tomas21

Hi--new to United, and I'm kind of lost trying to book an award flight. I would appreciate any help, and apologize for mucking up the board with a question that's obvious to some.

I am looking to book a flight for two from Appleton, Wi (ATW) to basically any Caribbean destination or cancun. We would like no more then roughly 8 hours of travel time. We would like to leave Appleton in the morning, but leave our destination not in the early morning.

Preferred travel dates are between October 13 and 18, and we'd like to stay for 3 nights.

I have searched like crazy and am coming up with nothing. Anything I can do different, or domI just have to wait?

JPG3392

Check award flight availability from a larger airport, such as MKE or ORD. That way you may be able to learn where the award availability problem lies. If the problem lies to flights to/from Appleton, perhaps you could find a way to work around that.

3Cforme

It could be more basic that that: does UA (+US) even offer paid routings ATW to a desired destination at the preferred flight times, taking into account seasonal operations and less-than-daily operations? If the routings don't work there's no point in looking for award availability.

sbrennan007

As mentioned above, I'd try MKE or ORD, in addition to this, now that school is out for the most part, you'll start seeing a couple more flight options open up, especially to the Caribbean.

Good luck and have a nice trip...

MSPeconomist

Can you fly from Green Bay instead of Appleton? Or even drive to Milwaukee or Madison for this trip?

Indelaware

From ATW UA only flies nonstop to ORD; neither US nor AC serves ATW.

Look for award availability between ORD and your preferred destination then figure out if there is award space between ATW and ORD that would connect well. Once you have all the flight numbers, then you can book your trip as one trip.

tomas21

So there is a 6am flight from ATW to ORD daily. I can leave from Green Bay, but I'm not sure that would help since the flight from there is around the same time.

Once I find some destinations from Chicago, do I just search more specifically from Appleton? I'm not sure I understand how that helps if nothing is coming up when I search from Appleton (ie if there are no flights that week when I search all the days from Appleton, how does knowing there are flights from Chicago help?).

Is there a time frame where additional saver seats tend to open up? Am I looking too far in advance?

Thanks for the help.

craz

as others have said already, youd do best with checking from ORD 1st or any UA Hub that has flights to where you want to go. eg I doubt theres a IAH or EWR non-stop to Green Bay, so by checking from Green Bay youd only end up probably seeing flights from ORD.

Just cause ORD-XYZ is available doesnt mean you will be able to find ATW-ORD or ABC-ORD. Thusly if EWR-CUN is available but ATW via AAA to EWR isnt that wont help you

If theres say MKE-IAH that helps you alot. I flew to RAP last week (last min) UA had flights from LGA/EWR/PHL to DEN but couldnt find from DEN-RAP, unless I went EasyPass. DL however had great timing flights and all mainline for my return and it was 32,500 while AA and UA would have set me back 50k.

If i was looking to go Id 1st check ORD/EWR/IAH to each place then check getting to those hubs from ATW,Green Bay,MKE or if need be even driving to ORD.

mmayer

I think what you are running into is UA's fairly limited schedule to the Caribbean.

I looked at flights to San Juan for an example. The problem is, until UA resumes the non-stop service to SJU from ORD in early November, the only outbounds available all leave early from Washington, Houston or Newark. In order to make one of these flights you would have to fly the night before.

If you can wait til November, it's a single connection in ORD to San Juan. The first day I see availability is Nov 5. After that date, you could leave Appleton at 6:00a, connecting to the 8:20a ORD-SJU that gets you in right around 3p. The return leaves around 4 and would get you back to Appleton around 10p.

To fly on your preferred dates, I also don't see much availability to San Juan, Kingston, Punta Cana, St. Thomas, or St. Croix.

CaptainMiles

Reality gets in the way of your requirements here, and your options will be very limited, if even possible.

The only Star Alliance carrier that flies out of ATW is UA, and they only fly to ORD. It's roughly a one-hour flight, and then add about one hour to connect at ORD. With your 8-hour limit, you are down to only 6 hours to get from ORD to your Caribbean destination.

A nonstop from ORD would be great. As far as I can tell, the only Caribbean destination that UA flies to nonstop from ORD is CUN. However, there is no coach saver award availability any time in October.

So to go anywhere in the Caribbean out of ORD you'll have to connect somewhere else. There goes another hour for that extra connection. You're down to 5.

This will quickly shrink your options to destination in the northern Caribbean: the Yucatan, Caymans, Jamaica, The Bahamas or Turks and Caicos. Dominican Republic may be on the edge if the connections are just right. Puerto Rico and beyond is probably too far for your total 8 hours.

Look for UA connections through IAH, or US Airways through CLT. If you had more time you could also look for connections through IAD, PHL, EWR or dare I say YYZ. AC flies to many Caribbean destinations (including Cuba, which you cannot use UA miles for). But you don't have the time for that.

Indelaware

It would be good to look at ATW-ORD-CLT-XXX for your outbound. ATW-ORD on UA, of course, and ORD-CLT-XXX on US. The morning connections should work well for you. For the return take a look at all UA XXX-IAH-ORD-ATW. Space is tight on the return dates you specified. You might consider the Bahamas (connections often through FLL) rather than the Caribbean.