Tickets (Advice appreciated)

[kylesolo]

My parents are moving to Germany in a few weeks, and as this will be my first winter holiday without them, I have decided to pack up and celebrate what an Australian backpacker informed me was called an Orphan's Christmas and getting out of the country for two weeks (the other option is going to stay with my brother and his in-laws, but since I don't really know them... I don't want to).

 

My issue is tickets. I know there are lots of travel hacking websites and tips out there... but honestly, they're not super helpful (throw too much information at me at once, especially numbers and financing and percentages and my brain shuts down), and based on my credit cards, I don't think I'll qualify for international flight anytime soon. I'm looking for relatively cheap tickets... and I know that I need to buy soon because the window is closing.

 

Any advice on places to check out? I've seen a few options - kayak is my go-to, but I've also been checking out various third party websites, google flights, and skyscanner, as well as going to airlines on their own.

 

My question - does anybody have any other advice or resources? I'm looking for better days to buy tickets, any super great third party websites, any amazing airlines based in Australia, ways to contact people with excess miles on their account, and any other strategies that people use that have been successful. Any advice helps.

 

Thank you all so much!

 

[SymphonicDan]

skyscanner.net is my go-to, although others seem similar in terms of what they offer. Some options with skyscanner:

 

- you can select "whole month" to find (e.g.) the cheapest days to fly between X and Y. This only works if there are lots of people searching for such flights. If you search for something obscure (e.g. Sarajevo to Managua) then it will just give you lots of question marks.

- you can select entire countries, to fine (e.g.) the cheapest city to fly to in country X. Usually the big airports are cheapest but not always.

 

Other advice:

- direct flights are often more expensive (so flying from X to Y may be $400 but X to Y to Z may be $300 even though it's strictly a longer trip)

- sometimes flights are more expensive during hours when businesses would book them. So the same flight at the same time may be cheaper if you book it on a Sunday afternoon than a Monday morning.