Honeymoon Help! DAL/DFW-XXX-ATH, BCN-XXX-DAL/DFW
 

Hi all,

Looking to book flights for my fiancee and I for our honeymoon Mediterranean cruise. We're looking at a ten day cruise departing Athens on May 24th, and ending in Barcelona on June 3rd. We are very flexible on dates to fly, as well as the exact airports we fly into and out of. We'd like to fly business class, and I have ~350,000 miles to burn. I'm very risk averse, so getting into town at least a day before the cruise leaves is a must.

It looks like Delta wants to charge 200,000+ miles per passenger for DL operated flights, so it looks like we'll have to utilize a partner airline. I found some Alitalia flights departing JFK and transiting SVO for 62,500 miles one-way, but with carrier imposed fees and taxes that comes to $630 + 125,000 miles just to get to Athens.

Please offer any other suggestions you may think of. If I can nail down the international sectors, we can book flights with cash to get to the international gateway.

Thanks in advance!

Delta.com will construct connections on AF, KLM, and Alitalia (as well as Aeroflot as you found). Keep looking. You'll need to call for Air Europa which might be useful for getting out of BCN (and maybe a TATL segment).

DFW-MSP-AMS x2 in J on May 22nd is 160k total on DL.
AMS-ATH x2 in J on May 23rd is 50k total on KL.

You can probably get DL to marry those when booking on phone for a discount since they will be considered one trip at that point.

BCN-JFK-DFW x2 in J on June 6th is 160k on DL.

That's barely over your budget, but you could always pay outright for AMS-ATH or fly it in Y to get back under budget.

Also look at rounding through LHR and price things out in pieces. Don't do DFW-ATH, instead try combos of DFW-AMS/DFW-LHR/DFW-MAN/DFW-CDG and AMS-ATH/AMS-LHR, etc.

Options move all around.

I will say that BCN is a great city to spend some time in. Have done it before and after cruises.

Another option for flight is Madrid. We did that recently to take a coach on a 767 to ATL. Having the 2 seats on one side are not bad vs biz where you do not sit together.

Train between BCN and Madrid is easy.

As to Athens... not sure about there, but flights between some cities in Europe can be cheap. On the trip below, we are doing our only paid flight from Venice to Berlin for $88 each on Alitalia.

By the way, I am TOTALLY with you on getting there the day before for a cruise.

I had a lot of trouble finding anything reasonable to ATH. I would start by seeing if you can game that step with an alternate point of arrival.

There are many connections, and you need to add DFW-BOS or DFW-DTW, but how about these?

5/21 DL 0124 (BOS/AMS) 16:37/05:50+
5/22 AF 1241 (AMS/CDG) 09:30/10:45
5/22 AF 1832 (CDG/ATH) 12:40/16:50
6/06 DL 0477 (BCN/JFK) 09:55/12:24
6/06 DL 4034 (JFK/DFW) 18:25/21:23
160,000 miles + $81.36 per person

5/21 DL 0018 (DTW/LHR) 22:17/11:05+
5/22 AF 1581 (LHR/CDG) 12:10/14:30 COACH
5/22 AF 1032 (CDG/ATH) 19:00/23:10
6/06 DL 0477 (BCN/JFK) 09:55/12:24
6/06 DL 4034 (JFK/DFW) 18:25/21:23
160,000 miles + $101.36 per person

Some really good suggestions here, really appreciate the help!

After a lot of digging, here's what I've booked:
5/20/2016 DFW-JFK-FRA (arrives 5/21/2016), 62,500 miles + $5.60 per person
6/7/2016 BCN-AMS-MSP-DFW, 62,500 miles + €235.73 per person

While this was more cash outlay than I'd have liked, I'm happy with a total of 250,000 miles. We'll also need to figure out FRA-ATH, but that should be simple enough.

If you book as a round trip/open jaw rather than two one-ways, doesn't the foreign origination scamcharge (most of the €235.73) go away?

You make a good point. Here's a prospective open-jaw booking from delta.com's multi-city feature and no international origin surcharge back from MAD. (This is a double open jaw, actually, but it illustrates the point.)

http://i1154.photobucket.com/albums/...psihdaygvn.png

Looks good.

But, in case you have second thoughts or stumble on something better, you have 24 hours to cancel.

Enjoy!

A little off topic but just curious.
Is your cruise with Carnival on the Vista?
If it is I will pass you in BCN.
I will be boarding the Vista in BCN on June 3rd after you get off.

Indeed it is! Not sure if you know this, but you will be the fourth group of passengers to sail on that ship. Her maiden voyage is May 1st, 2016.