did not operate every day. I believe that AerLingus might also have some flights via Dublin.

Get on sidestep.com and see the different routes that they come up with to get an idea of what options you might have. Then go to other sites and check prices.