air to Sydney and back from Auckland

Does anyone know what airlines and routings Oceania has used in the past for the Austraila cruises? We will be coming from the Atlanta area.

I can't answer your question. All I can do is say that when we did this itinerary -- in January 2008 -- we booked our own air. We live in NYC but we booked our reservations from LAX to Auckland, back from Sydney to LAX. (We have family in L.A. which made this convenient.) We used premium economy on Air New Zealand and it was definitely a good buy.

OTOH, that was almost 8 years ago.

Before you opt for O's air, you should check out what you can do on your own. You may find better itineraries for yourself, for example.

With Renaissance I quickly learned (on our first cruise where we also booked our own air) that doing your own was better ... we heard nightmarish stories from other passengers about the routings for their "free" air. The few times we've used O's air, we haven't encountered that kind of problem. Their schedules are much better than Ren's were.

But I would also suggest that for this itinerary you get a deviation if you use O's air. That's because it's a heck of a long flight (!) especially if you come from Atlanta, and you will acclimate better to the time change if you have a few days Down Under before you board the ship. Also, both cities are worth the time! (From LAX to Auckland was 14 hours as I recall.)

Although we didn't use O's air for that cruise, we went down two days early and came back two days later. I wish we'd spent more time in both Auckland and Sydney -- they are worth it.

Mura

We did Oz and NZed in 2013. Flew Virgin Australia to Sydney from LAX, then flew Emirates from Auckland back to SYD. Check the New Zealand site for Emirates for pricing and use the NZD pricing to book! Current exchange rate with USD is $1.52 in our favor! We booked business class seats for less than $500 USD and it was a real treat.

Like MURA and ALOHA1 we did not use O's air, and our international legs were to and from LAX (13 hours non-stop to Auckland, 14 from Sydney). However we flew steerage - fourth row from the absolute rear of a 747 - but it was on Qantas, so we've been spoiled ever since. Except for the overall roominess, it was almost the equivalent of business class on a domestic US flight.

To answer your direct question - We did take Oceania air on the Aus/NZ cruise in Feb of this year.:D

We got a deviation to spend 4 days in Sydney before the cruise and flew directly home from Auckland after the cruise. We live near Seattle and the routing going was SEA - SFO to Sydney on United. Returning it was Air NZ to Vancouver BC and an Air Canada shuttle to SEA.

Our TA researched the routing and, after our approval, requested and obtained the deviation as noted above for these specific flights. We paid the deviation fee and a small amount of overage but the net was less than we could have booked on our own. Our TA is experienced with Oceania and knows their routine airlines and routing.

As others have noted each trip is a different research project and sometimes DIY is better and other times Oceania air is cheaper. We always ask for the deviation price usually asking for specific flights. When sailing out of Miami we generally take whatever Oceania offers which has always been cheaper and also has been different airlines each time. I don't think they restrict air to specific airlines very much.

Note: the United flight sucked (as usual). Air NZ flight was very nice.

Enjoy your trip :)

Robbie

We went this year on Quantas PE Class, on our own. Paying the upgrade to PE and with the deviation, we went in four days early to Sidney, and stay two extra nights in Auckland, the price was not much different. If you don't take the deviation O's air is impossible to beat price wise. I believe the air discount was $1200 from O and you couldn't buy an economy ticket from anyone at that price. Seems most of the travelers using O's air were routed through either LAX or SFO. We chose the BNA-DFW-SID option for our own tickets. Extremely long 17 hour flights, but we didn't have to do double connections to get to either LAX or SFO.

I should add that O was able to bring some back directly from Auckland to our West Coast, however, many were routed back from Auckland through either Sidney or Brisbane, then to the West Coast.

We had several people from our cruise on our DFW-SID and AUK-SID-DFW flights, but we all seemed to be self bookers and none were routed that way by O.

Book your own air and when you want to fly with AIR NEW ZEALAND a great airline . Why not fly Sydney - Auckland one way, do the daylight XPT train Melbourne - Sydney one way and fly Melbourne - Auckland also . So make a round trip out of it and see both Melbourne and Sydney .

The Oceania cruise, to which the OP is referring, goes Sidney to Auckland. Seems most everyone flying into Sidney on Air New Zealand was actually on a United, global alliance, airplane. The return trip to the States was on an Air New Zealand flight.

