You know what’s stressful? Buying international plane tickets, that’s what!
Now, before anyone starts sassing me about complaining over something that is clearly a first world problem, let me beat you to the punch: I get it. We’re going to Bali; what could there be to complain about? We can afford the expensive ticket to a tropical location where our days will be filled with sun and sand and our nights with friends, food and shenanigans. For the love, we’re staying in a villa on the beach!
The location of the wedding/where we’ll be staying. Source
Now that I have cleared that up…
It’s freaking stressful! And honestly, slightly confusing. I remember how easy booking international flights used to be back in the day. You could hop on the airline website or jump over to a third party carrier like Travelocity or Kayak without any concerns. The flights would be priced relatively the same, right?
These days, it’s like taking a freaking IQ test to make sure you don’t get shafted by the various fine print. When I initially looked up flights to Denpasar, I opened a seach in Kayak because it’s my favorite. I was thrilled to see that each ticket cost less than $1500. Yes, that’s a lot of money but honestly, I was expecting worse. However, when I started looking at the details, I realized that it wouldn’t be so easy.
First of all, the first leg from Denver-Los Angeles was via Frontier. These days, Frontier charges a freaking arm and leg to check luggage if you don’t book your plane ticket through their individual site, so naturally, we wanted to avoid that. No big deal, right? I’ll book that portion on their site and then look at tickets from Los Angeles to Denpasar. Apparently those same flights aren’t offered though, so instead of trolling Korean Air’s website, I had to flip over to Singapore Airlines.
Oh, but wait! I have the option to fly through Tokyo or Taipei or Seoul? Great.
But Singapore Airlines is a Gold Star Alliance Member? I think I get some extra checked bags since I have a United frequent flier number, right? Hmmm, but where is that number…
Found it! Hold on, where did my flight go? It’s full?! But I can’t take that other flight because my initial Frontier flight arrives too late and the connection would be too tight!
Ughhh..
Thus far, we have zero tickets purchased, but I’m keeping the faith. Seriously, when did travel get so damn difficult?!
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Please tell me you struggle with air travel these days too?