fluff224

I have planned a trip to Italy in Sept . We plan to start in Milan, Cinque Terre, Siena & Bologna. From Bologna fly to Lisbon before returning to US, total time 3 weeks. I have been tracking airfare and have not seen ANY fluctuation in prices, app $1300ish. . I realize that I am looking pretty far out, but like to monitor prices. I live in NE Ohio and have several options;
1) CAK; 10 min from home, no car parking needed
2) CLE; 1 hr + drive, pay for parking
3) PIT; 2+ hr drive + pay for parking

When I compare prices I take into consideration the time driving & the cost to park for 3 weeks (also DH not fond of leaving his car for that length of time).

I try to limit the # of stops when flying. I prefer 1 stop. Surprisingly on other trips I have been able to get 1 stop from CAK to Europe.

I am making myself crazy right now. I have looked at flying into other airports; FLR, FCO, VCE. Even have dropped the multi city Lisbon leg for round trip in/out of Italy.

I know no one has a crystal ball to predict prices. But, does anyone have any suggestions? I usually use Kayak, Momondo or Google flights to track prices.

Any suggestions will be appreciated!

Christina

I am not clear on what your question is? That air fare seems expected for your entire itinerary in September, after all, that includes your flight within Europe? Sounds pretty good to me, going from Ohio to/from Italy in a popular time period.

So I am not clear on what you are asking. Kayak lists about every major airline, definitely from where you are flying, so I don't really think there are some great bargains you are not seeing. Getting 1 stop from CAK to Europe doesn't surprise me in the slightest, there are usually lots of nonstops from JFK/EWR, or some other big city (chicago, Pittsburgh or PHL) and I would expect you could get from CAK to some place like that in one nonstop flight.

If you just think you should get that flight a lot cheaper, I don't see that. I'm looking at flights that cost that much this summer just to France from Washington DC, which is less distance and a bigger airport.

American's hub is PHL and you can get a nonstop from CAK to there. United has a hub at EWR and you can get a nonstop from CAK to there (or to ORD). Delta is a partner with Alitalia and they have flights from CAK to ATL. But you probably saw all these options. You can get a 2 stop from from CAK to MXP on United. If you just think it should cost a lot less than $1300, I doubt it.

fluff224

Thanks for your response, Christina. I get rather obsessive when I start looking at airfare. Have been told that I'm like a dog with a new bone! The $1300 does not include the flight from Bologna to Lisbon. We are ending up in Bologna because I saw good flights to Lisbon. We are traveling by train which gives me some flexibility.

Back to my inquiry... I try to get the most bang for my buck. So, I will spend hours, days & weeks searching and waiting for fares to drop. Just haven't seen them budge. Good thing I'm retired! I submitted this post just to see if others had suggestions on how to approach my search. I've read to try booking one way for better prices. I certainly didn't find that in my search! I might have unreasonable price expectations since Sept is still a popular time to travel. I try to avoid highnseason, but we're traveling with another couple this year & Sept worked best for both of us.

ira

Hey fluff,

>I am making myself crazy right now.

Not unusual.

There is no way to predict prices because the airline's computers are used to predict the load for each flight. If one is very undersold, they could cancel it and move everyone onto a different flight.

Have you signed up for Kayak's fare notification?

Keep in mind that the closer you get to Sept, the more likely it is for prices to rise, and you will almost definitely end up in a middle seat.

My strategy has been to find a price I can live with, take it and forget about it.

Good luck.

DebitNM

1. use google flights; set up an alert.

2. start following airfare bloggers who often post great deals to Europe, you may have to do a bit of tweaking to get your exact itinerary [or just do the transatlantic portion with the inter Europe on budge carriers like easy jet or ryan air -- use www.skyscanner.com for those] but worth following:

thepointsguy
frequentmiler
secretflying
theflightdeal

Follow the above bloggers on Facebook or sign up for emails.

Lastly, are you looking at multi-city ticket? Also known as open jaw or are you looking at 2 one way tickets?

michelhuebeli

What are your dates, EXACTLY (or - if you have flexibility - within a day or two either way)?

Aramis

Hey fluff - give me some dates (ranges, I hope) and I will see if I can scare up something better than $1300 for you.

nukesafe

I know it is not exactly relevant, but I recently picked up an open jaw flight from Seattle to Frankfurt (one stop) and back from Paris (non-stop) in late September for $554. We were not planning to go this year, but I couldn't resist.

Hang in there, something might pop up.

michelhuebeli

No, not multi-city ticket, just two one-ways, unless TAP gets you on a return ticket to MXP and - with a stopover in LIS because it's TAP and worth trying - back home. Try TAP first.

