shirley24

I am going to be travelling to Australia in April/May and also wanted to visit family and friends in Bris. Syd. and Melb. Im wondering what passes are available either by air or rail.
I will be staying in Perth.
Im considering flying via Qatar airlines from JFK as its the post direct flight available also the most reasonable.
Before booking I thought I would ask if anyone has info on anything that I may have missed that would be helpful.

Thank you all in advance.
Shirley

longhorn55

Travel by train in Australia is not the most efficient way to get around and it's not particularly cost-efficient either. I would only consider taking the train (especially from Perth) if you have a great deal of time to devote to transportation.

Qantas offers an airpass, but it can only be purchased in conjuction with a trans-Pacific flight on Qantas. So, if you fly another airline, you can't buy it.

Virgin Australia used to offer an airpass, and may still do so, but it's not available online.

Bokhara2

I'd suggest you sign up for Qantas, Jetstar & Virgin e-notices of sales etc.
They all have regular sales & specials and Virgin has a daily "happy hour".

Make sure you read the T & Cs and that the travel dates you want are in the sale period before you click "buy".

Agree about trains. Fine for suburban, but not really the thing outside the cities.

shirley24

Thank you both.....I have only lived in the US for 3+ years and lived in Perth prior so I know what the trains are like. I do have plenty of time and will sign up with Qantas and keep a look out to what they may have coming up.
Their fare is quite a lot more than Qatar plus I would have to fly from the East coast to LA which in itself is a long flying time.
Thank you for your input and will follow your advice.

Melnq8

Hi Shirley -

This may not help you depending on your choice of airline alliance and where you're beginning your travel (East Coast of US?), but thought I'd share what we did when we lived in Perth.

We're UA gold card carriers, but not fans of UA, so we tried to fly Air NZ or Singapore whenever possible, both Star Alliance members.

We used to fly from Perth to Singapore via SIA and then on to the US via Tokyo or Seoul, but then we discovered we much preferred to fly from Perth to Auckland via Air NZ, then spend about ~12 hours in an airport hotel, then fly Air NZ to LAX or SFO.

This allowed us to fly Premium Economy on Air NZ (do check out their One Up Program) and to fly the Dreamliner from Perth to Auckland.

The drawback is that it's two back-to-back overnight flights, but getting to rest and shower in between, plus a trip out to Villa Maria Estate Winery near the Auckland Airport for a nice lunch, softened the blow considerably.

You do have to go through NZ immigration, but it's a quick easy process. We stayed at the Novotel attached to the Auckland Airport.

May not work for you, but thought it worth mentioning.

Bokhara2

I mean signing up with QF & Virgin for domestic flights, Shirley. It may be that you can find much cheaper internationals than QF & then take advantage of the domestic sales & specials.

northie

I fly Qantas frequently from Melbourne to New York - it takes approx 21 hours flying time which is 8 hours less than the shortest Qatar flight from New York via Dohar . Sure you have to go thru immigration at LAX but you get the Qantas flight from LAX as well . I looked at fares for that time and of course I don't know your dates but in March / April the Qantas fare is as low as $1295 AUD and Qatar is $1738AUD .
The Qantas Walkabout Air Pass has to be purchased simultaneously with either the Qantas or American Airlines trans pacific ticket . American Airlines commences flying daily LAX to Sydney from 17 Dec.
australiarailpass.com - gives details of 3 passes .

Dukey1

Flight distance-wise, the routing JFK-LAX-Per is 700 air miles closer but what's a few miles? I think you've received good advice.

shirley24

Thank you all for your input.