Travel

Cruise booked (departs from New Orleans), need a cheap flight!

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  • Jan 4th, 2015 8:15 pm
Sr. Member
Dec 23, 2001
927 posts
125 upvotes

Cruise booked (departs from New Orleans), need a cheap flight!

We have a cruise booked for the beginning of March, leaving New Orleans... now we have to find a way to get there.

Checking the WestJet and AirCanada's recent "~20% deals" left us thinking there has to be better out there. RedTag was the best at $554CAD pp round trip but even that price seems to have disappeared. Looking to depart from Pearson, preferably, but open to alternatives. I've seen a lot of lively debate about going to Buffalo; I'd really rather not as it's a significant drive for us unless the deal is too good to pass up.

United seems to be the cheapest bet. I've never flown with them; do they regularly have seat sales? Better to book direct (USD) or somewhere that will charge CAD?

Does anyone have any advice on finding a cheap flight? TIA.
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8 replies
Deal Addict
Oct 25, 2008
2321 posts
393 upvotes
North York
Invincible wrote: We have a cruise booked for the beginning of March, leaving New Orleans... now we have to find a way to get there.

Checking the WestJet and AirCanada's recent "~20% deals" left us thinking there has to be better out there. RedTag was the best at $554CAD pp round trip but even that price seems to have disappeared. Looking to depart from Pearson, preferably, but open to alternatives. I've seen a lot of lively debate about going to Buffalo; I'd really rather not as it's a significant drive for us unless the deal is too good to pass up.

United seems to be the cheapest bet. I've never flown with them; do they regularly have seat sales? Better to book direct (USD) or somewhere that will charge CAD?

Does anyone have any advice on finding a cheap flight? TIA.
http://goo.gl/flights/lq9q. CA$484 all in

Sun 1 Mar

15:05 – 16:04
Toronto – Chicago · YYZ–ORD
United 3820 · Economy class · Embraer ERJ-135/145
Operated by Expressjet Airlines DBA United Express
Average legroom (78 cm)
1h 59m
No in-seat power
No personal video
Layover in Chicago ORD1h 45m

17:49 – 20:15
Chicago – New Orleans · ORD–MSY
United 786 · Economy class · Airbus A319
Average legroom (76 cm)
2h 26m
No in-seat power
No personal video
Return flight
Sun 8 Mar

05:15 – 06:33
New Orleans – Houston · MSY–IAH
United 755 · Economy class · Airbus A320
Average legroom (76 cm)
1h 18m
No in-seat power
No personal video
Layover in Houston IAH1h 07m

07:40 – 11:51
Houston – Toronto · IAH–YYZ
United 5225 · Economy class · Canadair RJ 700
Operated by Skywest DBA United Express
Average legroom (76 cm)
3h 11m
No in-seat power
No personal video
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Newbie
Dec 8, 2014
73 posts
85 upvotes
Kanata, ON
Without dates, it's hard to give specific advice. General recommendations though:

1. Arrive at least one day in advance if you buy the air yourself. If your flight is cancelled/delayed and miss the ship, you'll either need to pay out of pocket to catch up or if that's really expensive, give up on the trip.

2. Check out airfare through the cruiseline. Sometimes you'll be able to leave on a 6am flight from Toronto the day the ship leaves, and the cruiseline is responsible for getting you to the first port if you don't make the ship in New Orleans. It will be more (you're paying for this as a form of travel insurance), but it may not be more than buying air plus hotel for one night beforehand. I do option #1 above, but people also do #2 (this) and it's a reasonable option.

3. Make sure you leave enough time to clear US customs when you return to New Orleans. Look to your cruiseline website for advice on the earliest flights to book. Figure out how much money you can save by booking an earlier-than-recommended flight and understand your risk tolerance. It looks to me like it's about $50 for a morning flight over a later one on the one date I checked. That's not worth it to me.

4. Generally book in CAD where you can. There's rarely more than a few dollars to be found booking in USD vs. CAD with the airlines, and unless your CC has no forex fees, you'll pay more going that route.

As for $550, I just paid about that for a rt to Texas in Feb. Not thrilled about it, but I've seen it higher as well.
Sr. Member
Dec 23, 2001
927 posts
125 upvotes
Thanks for the replies! Ethan, to boyfrombarrie's point - I should have given more details. I have seen flights in the 484 range as well however our boat arrives March 8th at 8am so the early flights leaving New Orleans won't work. (There is a 5:15am 6am something and the next one seems to be 5:17pm. That's the one I'm looking for, otherwise the flight you outlined there works perfectly from a time perspective but the one a few days earlier. We're looking to fly out Feb 27th to give us a few days buffer before the cruise leaves on the 1st.

This plan covers your first point.

