Priorities

When you’re embarking on the planning phases of a big trip, it’s best to lay out your destinations in order of priority. Some AirTrekkers are traveling because they have specific events they need to get to, like a wedding or a business meeting. Others just want to make sure they hit the Pushkar Camel Fair, or the Full Moon Party in Phuket. If you have something specific you’d like to do or be somewhere on a specific date, start there, and then figure out what else you’d like to include on top of that.

If you’re starting from scratch, without any specific events you need to hit, the best way to start analyzing your priority destinations is to make a wish list of everything you want to do or see. Not sure what’s the best airport to visit the Taj Mahal is in India? Don’t worry about it—all of our personal travel consultants are experienced and will help you figure out how to get to all your priority spots. Just start a brainstorming session listing everything you’d love to do. Then, take a step back and look at that list. Think about how much time you have to travel and how important your time is in each of the places you’ve listed. Use a ranking system to put those destinations in order of how much you’d like to see them. Then, give us a call.

We don’t expect you to have all the answers, and chances are you’re reading this because you need some help figuring out where to start. Not sure what’s possible/realistic for a 3 month trip? Put it in perspective. Do you really want to spend every 4th day in an airport, simply to cross items off your bucket list?

It’s often difficult for us to tell you what you should do or see because travel of this type is a very individual pursuit, but we’re happy to share our experiences with you and help you nail down what makes sense for your own personal journey.

Price and value

In general, the more flexible you are the better price you’ll be able to get. Planning a long trip is usually a balance of hitting the places you want to see at the time you want to be there, matching up specific dates to meet up with friends, using preferred carriers, and being open to do the unexpected things. Whenever there’s the opportunity for a free extra stopover, we let you know. Oftentimes too, it can be only slightly more expensive to add destinations that are en route to your priority stops, so you can stop there if you have some extra time.

Quite often, the least expensive airfare and the most direct route do not go hand in hand. We can issue almost any airline worldwide, so when we’re putting your trip together, consider best value versus money spent.

Finally, be prepared for higher fares if you’re traveling during the summer months or during peak holiday December/January travel season. Because demand is higher, airlines raise their prices to suit. If you can plan your trip around off-peak seasons and non-holidays, you’ll have access to lower fares.

Comfort

When you’re planning an extended trip, you often forget to consider what it’s like to move continuously for 24 hours straight to get somewhere. Usually, the least expensive routes are the ones that incorporate a few more connections. Keep this in mind when planning, and think about what you’re willing to sacrifice to save initially. Is an eight-hour layover in the middle of the night after you’ve been on a plane for 11 hours worth saving $200? It may seem like a significant savings, but when you’re on the road you could feel very differently about it.

You might try adding in some overnight stopovers along the way to break your journey up and give yourself that tiny bit of extra space to regroup before your next flight. When we’re booking your tickets we try to consider what it will actually be like for you to fly the routes we suggest, so if comfort isn’t as important as the bottom line, let us know!

Flexibility

If you’re able to be flexible with your dates during the initial booking process, it will help ensure that you get the best fares available when you actually make your reservations.  Airlines sell seats on every flight at very different prices, and some flights don’t operate every day. If you can be flexible with your dates, it gives us more of a chance to find the least expensive, most direct options for your trip.

Once you’re on the road, you’ll be able to change the dates of your flights, but not your destinations. We work with discounted tickets and airlines will often charge a fee to make adjustments to the dates. We’ll give you all of that specific information before you pay for your tickets so you know what making date changes will cost once they’re issued.

The most common misinformation passed around about standard around-the-world tickets is that you can make unlimited free date and routing changes with a set, up-front price. Unfortunately, this isn’t true. It is not possible to show up at the airport and jump on any plane at any time. This hasn’t been true for at least 20 years. “Open tickets” for a complicated international trip basically translates into, you pay for something you’re not guaranteed to get.

AirTreks requires you fix down your dates before you purchase your tickets. This is so we can ensure you have a confirmed seat on every leg of your journey. Of course, we realize it’s hard to pin down exactly what you’ll be doing 3 months into your trip (which may be 7-9 months from when you’re buying your tickets).  If you want your trip to be more flexible, you would simply fix down the portions of your flights that you can commit to and leave the rest of your itinerary open where you have less certainty, or where it makes sense to book your travels on the fly. (In Southeast Asia, for example, if you plan to spend 3 months touring around Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand, we would book your flight into Hanoi and out of, say, Bangkok 3 months later.)

Destination order

The more flexible you are with your routing initially, the easier it will be for your Personal Travel Consultant to put together the least expensive, most direct routing for the destinations you’re looking to hit. We consider your desired destinations and suggest the least expensive way of including them all. This works great for people who are flexible with the order of their itinerary.  Sometimes it’s a matter of availability and sometimes which airline has the best routing and schedule. To get the best fare, it’s helpful if you call us with a list of places you want to see and approximately how long you want to stay in each place. That way we can put together whatever route is the most cost effective and direct for you to include them all!

Cartagena, Colombia

Airlines

AirTreks works with almost every airline all around the world. Because we put together ticket packages for our clients, we’re not limited to a particular group of airlines (i.e. Star Alliance carriers)—we customize your trip based on what works best for you. The notable exception to this is online-only airlines, such as Easy Jet or Ryan Air. We can, however, book some airlines you might think are online-only, so ask us!

We only use carriers our staff feels are reputable, and we often book regional-specific airlines since they might offer the best price and schedule. Again, this is your trip, so if there’s a particular airline you’d like us to look into for you, let us know. Unless you have a strong preference for a particular carrier, we usually book whatever is the least expensive and most direct.

You can accrue airline miles on most of our fares, but because we work with discounted rates sometimes the airlines put restrictions on mileage accumulation. If it’s really important to you to earn miles, please let your Personal Travel Consultant know—we can use fares that are more expensive but that you’ll have a better chance of earning mileage credit on them.

Seasonality

Seasonality is a huge factor in ticket prices. High season for everywhere around the world is June – August for summer season and December 10 – January 10 for holiday travel. Shoulder season is April – May and September – October. Low season is January – March and November – early December. The reasons for this are pretty logical—most people around the world have more time off to travel during their summer months, so airlines take advantage of this by raising prices during that season.

Similarly, many people have time off to travel or want to visit family during the holiday season in December/January, so fares are higher during that time of year as well.  If that’s when you have time available to take a trip, expect pricing to be higher. We recommend booking about 6 months in advance if you will be traveling during peak season in order to take advantage of the lowest fares.  If you’re traveling for an extended period of time, it’s possible to work around seasonality in order to keep your costs lower.