BobNCheryl

We're going to spend our honeymoon in Italy in April. Because we have frequent flyer miles with Virgin-Atlantic we are flying from Los Angeles to London-Heathrow, and then fly to Milan.

Our plan is to find an airline (cheap, if possible) to fly us to Milan and then, after nine days of enjoying Italy, back to Heathrow from Rome.

Can anyone recommend a low cost airline that makes these flights? We may be limited because we have to allow time to deplane, find our luggage, and then check into to second airline in enough time.

My hope is to find an airline that uses the same terminal as Virgin does. So, if you know the Heathrow layout, and you know of some low cost airlines that fly to Italy, please leave a message here. We sure would appreciate it.

Thanks a lot!

Bob and Cheryl

flanneruk

There are no low-cost airlines flying from Heathrow. YOu have two broad choices:

1. Go to www.flybudget.com and look for low-cost airlines flying to the Milan area (Bergamo, though nice and less than a day's drive from Milan, isn't in Milan) or Rome (Ciampino is pretty much as close to Rome as Fiumicino, but has messier public transport) from Luton, Stansted or Gatwick. Then calculate the time and money needed to get to those airports from Heathrow. You need to allow a MINIMUM of five hours between landing at LHR and taking off from these other three London area airports. OR
2. Look at whether you can get deals from BA, bmi or Alitalia on flights from Heathrow. This can often be cheaper and quicker than trekking round the M25 for two hours or so. Open-jaws within Europe rarely attract the best deals, so you might find it much cheaper to get a return deal to, say Milan and fly or train there from Rome.

Steve_James

B&C - As Flanner says, the budget airlines don't use Heathrow.

But it's normally little more than an hour by bus from Heathrow to Gatwick - with frequent connections.

EASYJET (- the budget airline) fly Gatwick-Milan (Linate) for about £25 incl tax (- if you book 6 months in advance).

Easyjet also fly Rome (Ciampino) to Gatwick.

Easyjet may well be your cheapest option.

Check also Ryanair (www.ryanair.com) - but be aware that they use Stansted and Luton rather than Gatwick.
For Milan flights Ryanair fly to nearby Bergamo (- about an hour from Milan).

Hope this helps ...

Steve

janis

Besides the hassle of getting to one of the other London airports (it may be rarely more than an hour to LGW but with retrieving bags, immigration, getting to the coach, security at the LGW end, etc you'll still need 4-5 hours) There is the matter of the baggage allowances on the discount airlines. You will need to pack pretty light - some of them make more money on luggage overweight charges than on their fares. And they have VERY strict check in requirements - even a minute late can see you denied boarding. So you need to factor in a very generaous transfer time to be safe.

Heck - you are already getting the transatlantic flight for miles -- spend the money to book flights to/from LHR. You don't want to start out your honeymoon schlepping around the M25 hoping to catch your easyjet or ryanair flight . . . .

BobNCheryl

Thanks for everyone's comments. Have decided to listen to Janis and stay at Heathrow and use either bmi, BA or Alitalia to fly to Milan.

The problem is that it's nearly the same price to book round trip flights to and from Milan and Rome than it is to book open jaw flights into Milan and out of Rome.

Oh, well... Still, it's better than taking a 5 hour train ride from Rome to Milan, then a 2 hour flight to Heathrow, with a 5 hour layover (to allow time for getting luggage and check-in to Virgin) and then a 10 hour flight home to L.A.! What's a few hundred more dollars to avoid THAT?!

Thanks again.

Bob