We had a great experience flying Emirates between Australia and New Zealand a few years back. My husband in particular loves this airline—-everyone is so professional, and he loves the flight attendant uniforms.
Those are the 2 routes from the US to Europe that do not have a layover or stopover in Dubai. I knew about the MIlan flight (and we are taking it in March covid willing), but this is the first I heard of the one to Athens. Could be useful to lots of people.
I originally booked our March trip to Italy on British Airways, using our Avios to get business class. The flight has a layover at Heathrow and we have taken it many times, often with some time spent in London on the way home. By late July I was becoming concerned about that stop in the UK, which at the time was causing complications for entering Italy, even with an airside transit. I found I could use our Alaska miles to get seats on Emirates in business class, so I canceled the BA flight and booked the Emirates one. This was just days before the Emirates—Alaska Airlines partnership ended, but I did not know that at the time. The tickets are still good, but cannot be changed.
We have to get ourselves to JFK from Seattle separately, so we are flying there a couple of days ahead (we always enjoy a bit of time in New York). It appears that if we wanted to book that flight now, we would still have to fly ourselves to New York, even though Emirates serves our airport (SeaTac). If I try to book to Milan from Seattle, they will route us Seattle to Dubai nonstop, then Dubai back to Milan. Or a flight with 2 connections, Seattle to San Francisco to JFK to Milan. Nothing from Seattle to JFK.
But if you start in San Francisco, they will route you SFO—-JFK—-MXP.
Their one-way pricing is very reasonable if you want to do that. Like JFK to MXP in business class for $1800 in March (flex price).
