NinaSearching

I originally posted this under the Air Travel section, but thought perhaps it might make more sense to ask it here.

I need to travel from Washington DC to Amsterdam, arriving on 2 January.

The best fare I've found is on Scandanavian Airlines, changing planes in Copenhagen (Kastrup), but the connection time is only 65 minutes. I've heard the Copenhagen airport is small, but is just over an hour enough time to make it past security and immigration? Travelocity pegs the IAD-->CPH flight at 87% ontime and the CPH-->AMS flight as 92% ontime.

In addition to saving money on the fare (> $200 savings), I am trying to avoid the hotel expense of coming in a day early.

Thoughts?

nytraveler

If you really NEED to be there at a specific time, buy this only if it is a single ticket - otherwise YOU are responsible for any delays, missed flights or extra charges.

I would be concerned about delays from the US at that time of year - all it would take is a 30 minute delay and you would be up a creek,

meath1

I travel through Copenhagen regularly on SAS from Washington connecting to an SAS fight to Sweden and 65 minutes has always been enough time.My own experience is that the flight is always on time and sometimes gets in early. You will have to go through security to get into the airport including taking out your laptop and any electronics, take off your coat and shoes - but it has always been pretty quick. Then you will have to go through EU passport control, and at that time in the morning I have never encountered any delay, like security the only other people going through are those who were on your flight. The airport isn't large, but if your connection is a the far end of Terminal A you may have a very long walk/run.When you get to your gate you will have to show your passport again, along with your boarding pass. If you book both flights on one ticket, SAS will protect you on the next flight if you miss the connection. But should check when the next flight is to Amsterdam on SAS and the other Star Alliance partners. This is just my own experience - but I would take the chance on the short connection.

NinaSearching

Both legs of the flight (IAD -->CPH and CPH-->AMS) are on SAS, so yes it's on one ticket. The flight gets into CPH at 7:15am and the connection is at 8:20am. It sounds like that early on a Sunday morning might not be quite so busy.

The next flight CPH-->AMS is not til 17:45, and while I'm not opposed to hanging out in the airport all day AMS is not my final destination. I still need to get to Rotterdam that evening, as I have a class that starts at 9:30am Monday morning. So my concern is being stuck between paying an extra night hotel on the one hand, or having too little time to settle in on the other.

I think at this point my only concern is if there are weather delays out of Dulles. This is usually not an issue, but last year's snows were kinda scary.

hetismij

Bear in mind you will go through immigration at CPH since you are entering the Schengen zone. You won't go through customs though - your bags will be checked through.

Very often flights from the US get in earlier than scheduled due to the tailwinds, but of course you can't guarantee that.

If SAS are offering this as a legal connection then I would go for it. Immigration won't be much I wouldn't think, and you can probably get help getting through if the connection is tight.

You can get a train from Schiphol direct to Rotterdam, it takes about 50 minutes if you don't have to change at Leiden, and only slightly more if you do change at Leiden. Obviously a direct train would be best with luggage.

travelgourmet

Plenty of time.

That is one of the busiest times for international arrivals, but even so, immigration should take no more than 10-15 minutes. The longest possible walk from gate to gate will be no more than 15-20 minutes (depending upon how fast you walk) on top of that.

NinaSearching

Thanks, everyone, for your input. Turns out the fare I was looking at vanished overnight, so I ended up booking thru Heathrow. Oh well. Maybe I'll see the Copenhagen airport some other time!