Help with getting to Santorini on points/cheap
 

Hi there,

I'm looking for some advice on a points-earning/using strategy for getting to Santorini in the fall. From what I can tell, it's not doable to book a flight from the US to Santorini all in 1 go - it's more common to either 1) fly to Athens and then fly on Olympic Airways or Aegean Airlines (which code-shares with United and US Airways, but not sure if that means I can use United or AA points to book...); or 2) fly somewhere in Europe like London and then fly easyJet direct to Santorini.

I've got a decent amount of AA points, but am not so keen on flying to or through London with those due to the surcharges.

Any advice on strategies of which routes to take and airlines to focus on would be greatly appreciated so I can get started on some credit card signup bonuses!

Thanks so much, and happy new year!

Help with getting to Santorini on points/cheap
 

If there is award availability, you can use United (or other Star Alliance carriers) points on Aegean domestic flights.
Austrian, Niki, British Airways, and Vueling also have seasonal flights that you can book with miles.
Niki, from Vienna, is bookable using American miles and some Vueling flights are as well. They should show up when you search on aa.com.
You don't say when in Fall you're going, or where in the US youre flyinh from, but especially for September, the best routing is the one that has availability on the days you want to go. If you have the points now, book the transatlantic flights now. No one can predict what flight availability will be after you build up more points in a few months.

Thanks Adam! Flying from ATL and probably going at the beginning of October. It's for a friend's wedding, and the date is not finalized.

Focus on getting to Athens with your miles. ATH-JTR is a cheap flight you can do with Olympic or Aegean Air. Aegean is part of *A, so if you're doing a *A award, you can include ATH-JTR in your award booking, but note that Aegean awards are only bookable (with UA or AC miles, at least) within 6 months of flight date. Search now for ATH-JTR in July and you'll see availability every day through 7/1-7/12. 7/13 will be bookable tomorrow, for example. So you may not want to wait until 6 months out to book your award (as Adam said, grab transatlatic flights as soon as you can). In that case, just pay for ATH-JTR.

Unfortunately until you know the date of the wedding, and thus your range of travel dates, the only thing you can do is get as many miles you can. Theoretically, you'd be able to get to Athens using AA/US, Delta, or United miles.

Thanks guys, I appreciate the tips. It seems like there's barely any way to get to Athens on AA without going through London or making it a 2- to 3-layover trip, unfortunately. I think my next avenue of research will be getting somewhere in Europe on AA that can bypass a London layover and that always has cheap EasyJet/Ryanair/etc. flights to Athens.

Flying through LON in and of itself is not a bad thing. For example: on 10/2, there is at least 1 seat available on ATL-DFW-LHR-ATH. Because AA operates the transatlantic flight, the taxes, fees, and surcharges total just $99.50. Similar for US Air flights (multiple days have ATL-PHL-LHR-ATH). AA doesn't fly to ATH from the continental US, and US only does so from PHL, and that's a hard award seat to find. You're going to be looking at 2 layovers, but I don't see why you would prefer combining an award (of likely at least 1 layover since you're flying oneworld from ATL) + EasyJet/RyanAir.

Also, you can just have the award get you straight to Santorini. On 10/1 (and many other days), there is ATL-ORD-CDG-VIE-JTR with taxes, fees, and surcharges of just $61. I don't think it's likely you're going to avoid 3 stops on the way to Santorini no matter how you slice it if you're planning on using AA miles out of Atlanta. Might as well have it all on one itinerary.

Also note Air Berlin flies from Dusseldorf and Berlin to several other Greek cities from which you can take a ferry or cheap flight to Santorini, including Thessaloniki. There's typically good availability on MIA, ORD, and JFK flights. Iberia flies Madrid to Athens.
Unfortunately, there's no way to get to anywhere in Greece from Atlanta on any Oneworld carrier with less than two stops, except on British Airways, which seems to be limiting you here.

You'll also find that there are not that many budget carriers flying to Athens from cities that have Oneworld transatlantic service. Easyjet would require an airport change in London, Berlin, or Paris. Your options on Easyjet to Athens are Edinburgh, Manchester, Milan; on Norwegian Air Shuttle, Helsinki; Ryanair - None; Transavia - Amsterdam; Vueling- Barcelona and Rome.

There are actually more budget carriers that fly directly to Santorini, though mostly with seasonal service.
Blu-express: Rome
Condor: Frankfurt,Munich, Dusseldorf
Easyjet: Rome, Milan, Manchester
Edelweiss: Zurich
Jetairfly: Brussels
Norwegian: Helsinki
Thomson: manchester
Transavia: Amsterdam
Volotea: Venice
Vueling: Barcelona, Rome

Just don't stay at the youth hostel. Yuck.

In the past, DL has had seasonal service to ATH, but I'm not sure whether the route uses ATL or JFK.

This is great info, thanks everyone! Dukerau, thanks for pointing out that AA 10/1 flight. I think you're right - that's probably the best way to go. I was thinking if I flew somewhere else in Europe that I wanted to visit, I could do 2 days there and then do the Ryanair/whoever cheap flights down to Santorini, but it's hard to align schedules and probably asking for trouble!

We went to Santorini last summer on points. Although it wasn't ideal, it was still manageable. We flew from DTW-FRA-ATH-JTR using United points.

Good to know apagan4182, thanks!

Please keep in mind that ferries might be an issue in Autumn (many will still go, but might be delayed due to weather) and that many airlines stop flying to Greek vacation destinations sometimes in early September.

Yeah, and don't make the mistake of showing up on a Greek island in late October w/o hotel/apartment reservations and toting an 18-month-old.

16 years later and the wife STILL brings that up sometimes.