We want to use a bank rewards program to fly round trip to a destination in Europe and fly to Prague then Milan to Rome then back to the roundtrip hub. What is the cheapest airport to fly to nonstop from LAX?

Kevin from California
(normally I participate in the Fodor Africa forum)

There aren't that many non-stop destinations from LAX, but the cheapest is most likely London Heathrow because of competition. UA, AA, BA, Virgin and Air New Zealand all fly this route.

I don't know about "cheapest," but check out Swiss Air's non-stop from LAX to Zurich. It has great connections, more on the way to your destination of Prague and closer for your return from Milan or Rome.

BA is usually the cheapest to London from LAX. Then you can take a discount airline like Ryan Air to the other destinations.

Tomorrow? July? Next January? Nonstop only or would changing planes somewhere be okay?

You might want to check out Air New Zealand to Heathrow. More leg room in coach that most others and the food is pretty good. Price wise they tend to be cheaper than United or AA. After you get to London, there are all sorts of cheaper flights around Europe.

AerLingus has nonstop flights from LAX to Dublin, and they're usually relatively cheap since they've positioned themselves as a low-cost airline, but they are not scheduled every day. AerLingus also has flights from Dublin to Prague, but I don't think they're allowed to ticket you through. You would have to buy a separate Dublin-Prague ticket.

You can check on European budget airlines at www.skyscanner.net and www.whichbudget.com
They show you can fly
Easyjet from Prague to Milan Malpensa, Ryanair from Milan Orio al Serio to Rome Ciampino, and Aer Lingus from Rome Fiumicino to Dublin.

Express trains from Milan to Rome take 4 1/2 hours, so timewise it's not very different from flying by the time you factor getting to the airport, going through security, being early enough for a budget airline, etc.

thanks guys. you are as great as the Africa folk! Think we will fly into Rome and then go from there.

Grazie,

Kevin

A couple more European gateway cities to check: Frankfurt and Amsterdam.

Kevin, you are smart to fly into Rome. We were trying to save money, and are flying into LHR.
Now it's costing me plenty to fly around Europe, so that would have been better.