What's the best fare you've gotten from the U.S. to Europe? I'm especially interested in flights from DFW or IAH to ATH or ROM, but welcome all responses...

The best fare we've ever gotten was last year at the end of May. We flew PHL to Marseille and paid $789 for 2 tickets (all taxes and fees included).
It was a Delta codeshare (AirFrance fight).

Best we got was 2 years ago in mid-June. $491 Baltimore to Frankfurt. We could have had $441, but we had to fly on weekends.

Legendary fluke bargain stories abound here on and on other internet forums (especially the cheap Flights forum on www.eurotrip.com - - which I do recommend as an excellent source of info - - listen particularly to Don, the guru of sale fares, there). My own story is six seats, in business class, first week of May (2001), Evansville, IN to Rome, roundtrip for $899 each, all taxes and fees included.

Not particularly relevant to your question, but thanks for letting me reminisce.

In coach, chances are that fares as low as $400 may, on rare occasions exist for your route, in January or February. Mid summer, $800 would likely be considered a phenomenal bargain. If you have a whole year to scout, it's worth your while to watch for bargain fares to London (especially if you would enjoy a day stopover there). Fares onward to ROM or ATH can be VERY cheap.

Best wishes,

Rex

Oddly enough my best fare is still coming up.

Depart middle of this month Cincinnati to Paris round trip. $395 that includes all taxes and fees.

Great for you! Now that I think about, March was good to me also, in 2000. Seven seats, Columbus, OH to Munich for spring break - - either $327 or $357, I forget. I put together an entire trip for high schoolers for only $750, everything all-inclusive, including all meals (I didn't factor in the cost of the van rental, since four of the seven travelers were two of our own kids, my wife and myself).

Makes your price all the more remarkable, post-9/11, indy!

No wonder all the airlines are going broke.

I paid more to travel in 1969. When a dollar bought three gallons of gasoline.

Feb 2005 on a Northwest special:

Tulsa to Paris roundtrip for $333, all taxes and fees included. I'm not expecting to see that again, though!

PIT-EWR-CDG, March '04 Continental Airlines, $319.

I think back in '96 I had a fare for $276 on BA.

$250 Philadelphia - CDG on United in late April/early May 2000.

Air France had just announced daily flights from PHL to CDG at a ridiculously low promotional rates and the other airlines met the fares.

through www.statravel.com, I got two roundtrip, nonstop Virgin Atlantic tix in August 2000 (yes, August) Fort Lauderdale to London for $395 each, including taxes.

Of course, I had to be a student/faculty, and the other traveler either had to be a student/faculty or my spouse. (I had to have a .edu email)

Statravel.com has some very good fares, designed for students traveling abroad for study. Like I said, you need to have a .edu email address that they can verify... but the fares are great, and the flexibility is good ($25 to change, $50 to cancel, mine were).

I just looked up my old itinerary, and couldn't get nearly as good deals

April 2003: AUS-FCO-AUS on AA for $404 (upgraded to Biz on the return for "free" (for some reason mileage did not get deducted)

Nov 2002: AUS-CDG-AUS on AA for $378

We flew from Atlanta to Paris in March 2001 for $332 each incl junk fees. It was our least exp trip and I think it was before the Euro so our dollars went along way.

Late March 2003. RT from Chicago to Rome on BA for $420 booked through Orbitz.

I saw a tip here as I was checking Fodors one Saturday in January 2004 about a flight sale for Italy on Orbitz/Expedia. We checked and the flights were there.

We ended up booking nonstop flights from Newark to Rome on Alitalia and returning from Venice to JFK for $491 - Our flights were in mid-August 2004.

At the time, I opened another browser to try to book on Alitalia or Delta directly, but the prices weren't there.

It was great luck - and we weren't even planning to go to Italy last summer!

Sally

Best fare I ever got was right at the start of the Iraq war, on an open-jaw Continental itinerary, SFO-AMS, CDG-SFO. It was $430 or thereabouts, during the first week of April.

$411 RT OKC - CDG on Continental for March 2005. Couldn't pass it up. Jane00

We were fortunate to book a $99 each way fare from SFO to LHR on BA. I don't remember what the final price was with taxes, etc., but obviously it was considerably less than usual. We went for a week in early December of 2003 and had a terrific time.

Wish I could find a "dream" fare now. I'm having a terrible time!

$404 R/T from Sea to cdg at christmas time 2003. I just booked 2 tickets Sea to Marseille $975 in Business. Both on NWA.

$252.50 per RT ticket (non-stop) to Paris last October as part of Air France's 2-for-1 promotion. I doubt I'll ever beat that again!

Yesterday I got $460 USD total per ticket for SEA-MAD for August dates (see my thread).