We have a current thread in the (sparsely visited) China forum about flights from London to (anywhere in) China.

Best way to travel from London to China

Like many of you, I enjoy this type of challenge and initially felt that my Thailand idea was solid (e.g. get in some nice beach time and avoid paying $10k+).

I was humbled to learn how wrong I was. In fact, apart from Taiwan (need a business visa or Taiwan passport to pull off), Russia (good luck getting there in the first place), Sri Lanka (fuel shortage means he might end up getting stuck in Columbo), and Belarus/various 'stans (no thanks), every single flight into Mainland China costs at least $4k.

I was curious about which one of these was the most expensive in terms of cost per mile.

$4,600 for ICN-TAO (347 miles) was the winner at $13.26 per mile.

But, then SXM-SBH occurred to me; $256 for 20 miles = $12.80 per mile. I almost feel like it's unfair to compare St. Barth, Martha's Vineyard, or random outposts in Alaska with Qingdao (an actual city), so maybe a ~250-mile minimum should be in order for this exercise.

I'm curious to hear your responses wrt both puddle jumpers and flights between major cities. We're talking about economy class only.