Flying Multiple Destinations

Sounds like what you want is an "open jaw" flight. That is flying in and out of Europe from different cities. These kind of flight can be easily booked on site like Expedia, and even the airline sites. You will be given the choice of one-way, round trip and, multiple destinations. Multiple destinations is the same as open jaw.

Is there a specific city in Italy that is the easiest/cheapest to fly out of - or would I be better off returning to Paris for my flight home? Is it best to tell a travel agent what I need & book through "an expert"?

Rome or Milan are the two easiest Italian cities to fly out of back to the US. Don't bother going back to Paris. This trip I flew to Rome than back from Paris and it was great.

Judy,
That's an interesting question as I just spent a great deal of time doing my own online searching. When I wasn't happy with what I found, I contacted a travel agency to see if they could come up with something better. Although they did find one way to book my itinerary (through a different airline that codeshared) and came up with a little bit better price, once their $50/pp international fee was tacked on it was worse.
For Italy, we ended up flying into Rome and out of Verona. It took a lot of checking to find which flights into Rome were cheapest and which out of Verona were cheapest (and better than the alternative cities). But I limited myself to Air France so that I could do the Seattle-Paris direct flight and work from there. If you have the time and some knowledge, you should be able to do it yourself, but it doesn't cost to get your best deal and then have a TA see what they get.

Judy, I am not an expert on the topic of flying to Paris, but if you want to buy airline tickets for the lowest possible price : search for flights (Multiple Destinations) at a travel website, such as Orbitz. It will tell you which airline has the lowest price for airline tickets. (look for the total price, including taxes and fees). writeon paper the name of that airline, and the Flights numbers and dates. And look for information of that flight at that airline's internet website. The price for the tickets should be lower at the airline's website. The travel websites are now adding a high fee ($ 120. or more) for buying airline tickets through their website. In my experience, having a professional travel agent select the flights for me was never satisfactory. I always found the flights that I wanted, at much lower prices, by directly contacting an airline. But, there might be a possibility that a travel agent could find tickets from a ticket consolidator, at a lower price.

Hi Judy,

Since you are not leaving until next June, you have some time to research this yourself. I particularly like www.sidestep.com for checking out what options are available. Check the nearby airports option on sidestep. Whether it is cheaper to do the open jaws or to fly back from Paris will depend somewhat on what airlines fly from your location in the U.S. to Paris and Rome as well as what airlines they partner with and what they one-way options are. Good Luck

Check out kayak.com. Punch multi city and enter your destination city as well as the departure city. Remember the time and money you are saving by not needing to return to Paris. And with a trip like this time is very valuable!

Judy, There was an error in my previous posting here (9/20/07 at 6:39 p.m.). I said the price for airline tickets could be $ 120. more if purchased through a travel website such as Orbitz, compared with purchasing the tickets for the same flights from the airline's website. That is not correct. The difference in price is smaller than that. But I will not access www.Orbitz again ! Today my computer accessed that website, I looked at flight information for one destinationl, and I closed off that website. After that, my computer was "frozen" : my computer could not access an other website. My computer could not do anything. My computer could not disconnect from the internet. That happened twice, in two days.
I think Kayak is one of the better travel websites, for finding airline flight information and comparing prices.
During the past few years at this Travelers Helpline there was much discussion, comparing airlines, and favorite websites for airline flights information.

Regarding Kayak, I do like them however their Air France direct prices were not accurate for me. I used the link saying that I got a different price, and I was emailed that they are still working on the Air France ticketing. For many search results, they provide the direct link to book their price from whichever source is providing it.
It just happens that Air France wasn't quite right, but they do give you a good feel for what's out there and what kind of difference limiting your layovers will have on your fare.

I have found the most helpful site to be:
http://matrix.itasoftware.com/cvg/dispatch/login
This is a flight search-engine designed for use by travel agents. It will give a comprehensive listing of flights and fares and direct you to the airline's website for ticketing. There is no charge to use it.