I am in the planning phase for a trip June/July 2013. Hotels are all booked...the problem is the flight itinerary. I have registered at Kayak for alerts, and have been looking at Cheaptickets and Skyscanner.

Any insights on how to achieve this itinerary with the least cost and hassle?

Can fly out of either Dulles or Newark(or JFK) on 6/30/2013 to Zurich. Will be taking train from Lauterbrunnen to Florence.

Fly from Rome to Catania on 7/10/2013

Fly from Catania to Rome on the 16th, picking up a flight on the same day back to either Dulles or Newark.

From my initial research, it doesn't look like too many direct flights are available to Zurich, and from Rome back to the US. Also, not sure if I should purchase tix now or wait in the expectation of a price drop(HA!)

Any insights are greatly appreciated.

P.S. I live in Williamsburg, VA, but have family in both DC and Jersey.

United flys N/S from Dulles to Zurich or at least they used to.

My own itinerary was going to be IAD to Rome and then Barcelona back to IAD UNTIL I found more than $2000 cheaper routings with Air Canada... so now for July 2013 am flying DCA to Montreal to Rome and Barcelon to Toronto to DCA

I got all of that done by finding the cheap routing on Kayak several weeks ago and then booking directly with Air Canada.

Thanks Dukey!

I'll give that a shot!

IAD-ZRH: Non-stop United, Lufthansa, or BA via LHR.

JFK/EWR-ZRH: Non-stop Delta, American, Swiss, United, Lufthansa or BA via LHR.

FCO-IAD: Non-stop United, or USAir to Reagan via Philadelphia.

FCO-JFK/EWR: Non-stop Delta, Alitalia, United, Lufthansa, American, BA, or USAir to EWR via Charlotte.


Looks like more options (and I presume fare competition) from and to New York.

If you search for multi-destination tickets you should find a lot of options.

I certainly don't think you need to buy tickets now - but you should be aware that tickets to Zurich can be tricky.

(I had a client in Basel and Zurich was the best place to fly into - direct from NYC and then a 1 hr train ride versus the hell of switching at LHR to fly into Basel. And often we couldn't get tickets - even 3 weeks in advance - First or business - Zurich flights were just full).

The Rome part should be easy.

Check airfare ranges at the industry site:
www.matrixitasoftware.com
Enter departure city/choices, destination, whether you'll allow airport CHANGES enroute, how many stops you will tolerate and up to a month worth of travel dates for a look at a claendar of prices for all major carriers (US only,not intraEurope flights).
You cannot BOOk through this site, but it directs you to the appropriate airlines. Sometimes ther is great variability within dates of a month.