Flying San Francisco to Copenhagen
 

There are lots of different ways to get from SFO to CPH...flying SAS, Delta, Continental, United, Lufthansa, Air Canada, and combinations of those airlines. Assuming fares and transit times are roughly equal (SAS may be more expensive; Air Canada may be the cheapest), does anyone have an opinion on what route/planes/airlines are the best to take?

SAS is my to choice, Lufthansa - 2nd, others follow. We flew SAS from Seattle to Chicago and onto Copenhagen last summer. SAS just stopped a direct flight from Seattle to Copenhagen.

If you use SAS to fly to Copenhagen, get economy tickets and then use Optiontown to try for low priced upgrades to Business class. We did this in April and paid $462 a person for each segment. Well worth the money.

http://cc.bingj.com/cache.aspx?q=fly...01da7,48e82e2d

Lufthansa is flying an A380. Thoughts about that?

I'm not sure whether I can get the upgrade on SAS...some flights look pretty crowded already. Is Economy Extra on SAS worth the price difference of several hundred dollars each way? Does SAS have individual screens in Economy?

SAS has individual screens in economy, but the programming is on a loop, not on demand. Premium Economy is pretty good on SAS. Roughly akin to US domestic first class. It is a reasonable amount of room and service and food are good. If you are ponying up for PE, though, be sure to look at BA, Virgin, and Air France, as well.

Among your choices, I don't see that much difference among them. The Lufthansa flight might be interesting, due to the A380, but I don't find them particularly special generally. I'd generally be disinclined to take a long domestic flight (I include US to Canada flights in this bucket), such as SFO to Newark to CPH, so that may put Air Canada, Continental, and Delta behind the others. I'd also try to avoid narrow-body planes as much as possible - both Delta and Continental fly 757s to CPH, which are not very comfortable.

In terms of routings, I would prefer SFO-AMS-CPH or SFO-LHR-CPH (with BA).

We flew KLM with plane change in AMS - loved that airline! We got the seats cheaper through... I think Delta.

The A380 is quite a plane! I've flown it with Emirates several times out of Dubai, though not in economy. But others told me their economy seats, even though seemingly packed in cheek-by-jowl, felt surprisingly spacious and quite comfortable.

It also would be possible to book Lufthansa going to Copenhagen and SAS on the return through the United website on code share flights. Not sure if there is a downside to that, other than it means I would be economy on SAS without a chance to upgrade.