Zach1213

On the flip side, we occassionally we skip the Windjammer for a night in the MDR, but not often 🙂 We always figure the food onboard is never really that great, so we enjoy a quiet night in the Windjammer with some drinks and then get on with the night.

Yep, there are several reasons that a visa-exempt passport holder would be ineligible for ESTA. One of the ones I frequently encounter is previous travel to certain countries. Even legitimate visits to places like Yemen, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Syria, Somalia, and some others can put an immediate stop to ESTA eligibility. Not sure if Cuba is included in that list, but it might be.

Totally forgot about IAH-MAN. Wasn't it IAH-DME back in the day?

Just curious why longer in Europe that the US? To me it entirely depends on the airport. I would take 45 minutes on Munich over 90 minutes at JFK, and I would take 45 minutes at DFW over 90 minutes at Heathrow. And, of course, if there's any immigration/customs/security/terminal change to deal with. Just an FYI, customs and immigration are entirely different things that often get mistaken. Immigration cares about you as a person, and customs cares about what you're bringing in. Immigration checks your passport to make sure you can legally enter the country, and customs makes sure you aren't bringing any goods that you shouldn't (or shouldn't without paying). In the case of PHL-VCE, they would take place at the same location (VCE), but in many cases that's not the case...for example, if you fly PHL-CDG-VCE, you would clear immigration at CDG and customs at VCE.

Here's some info on how FlightRadar24 gets their info - https://www.flightradar24.com/how-it-works

You're looking at easily a 60-90 minute door-to-door drive, if everything goes smoothly and there's only average traffic. Arriving 90 minutes early would be recommended, at the minimum. So now you're looking at three hours, which means you'd have to be in the car and on the road by 8:25am, preferably even a bit earlier. Is it possible? Sure. But what if there's even just a slight delay in docking, or immigration, or getting your bags? And, do you really want to end your vacation stressing about getting to the airport on time? Personally, I would stick to Newark and just accept that you'll need to make a connection somewhere like Charlotte, DC, or Atlanta. Or, look at taking one of the numerous nonstops from EWR to TPA or RSW instead.

I've flown them a few times between Lisbon and Brazil and between Lisbon and Angola/Mozambique. Their hard product is pretty solid these days, especially for the price point. Seats are good, food is decent, entertainment is decent. Service is fine, not amazing nor terrible. They have definitely improved in recent years as they have received new aircraft like A339s and the A321NEOs. I believe the future is very bright for TAP, especially given their ability to fly the A321NEOs across the ocean at a lower cost than most other airlines doing transatlantic flights.

I've flown something like 55-65ish segments in the second half of 2023, some as short as 30 minutes and some as long as 17 hours, and everything in between. The vast majority have been just fine, most recently MNL-HKG-ORD on 12/23, and ORD-MCI on 12/26. I'm done for the year, though, unless someone pays me a TON of money to be somewhere tomorrow 🙂

Ah I forgot that Qatar was (apparently) discontinuing WDH. It was 3x weekly year round, then it looked like they were discontinuing Nov23 - Apr24, but now it looks like they may not be coming back at all 😞

And as I always do, as CC's resident Namibian, I urge everyone check out Namibia 🙂 To be fair, though, all those countries are awesome.

I get that. Just be aware that there are actual definitions in air travel and they can matter. Your own definition may be that E+ is an upgrade, but it technically isn't. Much like direct and nonstop flights are very different. Just things to be aware of (more for the greater good of others reading)...E+ is not, in fact, an upgrade...it's the same seat and service with a few extra inches of legroom (not that there's ever anything wrong with a few extra inches........)

Two things that travelers should know are completely different - immigration vs customs, and direct vs non-stop (flights).

Little known fact is they asked Skip Bayless but got confused when he said he only knew sports, not Mexican food, and then went to his brother Rick instead /s

East Coast to Auckland is long as hell no matter how you get there (including the nonstop JFK-AKL), but minimal connections/stops get you there as quickly as possible. I am a very firm believer in "just get me there"...it's going to be a long trip no matter what, so I would rather not make it even longer by stopping off somewhere. To each their own, of course, and each person has their own opinion (that you probably won't really know until you actually do it). As far as airlines go, if you're flying economy, they're all largely the same. Air New Zealand and Qantas have solid economy options, slightly above of Delta, United and American (all three of whom fly between the US and Auckland). So you have a lot of choices. I would look at pricing, preferred airline/alliance, and what schedule you think works best. You mentioned Hawaii, and Hawaiian Airlines is a fine choice via HNL...but I personally would plop myself on that JFK-AKL nonstop (either ANZ or Qantas) and just get it the heck over with.

Often times, holidays themselves are quiet days. It's the days before and after that are crazy busy. Of course, depends what holiday it is...

Looks like UA uses the E-175 most if not all days in May on COS-ORD. E-175s scatter throughout - they often use B and C gates, but also use E and F gates. Kind of a crap shoot.

I'll echo it again that, even with United being the largest operation at ORD, 90 minute will be just fine on a normal day.

Oh I believe you that the $139 fare from Newark to West Coast is real (I fly Alaska a lot, they can have some crazy low fares), and the $298 EWR-SEA one way in July is real (assuming EWR-SEA what was $298 one way and not GSP-EWR, I guess perhaps I am confused), but assuming it's EWR-SEA, that's still almost $500 roundtrip not counting the flights to get to Newark in the first place. And the checked bag prices I quoted are to get up to Newark from Greenville, not to get from Newark to Seattle. Having free bags on Alaska is great, but it won't do anything to help you get free bags on the United flight to get to EWR. Regarding EWR-West Coast, United operates tons of flights as EWR is a major hub for them. Then, of course, there's the countless JFK-west coast flights if one wants to make the trek to JFK, or lives in between EWR and JFK.

Even if OP were to somehow find EWR-SEA-EWR roundtrip for $498, and (hypothetically) a GSP-EWR flight for, say, $300 roundtrip (only UA flies that route, and not frequently, so fares usually aren't cheap from what I can tell), you're back up to almost $800 and have to now worry about going quite a distance out of the way via Newark, and the several hours minimum of buffer time between two separate tickets to, hopefully, avoid a mis-connection in EWR and the need to subsequently purchase a new last minute EWR-SEA ticket since you were a no show on the Alaska flight. Not worth it to me to save $100, but to each their own. Oh yeah, and baggage fees on two airlines instead of one, which might eat most if not all of that remaining $100.

$900 roundtrip per person does sound quite steep. But there is no magic time to book. I would head to Google Flights and look at your dates, as well as the alternative airports mentioned such as ATL and CLT. Be flexible, and also remember to look at alternative days...it can sometimes be worth it to fly a day earlier if the fare is low enough to offset a hotel/meals/car.

I mean, people on cruises bring power strips, staplers, christmas lights, and god knows what else. I would never bring my own sheets to a hotel, but that's a lot less odd than what a lot of people seem to bring on cruises.

OK that just seems excessively early to me!

I actually do remember having a purser on a CX flight once (feel like it was NRT-HKG but who knows) who did call herself "Cathay Cathy", maybe she owns the airline now 🙂

I'm confused about not being allowed to bring your rental car across. While most (all?) rental car companies in New Zealand restrict you from picking up on one island and dropping on the other (unless you pay a crazy fee), plenty of companies allow you to go back and forth on the ferry if you return the car on the same island you picked it up. For example, earlier this year, I picked up a car in Wellington, took it to/from Blenheim, and dropped it back in Wellington using the ferry both ways in between. This was with Hertz and there were no problems (even their website says that's fine).