I attempted to use Air New Zealand because of all the great things I had heard. For this long flight, I would only do PE or Business. United does not have true Premium Economy, only a few seats with extra leg room. Even with that I could never find a flight on United/ANZ that competed with Quantas. They never came within $500 per ticket. Then QA had a fare sale and dropped prices more, so I jumped on a PE seat at a very good deal. Both PE and Business on both our flights were sold out. In fact, both PE and Business sold completely out about 10.5 months before the flight. If one is taking this cruise, and doesn't want to risk being trapped in Economy, I would recommend making your reservations early. February is a big tourist month for Australia and a lot of Americans and Canadians are flying there. Plus, there are more cruise ships than just Oceania loading up there every day, with most all of those other cruise line loading ships far larger than the Marina.

The down side of QA is they do not fly from Auckland to the States. We had to catch an 8:00 a.m. flight from Auckland to Sidney, and lay over about 4 hours until our flight back to the States.

Flying over all of PE, Business, and 1st was full. There were a few empty seats in the lower level of the 380 in Economy. On both flights returning AUK-SID, and SID-DFW, there was not an empty seat on the plane. I'm far to old and stiff to fly those long hauls in Economy, plus the agony of a completely full plane.

Part of the Oceania cruise is a stop in Melbourne. One of our tour guides, in Melbourne did talk about the lovely train ride between Melbourne and Sidney, but since the Marina was taking us there we never considered taking time out of visiting Sidney to do that trip. We went into Sidney 4 days early, and between Sidney and the Blue Mtns. our time was crammed with no extra time for additional side trips.

One further comment about Qantas - I was able to book Business Class for LAX-SYD using an online booking service - Expedia - and got a price over $2500 less per seat than booking direct with Qantas. And this was a February flight. I have no explanation, but it worked and Business Class on Qantas is better than First Class on their Star Alliance partner American. It even gave me First Class on my AA domestic flights to get to LAX and access to the Executive Lounge at LAX - who knew?

It's now late July. I would recommend anyone not wanting to sit mid row in the back of the plane to be booking their Aussie/New Zealand now. Options will probably disappear soon.

One typically can't talk to O Air until 270 days out and last year by that time a lot of flight options were already off the table. If you screw around getting the air booked for this cruise, don't blame O Air because of the poor connections and multiple stopovers! One may already find that Business and PE seats are already gone on convenient flights within a 3-4 day window of the cruise start and end dates.

We live in Rochester, NY and are frequent flyers on Delta. We went on a Celebrity cruise last year from Sydney to Auckland. We flew to San Francisco on Delta through Atlanta and spent two nights in San Fran to help with jet lag in Australia. We then took Air New Zealand from San Fran to Melbourne. We spent a few nights in Melbourne before flying to Sydney for the cruise. We then took Air New Zealand back to San Fran and then transferred to Delta in San Fran to fly back home. Air New Zealand was very nice and had the best prices at the time.

Flying to Sydney or Melbourne Very expensive and there are better options

1. Ual...to LAx HNL -Gum- Cains with free stops in Honolulu

2 fly US onANA to NTR-then Thai to BKK-Brisbane through United as they are Star Alliance This latter route was 80,000 miles business class and 100,000 first class.. compared to Ual to Sydney 160,000 and 160,000 AUK for a total of 320,000 miles

now consider #3 Fly Thai to BKK from BNE or AUK for about 30,000 mi each way and BKK to LAX for 100,000 first so about Half .

Been many times to OZ... first time coach... never ever, never in any seat that does not go flat AND not in back of the wing.

Why??? well noise, vibration...but more important... air flow and contamination.. Air always enteres the flight deck first...flows to First where they use it and after they finish go to Business...then coach then out the aft after the restrooms ! Consertaviely on a 400 passenger plane, 0ver 250 folks have already used, expelled, hacked cough, belched etc in BEFORE IT GETS TO YOU. and.....IF YOU IN THE LAST 5 ROWS... YOU HAVE ALMOST 400 PEOPLE USING AND POLUTING THE AIR...BEFORE IT EVEN GETS TO YOU !!

Dan was using miles and flying "free" on that trip. He didn't point out that he had to overnight at least once, and I think twice going down, along the way. If one is buying the ticket, it changes the economics. Plus, not everyone is as excited about going in and out of through security as DA is.

