Tom

Does anyone know which, if any, airlines have direct flights from San Francisco to Italy, preferably to Rome or Venice? If not SF how about Los Angeles?

GGinSF

The only direct I know of is United's SF to Milan.

GGinSF

I was referring just to SFO. I'm sure there are several out of LAX but I'm not familiar with that airport.

grasshopper

Alitalia flies direct to Milan. I don't think United has a direct. They usually either stop in Frankfurt or Dulles.

GGinSF

Direct isn't the same as non-stop. Direct (at least in United's vocabulary) means that one doesn't get off of the plane, but there could be a stop on the way. This is in contrast to a transfer to another plane or a direct non-stop. Grasshopper is correct that United doesn't have a direct non-stop from SFO, they have a direct with 1 stop.

Grasshopper

You are correct, GG. I just looked at the ual website. I apologize.

GAC

Alitalia discontinued its daily nonstop flight from SFO to MXP on October 1, 2001. They will discontinue their daily nonstop flight from LAX to MXP after March 30, 2002. What a shame ....

Tom

If there are no non-stop flights from SF to Italy, is there any one itinerary that is better than others in terms of flying time, convenience, etc.

Joanne

Tom: We fly out of SFO and prefer flying to London, changing planes and on to our destination. We flew to Greece via JFK, with a terminal and plane change and found it far more difficult and tiring. We used United for several European trips, but in recent years have been flying with British Airways.<BR><BR>We find the overnight flight to London with a short 1-2 hour flight after the plane change easier than five hours to NY and then the longer leg of the trip after that.<BR><BR>j

Dayle

Hi Tom! I go with the same theory. I like the overnight flight taking me as far as possible before changing planes. This way, I at least get more of a chance of sleeping and better odds with the connection. For example if I missed the connection or some other problem came up once in Europe there are more options, train, drive, more flights etc.

Grasshopper

I agree with Dayle and Joanne. I fly to London or Paris and then go on from there. Usually, I try to plan for a couple of days in either of those cities just to catch up with jet lag, and take in a restaurant or shop I've missed. Of course that means flying back to London or Paris to fly home. In London I stay at the Holiday Inn near the airport and catch the 9 am flight to SFO. In Paris I usually just live with the transfer.

XXX

Tom,<BR><BR>If you would try Orbitz.com, or Travelocity.com, or any one of 100 other online sources, you would be able to find this out yourself in about 20 seconds.<BR><BR>Then, you could ask about what to do in Rome,etc.<BR><BR>XXX

Kathy

I'm glad someone brought up the "direct" vs. "non-stop" terminology. In the airline industry "non-stop" means just that, point A to point B with no stops in between. "Direct" only means no change of planes. You could conceivably make 1 or 2 stops along the way, but if there is no change of planes, it's considered direct. People need to understand the difference, because if you ask the airline if the flight is direct, and they say yes, you may be thinking it's non-stop, and what a surprise when you get to the airport. <BR><BR>There, unfortunately, are no non-stops out of SFO to Italy. Alitalia to Milan, non-stop, was the only one. Now that's gone.<BR><BR>Kathy

Tom

XXX<BR>You'll have to excuse me as this is my first trip to Europe. I tried the sites you mentioned and couldn't find a non-stop flight. I thought I might be missing something and am appreciative to those who responded. I now know that there are no non-stop flights, and that most seasoned travelers prefer to fly Europe first, and then change planes to Italy. Since a lot of the flights I was looking at stopped in the US, this information helped me to eliminate those choices. I'm sure that many people who ask questions here are novice travelers like me. It is certainly nice that some people seem so willing to help.

XXX

Dear Tom,<BR><BR>This spring will be my first trip to Europe as well. However, I spent some time reading the various discussions on this board, so at least I had some idea of what was going on.<BR><BR>If you had already checked out Orbitz, Travelocity, etc. and found no direct flights, don't you think that should have told you something??<BR><BR>The people who participate on this forum are very knowledgeable and helpful. It would seem to me that the best use of this forum are questions you have not been able to find answers to on your own, after reasonable research efforts.<BR><BR>You still see questionable postings like "I'm going to France for a week. What should I do? Where should I stay? etc."<BR><BR>XXX

EBT

XXX<BR>You are exactly the kind of person this forum could do without. There was nothing wrong with Tom's questions. The only thing out of line was your response. If you don't want to be helpful, keep your criticisms to yourself.