Travel spontaneously?

[athena53]

We spent a week in Switzerland where we just went with the flow. It was kind of sad to see people on tours go up to the top of the mountain when we knew it would be socked in.

I agree. I've taken small group tours and cruises in some places where I didn't want to find my way around on my own (India, for example) or where the area was best seen/visited from a small ship. On my own, which is what I always do in Europe, my plans change depending on the day. Bad weather? Museum day. Not enough time to enjoy a place? I go back. I climbed Arthur's Seat 3 times in 4 days in Edinburgh last month. One morning I was going to go to Dunblane and saw in the entry underneath in the guidebook that Dundee had the restored ship Discovery, which was built there and set off for Antarctica in 1901. It was 1.5 hours away by train. SOLD! Great museum and we pretty much had the run of the ship.

I've also been avoiding major tourist destinations- was in Edinburgh but didn't visit the Castle and was in Paris but didn't visit the Louvre or the D'Orsay. (Been to all of them; the latter two are pure chaos.) I wandered a lot. It was a great trip.

 

[Talkjk]

There's no negotiating with airlines according to this stackexchange post that's got a goodly number of up votes. The idea is great, though, but they make the point that it would be an absolute CF trying to control who had authority to do what.

Yes, that does make sense, how would they control it.

On the subject of full planes. We fly to Kauai quite often and the plane is not always full. The direct flight on Alaska from San Diego to Kauai on Friday OCT 12th show thirty available seats today as they did yesterday when I posed the question. We find that for the flight to Kauai you rarely get stand by passengers. Not to many connecting flights out of LIH.

 

[sengsational]

Buddy Pass

Yes, that does make sense, how would they control it.

On the subject of full planes. We fly to Kauai quite often and the plane is not always full. The direct flight on Alaska from San Diego to Kauai on Friday OCT 12th show thirty available seats today as they did yesterday when I posed the question. We find that for the flight to Kauai you rarely get stand by passengers. Not to many connecting flights out of LIH.

One way the airlines might be keeping the planes full nowadays might be the buddy passes. Two friends of mine have friends that are airline employees and are on their buddy list. I should probably have searched the board first as this must have been discussed at length already, but it was new to me. It's kind of like stand by, except now you can utilize the airlines' buddy pass web site to judge how likely it is to get a seat. The number of buddies is limited, and the number of flight segments per year is limited, but these two guys fly very cheap on these passes.

 

[f35phixer]

we have a space available perk from a friend and cant wait to see the loads and see all those empty first class sets open, hey sweetie lets go to XYZ for the week.....

 

[Sunny]

Considering we have so many places we want to go combined with it is not fun planning trips combined with analysis paralysis when we do plan on somewhere, it'd be great to find deals guiding our path.

I've tried signing up for a few sites, but most of the "deals" don't really seem to be deals. Any good resources out there?

 

[brett]

There a lots of sites to google. We are often looking of special offers but sometime you have to hunt them down on your own.

We have had a Delta skymiles account for years. Not that we fly Delta very often but we have it. It was us 35K each. So,after deciding to go to Thailand in Jan, we checked skymiles. Voila, they had one way flight at 35K points and $70 USD. We booked immediately.

We thought of then going to Oz to see friends. Since we will be in Southern Thailand we started looking at air from various airlines. Ended up with a $210 USD late Feb. fare from Krabi. Thailand (near where we will be) to Gold Coast, Australia on Scoot (Singapore Airlines). And to come home one way a month later. A $240 USD fare on Jetstar (Qantas) from Sydney to Honolulu. One ways home direct were far more expensive. So now we need a good fare in March from HNL home. Even if we add two days hotel in HNL it will still be less money than a one way direct home and it is better for us. We did this several years ago when one ways flights from Australia were cost prohibitive.

The other thing we do is price and compare identical travel product from sites in other countries. Many vendors use selective pricing that varies by location. Buying domestic airfares on a Turkish web site was considerably less expensive than going the expedia type route for the exact same flights. Had the same experience booking flights by calling Aerolineas in BA vs buying them on line through a NA site. We have our first few days in Playa booked and then we might look at Peurto Morales or Isla Majeure (sp).

Most of our tips we obtained from travelers who were far more experienced and resourceful than us. We are visiting family in Ontario next week. For an extra $100. each in airfare we are going to stop in Cancun for a few weeks on the way back. Why not. But...we are retired and have lots of time.

 

[kgtest]

No, but if you travel to Hawaii often, you know they often have sale in fall and spring. Stay away from summer. I’ve been waiting for sale to Hawaii and today I nabbed two tickets for less than $120 each way on Hawaiian Airlines. I’m open to any month that’s cool in California. Much cheaper than my aborted plan to Tahoe this week. Airline tickets that is. Hotels probably more expensive in Hawaii though.

I lived in Hawaii for a bit. I can attest, there is no lack of demand from the time west coast schools let out until they start back up. I would say the islands double in population during those three summer months.


October is always cheap!

 

[kgtest]

One way the airlines might be keeping the planes full nowadays might be the buddy passes. Two friends of mine have friends that are airline employees and are on their buddy list. I should probably have searched the board first as this must have been discussed at length already, but it was new to me. It's kind of like stand by, except now you can utilize the airlines' buddy pass web site to judge how likely it is to get a seat. The number of buddies is limited, and the number of flight segments per year is limited, but these two guys fly very cheap on these passes.

Knowing a pilot willing to loan out buddy passes is basically as good as it gets. I have a few pilot friends that have these available, I've asked but it seems only the CLOSEST friends get to use them.



And then I see those friends thanking said pilot, only to be bumped to the next days flights. Sooo, being flexible is really the key. If you are flexible enough to wait 3 days for the flight...and don't care if you EVER make it, then the buddy pass is great.


If there are 3 open seats, and 3 furloughed pilots board right before you, and you are using a buddy pass...you are not getting on the plane.

 

[brett]

We started to travel spontaneously when I retired. We spent seven months traveling. The only hard givens were a safari followed by three weeks in Africa in the November time frame and a condo in Costa Rica for the month of January. Carry on only. We started with an inexpensive Toronto-Porto, Portugal flight in August. Everything else through March was spontaneous. It set the stage for our subsequent travels.

 

[braumeister]

I climbed Arthur's Seat 3 times in 4 days in Edinburgh last month.

That's a great walk!
And when we were there this summer I discovered a fantastic pub nearby. The Sheep Heid Inn in Duddingston is 600 years old and a great place for lunch (and perhaps a game of skittles) after the hike. There is also a marvelous little botanical garden nearby called Dr. Neil's Garden that is kind of a hidden treasure.