YVR Cockroach

Just wondering what the fog delay potential is for SFO in early March?

I want to fly YYJ-PPT on a ST airline and was initially thinking YYJ-SEA-LAX, overnight before flying LAX-PPT the next day (has to be booked separately two tickets, DL and AF as uisng DL in one booking increases the fare by a huge amount even with a >24 hr layover in LAX.

SFO-PPT (via LAX) is actually cheaper than LAX-PPT due to some LCC competition (fares not applicable to OAK or SJC). It's also slightly cheaper getting from YYJ to SFO vs LAX.

Is fog/weather delay worth the savings of ~$100 pp? Added bonus is that my wife would like to see a former colleague of hers in the east bay.

squeakr

YVR Cockroach

It's the next day that I'm concerned about. SFO-LAX-PPT s the 2nd fiight is only ~2x weekly. Miss it and could be 3-4 days until the next flight.

Questioning whether all the hassle and layovers is worth $100 pp savings.

Just a note: YYJ-PPT on DL.com or AF.com runs >2.7x what YYJ-SFO//SFO-PPT or YYJ-LAX//LAX-PPT runs. On DL.com one can book YYJ-SFO and SFO-PPT separately but when you try to book it as muti-leg, no flights are found. With LAX, the high fare is returned even with a >24h or > 48h break at LAX.

Eastbay1K

"Fog" may not be the right term for your delay, but March is still the tail end of the rainy season, and if ceilings go below a certain minimum, arrivals go from 60 per hour to about 30 per hour. It is also the beginning of the spring "late night/early morning low clouds and fog along the coast" season. Shorter hops in the West are the first to cancel/delay when this happens.

I would feel comfortable-ish with a 4 hour SFO connection.

HSaxa

YVR Cockroach

The connection in the Bay area between the two tickets would be overnight. Given our lack of lounge access and small savings, I think we'll just head for the LAX area and overnight there. The extra flight costs will be offset partially by slightly-lower hotel rates

Not that we're losing much in the way of miles at ~25% earnings rate.

Thanks all

YVR Cockroach

To seal the deal, the LAX-PPT ticket is fully refundable for some reason if purchased through AF.ca. Refund fee of either $ or € 250 through klm.ca (both T fares) or non-refundable through DL.com (U fare). SFO fare through AF.ca is about 55-60% refundable.

HSaxa

YVR Cockroach

We would have flown down the day before to an area airport (i.e., SFO, OAK or SJC). My wife would have liked to have met with her former colleague (lives/works towards Vacaville). Trouble is the friend travels a lot for work.

There's various DL flights offered from SFO down to LAX all day so connection time in LAX are anywhere from 4 to 9 hrs (or more) depending on which flight out of SFO one takes. The connecting flight on AF doesn't leave until nearly midnight. W/O a lounge to hang out in (shock, horror), I think it'd be an awful layover so I think for the money involved, we'd might as well fly down to LAX the day before and at least have the whole day and most of the evening in LAX rather than hag around airports all day. It wasn't as if the savings were in the hundreds of dollars each. Barely $100 each really.

freeagent