soooo, i have been trying to get quotes recently from various travel agents in an attempt to get this trip on the road!
i had budgeted £1800 for my flights but was hoping for something more round the £1300 – £1400 mark (or even less!) but i had a nasty shock when i was told that doing both north and south america was pretty much out of the question as that would take my ticket to £2200 upwards. eek!
so after much thinking i have decided to compromise south america for the moment. i am aware that this may seem a bit of a daft idea as i have done most of the other countries on my itinerary but i have come to this decision based on a few reasons -
- i set my heart on doing this trek america trip as it was one of the best parts of my last trip, and i really won’t be able to do it combined with south america.
- i was already worried about south america as i knew i had no way near enough time to do it. 3 – 4 months was only enough for a few countries and i really wanted to do it in-depth!
- i can always come back and do south america as a separate trip. taking 6 months out just to do south america sounds more doable than a 3rd rtw trip!
okay so i am back to my original itinerary with a few little tweaks and it reads like this: (the // denote an overland section)
London – New York//Los Angeles – Fiji – Auckland – Sydney – Singapore//Bangkok – Delhi – London
My quotes were as follows:
STA: Cost of changing date (per date change):
£1600 £35
£1600 Free
£1485 £10 – 20 plus local admin fee which i estimate would add up to £50
£1499 £80
I have estimated that I will make at least 3 date changes (Australia to Singapore, Thailand to India and India to UK) so with STA that would cost me £105, Trailfinders would cost me £150, Travel Nation would cost me £240.
That means the cheaper flight tickets outweigh the more expensive ones and Flight Centre comes in the clear winner! They make a deal out of free flight changes too which reassured me that it wasn’t just a line to get me to buy the tickets!
It’s just all about getting the guts up to book them now. As I have the money I have been telling myself there is absolutely no reason to not book them in the next few days so it’s now or never!
I may book the trek america trip first as this is what my flight dates as hinge around, had been debating whether or not to push it back a month as this means a month extra pay but if i already have enough money and some extra then what is the point!
