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Layover Options

Posted by (Ooltewah, Tennessee) on

Good Morning,
First, let me apologize for my question. I hate that I’m even asking it but I’m looking for opinions on potential layovers.

My sister and I are trying to decide which layover would be best for our annual December Italy trip (first week of the month). We have 2 options;

Delta: The first option is flying out of our respective airports, meeting in Atlanta then flying to Florence Italy with a layover in Amsterdam. The layover in Amsterdam is 1hr50 min for both legs. This flight option has us returning home at 6:45pm

United/Dolomiti: Our second option is flying out of Knoxville (1hr30 min away, 2 hrs for sister) to Dulles with a layover (3 hrs) in Munich on the way over and Frankfurt on the return. Arrival back to TYS would be 7pm followed by a long drive home.

Both flights arrive in Florence within 30 min of each other & are the same cost. My conundrum is with everything going on in Schiphol, should we forgo the ideal return for the safer option? I know it’s difficult to imagine what the airport situation will be at the time (which is why I hated to ask this question) but my hope is the chaos would be somewhat better by that time or at least not disrupt connecting flights compared to departures. Note: we will use a carry on for the 2nd option to lessen having luggage delayed

Thanks for putting up with the question!
Amanda

Posted by
32737 posts

that's a perfectly reasonable question, and there is no need to apologise for it. I've much much reasonable questions here over the years.

Since I don't have any experience with either of those routes I'll let others answer, but to reassure you that you and the question are welcome here.

Posted by
6888 posts

First week of December is not peak travel season in Europe, and by then, one could hope that Schiphol's staffing issues will have improved.
I would therefore opt for the Schiphol option, to avoid that 2-hour drive at 7PM after the long flight back home.

Posted by
1078 posts

I just got back from Europe and went though Schiphol both going and coming back. As long as you are doing carry on only you will have no problems, in fact Schphiol is one of the easier airports to connect through. If your checking luggage then it will be a throw of the dice. When I schedule airline tickets my favorite airports in Europe are Zurich, Schiphol, Milan, and the ones I try to avoid if possible are Heathrow, CDG and Frankfurt because of past experience, but I have used all of them over the last 20 years.

Posted by
1220 posts

I'm the opposite of Donald in some ways. Also because of my experience I like Frankfurt, it's always been good there and I've gone through there both this year in June and for our GAS trip in 2018. I also used Heathrow this year and my experience was good. Carry on only. But I would say go through Schipol in this case.

Posted by
565 posts

Hi Amanda, I would opt for number 1. Returning to TYS and having to drive home would be a deal breaker for me. (BTW I live in East Brainerd).

Posted by
181 posts

Donald: thank you, that’s what I wanted to hear!

Katheryne: TYS is always an option but after a long flight & with few options to pull over on the drive back, we’ve decided to chance Schiphol. Also, I live in the East Brainerd portion of Ooltewah, close to the high school. Small world :)

Posted by
4044 posts

The most efficient approach, but not the friendliest, is to fly your separate ways and meet up at your destination hotel.
One or the other might eliminate a connecting flight. And since you plan to meet up in the middle of your separate itineraries, you might not be able to book seats together -- although that's just my guess.

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