Posidrive

From what I can work out, the Canadian Affair flights to the east coast have good legroom even in cattle class. The West coast/Calgary flights much less so. On this route the standard cabin it's very cramped fo me at 5 ft 10 although I'm not the thinest person in the world. Felt OK during the flight to Clagray, but the return was a nightmare when the seat in fron reclined.

bombards

I have been checking out the fares for Zoom and they are soooo much cheaper than Air Canada.( Who incidentally lost our baggage in MARCH 05 and we were flying bussiness/first!)

Would be interested to know whether the upgrade is worth it re: leg room?

Hate being ripped off by airlines, so will go budget from now on!

Bombards

gooding

I think it is the Thomas Cook flight that has all he same 32/ 34 inch leg room throughout the plane. Same legroom in cattle as premium, Get extra width in premium. Some east coast planes have leather seats throughout cabin.

Just booked my flights for June 24th can' t wait to go back

g_is_for_canada

I booked my seats now. The price was ok at £272 although I get a bad feeling about any airline that mekes you pay extra from reserving your seat. Next they'll be charging you for breathing!

I'm surprised at the kind of prices they're charging for travel in July and August though. I've seen prices as high as £400 one way plus tax (Manchester - Vancouver). I'd rather not go at that rate!

I'm out on Sunday 29th May returning 5th June. Will provide an update based on how good or poor they are.

Snave

Biiiiink: Have you tried LadyHaye? www.ladyhaye.co.uk ? Just a thought - I highly recomend them after getting our two cats into Montreal...

Snave

IMHO use Zoom.

1. Flights with Canadian Affair are non-refundable, non-transferrable. With Zoom you can change flight dates and destinations for a small fee.
2. Canadian Affair cancelled an Ottawa flight on us for 09MAY2005 with less than two weeks notice. OK - so we got a full refund, but it left us - almost - stranded until we managed to get on a Montreal Zoom flight.
3. We hired a car with Canadian Affair. Even though the car booking was for the whole package (CDW, taxes etc) we found afterwards that Hertz had charged all insurances and taxes as an extra to my Visa card as they weren't on the voucher. I still have not had that cash back nearly one month later. Canadian Affair promise to call you back but don't. I've nearly given up as the 'phone bill to London is building up.

Use Zoom, don't try Canadian Affair.

Cathairtumbleweeds

Hello! We're also planning on flying Air Transat as they charge a flat fee for animals ($150 each - a lot cheaper than I've seen elsewhere!) - we haven't booked yet, did you just tell the people on the end of the phone when you booked your flights?

Cheers!

Wendy


24 more sleeps

g_is_for_canada

I'm now booked with them so I'm about to find out for myself. I'll make sure my insurance is up to scratch to cover flight cancellations. Regarding car hire, I've always found it much cheaper going direct to Hertz. I'm getting a rate of £125 / week all in which is far lower than C/A car hire charged. So called 'cheap' car hire companies often make up their difference in hidden costs. For example 'bring it back empty' instantly loses my business

If I were you, I'd complain to your credit card issuer if you didn't authorise these charges. But make sure you didn't sign something saying you agreed to it, written in 1 pt writing

Voyager970

Hello

On the subject of car hire, we have booked our car hire, well not a car, a people carrier, minivan, through a company called Thrifty in the UK.
Cost for us, all inclusive of taxes,
CDW
local state taxes
unlimited milage,
third party insurance
National tax
Airport tax
Cancellation protection Insurance
Theft Protection Cover

Toatl cost is £612.75 for a total of 22 days hire

I think thats not a bad deal at all.

I had a good look at all your multi nationals for car hire and non of them could beat the price of Thrifty, the nearest to it was somehting like £200 more than thrifty

We site is
www.thrifty.co.uk or tel 01494 751600 from the UK

They send you a pre-paid voucher which you exchange for your car at your chosen destination

Eddie

dbd33

My parents come to Toronto once a year and rent full sized car for a month. I charge the car to my Amex so as to avoid having to pay for the CDW and insurances. Last year it was $1050, $50 more than the year before. We've used Hertz, Thirty and Budget. I try the local firms most years but they haven't been cheaper. Toronto's a good market though, lots of firms. Renting in small towns is a lot more.

scotty71

Flown with Canadian Affair a few times now and always been happy with them. Most of their flights that I've been on have 35" leg room - way better than a lot of scheduled airlines.

Staff are generally very pleasant and helpful and if you book on the web it's often £10-15 cheaper for instant purchase.

Had 3 seats to myself last week Manchestr/Halifax in both directions, so even got a bit of sleep ..:-) I was cheeky enough to ask if they had any triples coming back and the girl blocked of tthe two seats next to me cos the plane wasn't full ..:-)

Even the food isn't as bad as some airline food ..:-) They don't seem too bothered about checking in 3 hrs before either .. I was only 2 and a half hours before the flight at Manchester and only about an hour and a half before at Halifax. Was travelling alone so not bothered about needing seats next to anyone tho ..

Canucklehead

My 78 year old mother flew to Gatwick with Zoom. Her return flight to Toronto scheduled to depart on Friday 27 May at 08:40 am left at 02:45 am on Saturday 28 May.....an 18 hour delay We had no joy from either side of the Atlantic...my brothers in Canada and me stuck on the Isle of Wight were unable to talk to a Zoom representative about the situation either on Zoom phone or Gatwick...the details on their website were inaccurate. Customer service at Zoom is either non-existent or very well concealed...we shall be taking this further. Her flight landed in Montreal where she was allocated to the wrong coach and ended up missing her flight to Toronto. She had to plead with Air Canada to put her on the next flight to Toronto as they had no record of any arrangements made by Zoom for her 'safe' passage. When Mom didn't arrive in Toronto my brothers were frantic...again Zoom washed their hands of the situation. My brother contacted the police and airport security..we waited. My mother finally arrived in Belleville on a coach at 5pm local time completely shattered as she had been up since 1 am Friday BDT a total of 45 hours.

There is a reason why charters are so much cheaper than scheduled airlines...we have learned our lesson and will be looking for seat sales with Air Canada or BA in the future. And my Mom will not be flying by herself ever again. Zoom is worth zip!!!!

scotty71

Every sympathy with your Mom and that sounds like pretty awful service but I'm not sure things are necessarily better with scheduled airlines .. I've had a flight cancelled completely (Continental) leaving me stuck in Chicago overnight and the longest delay I've ever had otherwise was with Air Canada - 9 hours late leaving London!!

I guess you can be lucky or unlucky with any flight ..

scotty71

Every sympathy with your Mom and that sounds like pretty awful service but I'm not sure things are necessarily better with scheduled airlines .. I've had a flight cancelled completely (Continental) leaving me stuck in Chicago overnight and the longest delay I've ever had otherwise was with Air Canada - 9 hours late leaving London!!

I guess you can be lucky or unlucky with any flight .....

Posidrive

Sounds like a pretty good deal. You may also want to check out www.autoeurope.com inn future as well. They were far far chepaer for our Calgary hire last year and next week. They work work the majors such as Thrifty, etc. When the guys at the desk in Calgary saw how much we had paid they had to do a double take

As an example we are paying £190 for 8 days hire of a compact (But they never have one so should get a free upgrade ). This includes all the extra insurances and airport pickup taxes.