Need help with flight from PDX to Cambodia
 

Hi! Thanks for all your help in my earlier thread!

I think we are settled on flying out of PDX (portland, oregon) on the 10th of December and need to be back before Christmas.

I've plugged in a number of different settings into all the big name travel airline sites and have yet to find any great deals... and it seems like most of them leave us at the Bangkok airport from 12 am to 7 am in the morning. That seems a little excessive, but I've slept in airports before and I'll do it again if I have to. Is the Bangkok airport decent for a 7 hour layover?

Would we be better off trying to get ourselves on different flights and trying to avoid that layover?

And should we be going through all this with a travel agent instead of online? I've heard that travel agents actually have good rates to Cambodia... though I am skeptical.

Because we want to spend a couple nights in Siem Reap, are we better off flying into there and then flying down to Phnom Phen for the duration of our time at the orphanage and then back to Siem Reap to fly back to PDX? Or are there any cheap flights into Siem Reap to begin with? It looks as though all of the flights I found for Siem Reap were more expensive.

I also looked into doing a multi leg trip flying into Phnom Phen and then to Siem reap and out from there. Is that a good way to go?

Maybe I'm stressing out too much but we are wanting to buy tickets tomorrow and I always nit pick over this stuff to try and get the best deals...

...and deals without 7 hour layovers in the middle of the night in Thailand... it's not like that is enough time to go out and see Bangkok or anything...

UA and NW will get you to BKK late at night, but many Asian airlines depart from the US West Coast late evening and arrive Asia in the morning.

Why so this late in getting your tickets? You're not going to get any good deals to Asia after 12/7 now.

There's something of a misconception that you HAVE to go through Bangkok to get to Cambodia. That's just not true. EVA has flights via Taipei to Phnom Penh, and a new airline called Angkor Airways flies from Taipei directly to Seam Reap. You can also check out Cathay Pacific.

The big airline sites are really not very good for Asian travel, except for the major routes like Bangkok - US. A travel agent specializing in Cambodia might get you a better deal as well as better flights.

You could also fly Malaysia airlines to Kuala Lumpur, then fly on discount Air Asia to SR. Return from PP on the same airline and take Malaysia back home.

Or fly into Hong Kong and take Siem Reap Airlines to Siem Reap, from SR to PP and PP back to HH. This way you could make use of the Bangkok Air Discovery Pass which would cost around $300 for the 3 segments.

Never heard of new Cambodia airline call Angkor Airways until I looked it up. It is a chartered airline so I assume it is used for tour groups.

Thanks for the help guys!

The tip about maybe flying to Hong Kong looks like it could be a good one.

It looks like we can get to Hong Kong for $884...

That seems cheap? But I'm having a hard time piecing together the rest of the trip. Bangkok Airways looks like it might work for a:

Hong Kong > Phnom Phen > Siem Reap > Hong Kong

Multi Leg journey... but their site isn't giving me price quotes...

Also I'm having a hard time figuring out the dates to put into the Orbitz system because of the time changes and flight times?

What times do they list? Local times? Or all my Pacific Standard Times?

We need to be home on the 22nd... so do I list my flight out of Hong Kong on the 21st? Or how do I do that? Thanks!

Thanks again! =)

All 'start times' for flights are local dates. You gain a day back when you fly west to east, so from Hong Kong you can leave on the 21st and arrive in the US on the same day (probably 'before' you left Hong Kong).

For Bangkok Air, I think most people have better luck going through their call center in the US, and I think this is even required to get the 3-trip discount.

Michael mentioned EVA, which is who we used to fly into BKK, but return from Phnom Penh (via Taipei).

I just wanted to say that if you use their site, which isn't the best in the world, then USA to Phnon Penh may not show up as a flight option. We had to piece the segments together ourselves... hard to explain. (also managed to go through the Chinese site to reserve seats... not easy for someone who don't speak or read it).

BUT - we ended up with a pretty reasonable price at the time, then added $200 to get premium economy seats. Mostly for all the extra space. I'm sure prices are up, but the easiest thing would probably be to call them and ask so you can compare.