2) Interesting. I wouldn't have thought of this! The other part of our plans I hadn't mentioned was to check out New Orleans for a few days. "Insurance" + exploring :)

3) It seems that United's "next" flight at a reasonable cost is 5:17pm which should give us plenty of time, assuming the ship arrives on time. That said, it's good to keep this in mind in case something comes up at a different time. I wouldn't have thought to consult the cruiseline website for suggested flight times.

4) This was the approach we took with the cruise itself and would like to do the same with the flight if we can - which brings me to the question I had for Ethan: I've checked Google Flights a few times recently as well - how do you know it's CAD? I do have a card with no forex fees however the examples I've seen are within a few bucks as you said.

So as for price, what are the odds of them going up? Last year's trip had us book flights "sooner" than we might have wanted to for fear of prices rising. We later saw the flight drop by a decent amount. Not that there are any crystal balls, but are there certain trends to look for before pulling the trigger?
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Deal Addict
Dec 6, 2006
2926 posts
1499 upvotes
Invincible wrote: Thanks for the replies! Ethan, to boyfrombarrie's point - I should have given more details. I have seen flights in the 484 range as well however our boat arrives March 8th at 8am so the early flights leaving New Orleans won't work. (There is a 5:15am 6am something and the next one seems to be 5:17pm. That's the one I'm looking for, otherwise the flight you outlined there works perfectly from a time perspective but the one a few days earlier. We're looking to fly out Feb 27th to give us a few days buffer before the cruise leaves on the 1st.

This plan covers your first point.

2) Interesting. I wouldn't have thought of this! The other part of our plans I hadn't mentioned was to check out New Orleans for a few days. "Insurance" + exploring :)

3) It seems that United's "next" flight at a reasonable cost is 5:17pm which should give us plenty of time, assuming the ship arrives on time. That said, it's good to keep this in mind in case something comes up at a different time. I wouldn't have thought to consult the cruiseline website for suggested flight times.

4) This was the approach we took with the cruise itself and would like to do the same with the flight if we can - which brings me to the question I had for Ethan: I've checked Google Flights a few times recently as well - how do you know it's CAD? I do have a card with no forex fees however the examples I've seen are within a few bucks as you said.

So as for price, what are the odds of them going up? Last year's trip had us book flights "sooner" than we might have wanted to for fear of prices rising. We later saw the flight drop by a decent amount. Not that there are any crystal balls, but are there certain trends to look for before pulling the trigger?
Looks like around $300US from buffalo with several airlines including southwest with free checked bag.
Sr. Member
Dec 23, 2001
927 posts
125 upvotes
webworm wrote: Looks like around $300US from buffalo with several airlines including southwest with free checked bag.
Hrm, I'll take a closer look at Buffalo then. Someone told me the airport offers free parking for Canadians? If so, that's another good savings. I like Southwest's free checked bag but the dates/times I've seen net pretty much the same cost? Where were you seeing the ~$300?

[IMG]http://content.screencast.com/users/Tya ... 2_2217.png[/IMG]

Edit: this is for 4 adults.
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Sr. Member
Dec 24, 2013
668 posts
80 upvotes
Toronto
Try cheapoair.com its pretty good, but be careful of mixed airline iteneraries
Newbie
Dec 8, 2014
73 posts
85 upvotes
Kanata, ON
Invincible wrote: 3) It seems that United's "next" flight at a reasonable cost is 5:17pm which should give us plenty of time, assuming the ship arrives on time. That said, it's good to keep this in mind in case something comes up at a different time. I wouldn't have thought to consult the cruiseline website for suggested flight times.
5 pm should be tons of time. It's normally the morning flights that would potentially cause a problem if there's a delay in docking or clearing US immigration.
Invincible wrote: 4) This was the approach we took with the cruise itself and would like to do the same with the flight if we can - which brings me to the question I had for Ethan: I've checked Google Flights a few times recently as well - how do you know it's CAD? I do have a card with no forex fees however the examples I've seen are within a few bucks as you said.
Google flights should default to Canadian $ if you're in Canada. At the very bottom of the screen you can confirm / change the currency.
Invincible wrote: So as for price, what are the odds of them going up? Last year's trip had us book flights "sooner" than we might have wanted to for fear of prices rising. We later saw the flight drop by a decent amount. Not that there are any crystal balls, but are there certain trends to look for before pulling the trigger?
I don't have a crystal ball either, but I'd suggest that no matter what, you have flights booked at the two week mark - the potential savings at that point are dwarfed by the risk of a huge increase.
Sr. Member
Dec 23, 2001
927 posts
125 upvotes
Thanks for the advice. I have a number of price alerts set up and plan to hold out at least until later this month... so long as I can keep the friends we're travelling with from pulling the trigger :)
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