Hi,
Anyone here recently taken a flight from Istanbul to Athens? My
wife, baby, and I are flying over to Istanbul and Greece for a couple
of weeks later this month, and have been working hard to find a decent
fare that works for us. Best we've done so far is an air fare to
Istanbul which returns us to the USA from Athens. We have to make our
own way from Istanbul to Athens (sounds crazy, but we cannot find a
simple return air fare that will allow us a stopover in Athens on the
return leg).

The obvious option is to buy air fares between the two cities from
here before we go, but I resent having to pay all the airport,federal,
and 9/11 fees for a fare that doesn't even have anything to do with
flying within the USA - I'm already paying for it via the main airfare
to Europe, why should I get slugged again for a flight between two
other country's? At any rate I was curious to know what kind of deals
people may have found recently in Istanbul for flights to Athens. Best
available from the USA end is a $100 fare via Olympic, plus all the
taxes and booking fees that take it out to about $150 each.

Thanks in advance.....Tim

[email protected] (tim wilde) wrote in
news:[email protected] om:

    > Hi,
    > Anyone here recently taken a flight from Istanbul to Athens? My
    > wife, baby, and I are flying over to Istanbul and Greece for a couple
    > of weeks later this month, and have been working hard to find a decent
    > fare that works for us. Best we've done so far is an air fare to
    > Istanbul which returns us to the USA from Athens.

You must have done something wrong. On www.olympic-airways.com I find
Istanbul/Athens one way fares a little over 100 USD per person.

Travel agencies or search engines inside the US are unlikely to find you
connections between other countries, as their market is connections to/from
US obviously. You should search websites of the originating or target
country.

Regards

--
Even though people recommend them a lot, I do not see "Make a shorter link"
style services having much long-term value to anyone - they will just go
belly up when you are digging through archived messages and would most need
the original URLs. <[email protected]>

On 5 Oct 2004 12:34:32 -0700, [email protected] (tim wilde)
wrote:

    >Hi,
    > Anyone here recently taken a flight from Istanbul to Athens? My
    >wife, baby, and I are flying over to Istanbul and Greece for a couple
    >of weeks later this month, and have been working hard to find a decent
    >fare that works for us. Best we've done so far is an air fare to
    >Istanbul which returns us to the USA from Athens. We have to make our
    >own way from Istanbul to Athens (sounds crazy, but we cannot find a
    >simple return air fare that will allow us a stopover in Athens on the
    >return leg).
    >The obvious option is to buy air fares between the two cities from
    >here before we go, but I resent having to pay all the airport,federal,
    >and 9/11 fees for a fare that doesn't even have anything to do with
    >flying within the USA - I'm already paying for it via the main airfare
    >to Europe, why should I get slugged again for a flight between two
    >other country's? At any rate I was curious to know what kind of deals
    >people may have found recently in Istanbul for flights to Athens. Best
    >available from the USA end is a $100 fare via Olympic, plus all the
    >taxes and booking fees that take it out to about $150 each.


Returns cost about 180 Euro with all taxes in there. Your cost
sounds about right for a single.

Stelios


--

The address in the headers is real and does not need de-mungeing

    >Best
    >available from the USA end is a $100 fare via Olympic, plus all the
    >taxes and booking fees that take it out to about $150 each.

Actually that's not bad at all. When I flew between Athens and Istanbul in June
2003 it was even more expensive than that. Unfortunately there's just not
enough competition on that route to drive prices down. In fact, I believe
Olypic and Turkish Airlines are the only two carriers that fly that route.