If you want to try the HKG method, try one of the agents in Hong Kong. Like www.tiglion.com. They may be able to book those for you.

Like others are saying you depart HKG on 12/22 and arrive home same day.

You may be too late to get seats on the Discovery pass but try anyway. Go to the Siem Reap Airline site
http://www.siemreapairways.com/ and find the flights that you want to take. Then phone the Bangkok Airlines 800 number and see if these are available and if they are book them and arrange payment.

EVA's 'deluxe' class, which is sort of a premium economy, is usually the same price or less than the cost of other airline's economy. I haven't used them in a while, but EVA was almost always a good deal.

Thanks again for all your help! It seems like when I'm trying to piece together a:

PDX > Phnom Phen > Siem Reap > PDX

trip, and using various big destinations as stepping stones for the little airlines, I always run into just one or two tiny problems like flights not going out on the exact day I need them to.

Does anyone have any good recommendations for a great travel agency who specializes in Asian travel who I could speak to on a telephone who could help me with this?

I suspect that by avoiding backtracking to PP you're probably causing yourself a lot of problems AND paying more as well. Consider solving the PDX > PP > PDX flight as one issue and the PP > SR > PP as another. You can't get it all from one airline anyway, so get the best price on the two legs separately.

If you end up with a long layover in PP on the way back, it's no big deal. The airport is only about 15 minutes from downtown, where there are tons of restaurants, shops and sidewalk cafes to while away your time in.

two important things:

- don't use Orbitz. use www.kayak.com. you'll get a better search of more websites and they search orbitz while doing that anyway.

- flying to hong kong is a good idea

- you need to book Bangkok Airways Discovery Pass over the phone. you cannot book it online. Call them at 1-866-Bangkok for that. You need at least 3 legs, which you have. HK-PP, PP-SM, and SM-HK. The international legs will cost $90 plus tax and the internal leg will be $55 plus tax. you can use their website to check flight times, but not to book tickets via the pass.

another thing you can do on www.kayak.com is click the "multiple destination" button and enter your entire desired itinerary. then it will search exactly what you're looking for.

Wow, that Kayak site is great!!

Ok... after spending the last 7 hours searching for all of these flights, I can safely say that anyone who finds me a flight from Siem Reap that gets me to Hong Kong in time for a 12:50 flight will be my hero.

800$ buys you a return trip to Hong Kong leaving on the 10th and returning on the 23rd. I can get the trip to Phnom Phen, and then to Siem Reap, but cannot finish off the trip back to Hong Kong to get back to PDX.

4 out of 5 work. Typical.

This:

http://www.cambodia-airports.com/sie...p;sortBy=route

Claims that "DragonAir" makes the flight on the day I need, BUT, when I go to their website, I can't find Siem Reap anywhere.

I'm about to just bite the bullet and grab the cheapest PDX > Phnom Phen round trip... and then grab the most convenient Phnom <-> Siem Reap round trip. It's far from ideal and sticks us in the Bangkok airport overnight, but if I can't find anything better, I don't know what else to do.

*shrug*

And has anyone ever stayed overnight at the Bangkok airport?

Yet another question:

Could we possibly make this connection at the Phnom Phen Airport?

Arrive from Siem Reap at 9:00 AM

Be on the Next flight to Honk Kong at: 9:55 from Pochentong, terminal I

55 minutes seems really short to get bags moved?

Otherwise I guess we could arrive late the night before in Phnom Phen and hop the next flight to Hong Kong...

http://www.thaiair.com/ is being very nice to me...

I don't know how efficient they are at the PNH airport about connections since I have only been arriving or departing there. But it's really small, like only 4 gates as I recall. (very nice inside though)

Thanks :)

How long did it take to get your luggage?


Would you risk a 55 minute connection?

If not then we just arrive late(ish) in Phnom Phen and spend the night there. I've been told that it's not great to be out too terribly late at night in Phnom Phen...


If anyone knows of a flight leaving Siem Reap on the 22nd and arriving in Hong Kong before 10 am on the 23rd, I would really appreciate your knowledge hehe. I really am starting to think that such a thing doesn't exist though...

www.sleepinginairports.com is a good site to check on staying at or near BKK