by Lufthansa Flyer | Jun 7, 2016 | Fare Sale, Featured, Lufthansa, Swiss |
No doubt that Turkish tourism is suffering and load factors are down, but for those of you with a desire to see Istanbul, this may be a great opportunity. I’ve been there a few times, and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it on every visit!
In reviewing fares, I found several options available between certain US gateways and Istanbul that can be booked for as low as $450 (San Francisco – Istanbul on SWISS) if you travel between September and March and stay at least 7 days. Istanbul fares from other US gateways range between $500 and $600. The East coast of the USA prices in the low to mid $500 range, the Midwest comes in around $550-$600.
There’s no published end to the fare sale so it is probably just a matter of inventory control that will determine when fares start to go back to normal. But for now, these are really worth taking advantage of.
Pay attention when booking your flights as they can be operated by Lufthansa, SWISS, United, or Air Canada.
If you’re going to fly Economy, your best bet would be to book an LH flight since you can bid to upgrade to Premium Economy for $200-300 per long-haul segment or pay about the same amount and upgrade once you board your flight if Premium Economy seats are available. If you upgrade the entire trip, you’ll still be able to get to IST and back for about $1000. Not bad!
To see the best ‘Matrix’ of fares, I suggest using Google.com/flights – it lays out all of your options and gives you fares for 2 months out on one screen.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Jun 7, 2016 | 777, Austrian, Featured, Route Announcements |
To meet the demand of fans traveling to and from this year’s Euro 2016 being hosted by France, Austrian has assigned the 777 to fly between Vienna and Paris. Of the 4 daily roundtrips between the cities, the 777 will be assigned specifically to flights OS411 and OS412. OS411 departs Vienna at 7:05a and arrives in Paris at 9:10a. OS412 departs Paris at 10:00 and arrives in Vienna at 12:00p.
Here are the specific dates for the 777 flights:
Daily from Thursday June 16 through Sunday June 19 (OS411/412).
Daily from Tuesday June 21 Through Thursday June 23 (OS 411/412).
This of course assuming that the French ATC workers don’t screw things up by going on Strike as they’ve threatened to do during the Tournament. However, I don’t see them being stupid enough to try that stunt if they wish to have the public’s support for their silly ‘plights’ 🙂
But again, the French ATC’ers have tried to make a career out of striking……
by Lufthansa Flyer | Jun 6, 2016 | Airlines, Avgeek, Featured, Industry News |
In what I would categorize under the heading of ‘What are they thinking?’, Turkey has decided in order to revive tourism to a once thriving coastal town, it would make sense to sink an Airbus A300 into the ocean in the hopes that divers would come to visit it. They also claim that it will help build a new reef for fish and corals to make home and would be the largest aircraft ever to be sunk for this purpose. The last point I won’t argue since it’s been proven that artificial reefs can work. What I do wonder is will people now flock to Kusadasi, Turkey to dive the wreck.
What used to be a favorite destination of Russians and Europeans alike, Kusadasi is struggling to stay alive. In fact, according to the RT.com article covering the event, it is suggested that Russian tourism has fallen off by as much as 81% due to sanctions, terrorism and basic distrust of each other. Also noted was the fact that dozens of hotels, restaurants, and shops have been shuttered due to the dramatic drop in tourism. Apparently the dunking of an Airbus is the best idea that the local Chamber of Commerce could come up with!
Back to the sinking of the A300….
The A300 was dismantled in Istanbul and trucked on 5 flatbeds to Kusadasi where cranes helped position the aircraft. With the aid of rafts and divers, it was lowered, complete with wings, into its final resting place 60 feet below the surface of the Aegean Sea. It is now open for business.
To see various tweets and Instagram posts showing the event, click here to be taken to the RT.com story.
Are you thinking ‘Slow News Day” ???
