My recent experiences mirror this trend. When I wanted to travel from my home airport in Redmond, Ore., to Los Angeles and Palm Springs around Christmas last year, I found nothing but exorbitant airfares. Then I expanded my geographic range and saved by flying into McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas rather than the California airports, and then departing from Los Angeles International Airport about 10 days later.
Las Vegas, 280 miles from Los Angeles, isn’t normally associated with saving significant money for a traveler bound for Southern California, but in this case, because I was buying four tickets for my family, it was worth changing my itinerary, even accounting for the higher price I paid for my rental car (a common problem related to open-jaw itineraries that can sometimes be solved by redeeming points for a one-way car rental). Ultimately, I ended up saving about $1,200 overall.
When shopping for fares to Europe, I often search for one-way deals using Google Flights and simply adding nearby airports in the search function and looking at the fare calendar. If you’re flexible, it pays to find the cheapest entry and exit points to Europe and then fill in the gaps overland or with flights on low-cost carriers like Norwegian Air, Ryanair, easyJet, Vueling, Wizz Air, Primera Air and others.
For example, if you’re traveling from North America to Europe, Reykjavik, London and the Nordic capitals — Oslo, Stockholm, Copenhagen or Helsinki — are often great access points for travel to almost anywhere on the continent.
In the summer, it can be hard to score a great fare directly to Mediterranean countries, particularly Greece and Italy. When recently searching for fares from Oregon to Athens, I found most round-trip fares were about $2,000 each — a pricey proposition since I’m buying four tickets. But then I noticed a one-way fare under $400 to London on WestJet, a Calgary-based, low-cost carrier. A few more clicks and I realized that I could spend the weekend in London and then proceed to Corfu on Ryanair for $125.
