Sydney to London?

Tanabe

Hi Folks,

Have a friend looking to travel from Sydney mid Dec, staying with me here in South East Ireland for 3 weeks and heading back to Sydney early Jan.

Does anybody know what's the best site to book from/best airway to fly with?
Are you better off flying from Sydney to London and then getting a connecting flight?

Has anybody done something similar in the past?

Any help appreciated, thanks.

The Sweeper

First, there are plenty of airlines that fly Australia to the UK, but not as many that do connecting flights to Ireland. British Airways/Qantas do the Dublin flight.

When the major airlines fly through Heathrow, they often charge more. A Dublin to Sydney flight will often connect somewhere like Dublin - Amsterdam - Asia - Sydney, as opposed to Dublin - Heathrow - Asia - Sydney.

I'd recommend flying a connected flight Dublin - Europe - Asia - Sydney, just because if you're delayed at any point, the airline provides the next connection - so if you miss your Heathrow to Dublin connection because your Singapore to Heathrow flight was late, the airline just puts you on the next flight. (As opposed to you booking that leg yourself as a separate flight, where you'll have to PAY for another flight if you're late.)

It's more expensive to fly out of Australia than it is to fly into Australia, and the Christmas flight season is more expensive. Your best bet is to google "Cheap flights Australia", which will bring up all the options.

What I would recommend is that if you book through an online agent, pay your flight price in full up front - I've had an agent mess up my flights in the past. They asked me for a deposit, which I paid, and the balance was due a month before the flight. Six weeks before the flight, the agent rang me to tell me my flights were gone because the airline had requested confirmation from the agent over the weekend, the agent weren't at work because it was a Sunday, so the airlines had released my seats and they'd been snatched up by someone else and weren't available to rebook. I had to change my days of travel, and the agent basically told me it was my fault for not paying in full up front.

(That agent was dialaflight - won't be using them again!)

In the space of nine months I flew up and back from London to Australia three times, and I went from the very cheap (China Eastern via Shanghai) to what I felt was the best of budget (Malaysia Airlines) to the allegedly good (Cathay Pacific - who gave me food poisoning on the London - Singapore leg of a flight, were then arseholes about it and I'll never fly with them again).

If I was flying to and from Dublin, I'd go BA/Qantas, and if I was flying to and from London, I'd go Malaysia Airlines again.

Daithio

www.etihadairways.com

These guys are by far and away the cheapest. I've never flown with them but by all accounts the service is excellent too. Also I'm fairly certain you can fly Sydney-Abu Dabi (sp?) Abu Dabi-Dublin, and in doing so cut out the London- Dublin leg of the journey, which after 20 hours on a plane is a real pain in the arse. Check them out anyway, last time I checked they were more than a few hundred euro cheaper than anyone else.

Daithio

Also to add, that if you're looking for comfort and service alone, and money is not an issue, I'd definitely go with singapore airlines. www.singaporeair.com You will pay a little extra for them, but they're still reasonable enough value, considering the service you get, and singapore airport is absolutely amazing, best place to transit through by a mile.

cupthehand

Daithio wrote: »

Also to add, that if you're looking for comfort and service alone, and money is not an issue, I'd definitely go with singapore airlines. www.singaporeair.com You will pay a little extra for them, but they're still reasonable enough value, considering the service you get, and singapore airport is absolutely amazing, best place to transit through by a mile.

Can connect to both Dublin and Cork with them too via London

pucan

Daithio wrote: »

www.etihadairways.com

These guys are by far and away the cheapest. I've never flown with them but by all accounts the service is excellent too. Also I'm fairly certain you can fly Sydney-Abu Dabi (sp?) Abu Dabi-Dublin, and in doing so cut out the London- Dublin leg of the journey, which after 20 hours on a plane is a real pain in the arse. Check them out anyway, last time I checked they were more than a few hundred euro cheaper than anyone else.

They aren't as cheap anymore. Still competitive though.
1 good experience, 1 terrible experience. But its worth the risk to avoid heathrow, one making one change cuts quite a few hours off you're traveling time. Abu Dabi is a bit of a hole, cheap bar and duty free though