As I look on ITA matrix (my favorite look-up site, now owned by Google and may go away soon), with the "calendar" option set to Sep. 1 searching for cheapest fare for all of September, I see one-way fares to MXP as low as $338 on, for example, Mon. 9/25 United CLE-EWR TAP EWR-LIS TAP LIS-MXP (same fare on 9/26 and 9/27)

Also $362 (Sun.9/24 with United CLE-EWR and TAP EWR-LIS and LIS-MXP), same fare on other dates.

Many other fares from $436 to $454 to $467 to $475 etc. on earlier September dates, starting with Sep. 1 for $467.

That's just for starters - you have not looked in the right places, keep your hopes up and you won't spend anywhere near $1300.

fluff224

I am looking at booking multi city;
9/11 CAK to MXP
10/1 LIS to CAK

I have not had any luck with booking one way tickets. I will try again.

Nukesafe, $554 from Seattle?? I am so jealous! I realize my destinations aren't the most popular & therefore more expensive. But, I keep trying. I tried Lisbon flipping & going to Lisbon 1st leaving CAK on 9/4 and returning from MXP on 9/27. Not much difference.

Michelhuebeli, will look at the ITA matrix. I getting cross eyed right now from searching!!!

fluff224

Oh, I neglected to say that I might be a bit of a travel snob in that not only do I look for 1 stop, but also shortest travel time. All that plus the cheapest fare!!

Saraho

ttt

Southam

Google has owned itasoftware for a number of years. Why would it go away? The service seems a natural fit for the much more recent Google Flights, although the older service is aimed at the industry rather than retail consumers. Anyhow, a multi-city search function will almost always be cheaper than negotiating separate one-ways. Personally, I watch Cheapoair because it is easy to use (despite its clunky name) but no one site covers everything. For European short-hops I look at www.skyscanner.com first.

DebitNM

<i> "michelhuebeli on Mar 19, 17 at 5:28pm
No, not multi-city ticket, just two one-ways</i>"

Sorry, I have to disagree. It is not often that 2 one way tickets are less than a multi-city/open jaw ticket using the same airline alliance.

Gardyloo

Look for round trips to Lisbon with a separate one-way ticket from Lisbon to Italy on the outbound trip. I'm seeing CAK-LIS round trips in the $1000 range; a ticket from LIS to MIL or ROM would probably be in the $120 range. Obviously you'd need to give yourselves plenty of leeway on the outbound leg as you wouldn't be protected for the connection if your incoming flight was late.

ITA is the engine behind Kayak and many other online services; Google isn't going to muck around with a moneymaker.

heart2travel

I got 650$ from California for September thru Air France. SFO-MXP one stop in Paris. Return LIS-SFO one stop I cant remember where? Lowest rate I have paid for Europe ever I think...I am like you fluff224, its an obsession and I liken it to video game addicts. I love to hunt good airfare!
Good Luck...

nukesafe

BTW, I often use the Hipmunk search engine https://www.hipmunk.com/ to search for flights because they have a search filter function called "Agony". That gives results with a selection of flights that tries to balance cost vs. flight time. That way I don't have to mess with flights that might be cheap but take 23 hours from SEA to CDG. The flight I got back from Paris is a nonstop that takes not much more than ten hours.

daria

Consult cheapair.com (different than cheapoair.com). They do an analysis every year of prices paid for tickets to and from different locations based on actual sales. So, you can see what the range of prices should be for your dates and locations. Also, if you input your cities and dates, they will tell you, based on the same data, a range of dates when prices will likely be at the lowest (and what that price will likely be). Of course, this is not for certain, but it is based on actual sales data. Based on the last two trips to Europe I planned using their system, I don't think you are looking early. It may be late, but check and see what their site says for your airports. For example, we are going to Spain in June 2018 and cheapair says prices will be the best from late July 2017-November 2017.

According to Rick Steves, airfare to Italy from US is typically going to be $1,000-$1,400, so yes it is expensive but you are in the range.

Roger1x

I can't help you with fares to Italy in September but for Christina, United has non stop flights from Dulles to Paris for $750 round trip for all of August and September. That is a lot less than $1300 you are talking about.

fluff224

I have been playing around with flights using the search engines (ita matrix, hipmunk, chepoair, etc) so many of you suggested. I didn't see much difference in flying into MXP 1st & out of LIS or flying into LIS 1st & out of MXP. $1288 ish.Intra Europe flights between the 2 are app $150 or even less.

I have thrown it out to my DH that we stay on in Italy after we part with our friends in Bologna. As much as we are interested in Portugal, we could pair it with Spain next year. The main focus of our trip is Milan, CT, Siena, & Bologna for 13 days. I figure as long as we are there, make the most of it.

Yes, heart2travel, it is an obsession to snag a great airfare! I agree, ira,I don't look back once I book a fare that I feel is a good price. That's why I spend so much time looking.