Funny thing, not, I just recently tried to book an adventurous round about like DA describes to use free miles on UA to a China. Problem was I only had enough miles for myself, not my wife. So when I checked pricing for an accompanying ticket for my wife, the price was over 50% higher than flying the direct route. So if we flew together, I would burn up all the miles and almost pay for an extra ticket through the price of my wife's ticket. Plus it was going to cost extra night in a hotel going both ways. Not so free travel. Saved the miles for another day, and bought the direct flights.

I think I am with Pinotlover on this one. Everyone has different priorities in setting up their travel arrangements. Dan is one of those people who enjoys play the points game and, apparently, has no problem taking extra days of travel just to do so. More power to all of them and have fun messing with the airlines. Others expend great energy to find the cheapest fare. Again, more power to them.

We have settled on the goal of least time enroute. Nonstops preferred and if points work, great, but let's just get there and start our holiday. We do not find modern air travel to be comfortable in any class and even the best airport lounges are boring. We just want to get it over with.

To each his own.

Robbie

We have settled on the goal of least time enroute. Nonstops preferred and if points work, great, but let's just get there and start our holiday. We do not find modern air travel to be comfortable in any class and even the best airport lounges are boring. We just want to get it over with.

 

To each his own.

 

Robbie

I agree

I am too old & not good at the getting there part anymore

I just want the flying part over with ASAP

Dan was using miles and flying "free" on that trip. He didn't point out that he had to overnight at least once, and I think twice going down, along the way. If one is buying the ticket, it changes the economics. Plus, not everyone is as excited about going in and out of through security as DA is.

 

Funny thing, not, I just recently tried to book an adventurous round about like DA describes to use free miles on UA to a China. Problem was I only had enough miles for myself, not my wife. So when I checked pricing for an accompanying ticket for my wife, the price was over 50% higher than flying the direct route. So if we flew together, I would burn up all the miles and almost pay for an extra ticket through the price of my wife's ticket. Plus it was going to cost extra night in a hotel going both ways. Not so free travel. Saved the miles for another day, and bought the direct flights.

Using my routes as described all except Guam do not require a lay-over either going or returning to Australia. Also there will be , with the exception of Guam flights, only going through security once) (1) for the entire flights connecting....the same as a non stop. Too, while the routing is longer in the outbound or return leg, you will be in large, fully reclining sky beds, and dining on excellent foods, and fine wines.

NOW THIS ROUTING WAS FOR AUSTRAILA ONLY!!!. IT WAS NOT INTENDED FOR CHINA WHICH IS VERY RESTRICTED TIGHT MARKET FOR WHICH THERE ARE LITTLE DISCOUNTS. yOU MIGHT CHECK FLYING THROUGH KOREA AS A ROUTE. in looking at China routing I found none that were an overnight....

fINALY, I BOOK AT 300 DAYS OUT FOR REVENUE OR MILES....AFTER 280 DAYS ITS VERY RARE TO GET THE DEALS OFFERED EVEN A FEW DAYS PRIOR

I agree

I am too old & not good at the getting there part anymore

I just want the flying part over with ASAP

getting THERE fast and that's best can seem logical, However, in cramped seats,with bad air and poor food and other potential serious health risks, the shorter "non stop" can result getting to the destination, in very poor health and mental condition requiring many days to recover from.

I used to fly for work 17 to 21 hours one way flights for my job... Which made it clear that I was to fly in a class that would provide a bed and comfort because I was also expected to be firing on all cylinders about 1 min after the plane landed !!! After flying insane distances and back in a matter of hours (SFO-LHR-ZUR-IAD-SFO) all in a 48hour period. Or flights SFO-LHR leave Tuesday 5pm SFO- Return Back IN SFO Thursday 10am!!! London for a afternoon meeting and dinner then back the next flight out... Today I avoid flying in the US... and will drive. Domestic flights are all bad even in first

For all international flights 3 to8 hours will not fly in less than Business over 8 hours First Class only. I respect others opinions... but even with my prejudiced experience, I find it hard to understand that someone be uncomfortable in some of the newer sky beds- like theA340-400 and A380-800 with top name chefs and catering their top seats...food like on Oceania on an airplane sipping your own bottle of Dom.

I am retired and don't go to work for anyone... I don't have to be anywhere any time for anyone. I maintain just under 700-800K miles min for my international trav. And yes I have taken the time to learn and play the game to very high levels... because it pays serious money and I am NOT rich. Working smarter not harder requires constant attention. This past year, well 14 months I saved about $34,000.00 in airfare.....BUT SO CAN YOU!! YOU JUST NEED TO TAKE THE FIRST STEP AND HAVE DESIRE.