Booking Your Flight

I have been trying different search methods to find the best airfare prices.  I use Kayak and CheapOAir quite a bit.  You can do a multi-city search and buy all your airfare at one time.  Here is an example of a search using Kayak and Chicago as the base here in the states.  I have found Indianapolis to be more expensive - as much as $200 per person or more.  You can also use airfarewatchdog.  They will allow you to compare many sites. 

Kayak
CheapOAir
Airfarewatchdog

Use the multi-city option for both including the airfare from Dublin to Venice or for just your USA to Europe flight since you will be flying into Ireland and out of Italy.

Example below:

Go to the website and click on Flights - choose Multi City.

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once you click Multi-city it will take you to the next screen where you can enter your flight segments and dates. 

 

 

It will take a few moments and when everything stops your results will be displayed starting with the least expensive.

 

 

 

It is important to pay attention to a couple of things once your search results are displayed.  Under the price you will see the website that is offering the price.  If it is multicarrier they are using different airlines.  As long as you are not connecting to flights outside this ticket you will be fine.  However, if you are connecting to flights outside this ticket it is better to always book directly with the airline.  If you are delayed and miss your connecting flight they are more inclined to take care of you if you booked with them.   Booking the ticket above doesn't matter since once you get to Dublin you are not catching a flight booked elsewhere.  I hope that makes sense.

 

The other important thing is flight time.  I highlighted the flight times above in yellow.  The time behind the segment is total flight time.  Sometimes the budget sites will have long layovers and you might have a flight time of 20 hours or 30 hours etc.  If you don't mind laying over somewhere for a bit of time - no big deal.  We were able to stop in Warsaw Poland one year on our way to Greece because we had a layover of 36 hours.  We loved it.  The search result above is actually a very good deal.  You can get all the flights you need for the trip for under a grand.  In my estimated costs I had 1,160.00 for all flights.

 

 

NOTE:  The best flight for us from Dublin to Venice is the Aer Lingus flight.  They are one of the few that fly non-stop to Venice.  I WOULD BOOK YOUR TICKETS BY FEBRUARY 1ST!  Our count is currently around 44 to 50 people.  That means we will need 44 to 50 seats on that Aer Lingus flight.  One of the other options is German Wings - departs Dublin at noon and arrives Venice at 8:40pm.  It is an option but you are losing an entire afternoon in Venice. There is also Vueling (pronounced vwelling) which departs Dublin at 2:50pm and arrives Venice at 9:50pm.  Again - you used an entire day to get from Dublin to Venice.  Also this flight is $200 per person right now. 

 

So if you don't get on the Aer Lingus flight - don't panic - we can still get you to Venice.  :)

 

Slante