WowAir sale: flights US to Europe starting at $89

WowAir is having a sale starting at $89 one-way from Boston to London, and has $99 flights from many locations to destinations all around Europe (+ Tel Aviv). Aside from London, Milan, Italy and Lyon, France are particularly good deals at $99-129 one-way from most US served cities. Prices bounce WowAir is having another $69 flight sale! GO GO GO!
The prices are real, no added taxes or anything. I booked one of these flights for my honeymoon ($69 San Francisco to London one-way) and it was not bad at all, really. Well, it was what you would expect, at any rate. Book ASAP (these prices will disappear within hours, most likely); fly September through November. Fly from: BOS, BWI, PIT, LAX, SFO, MIA. Fly to: Paris, London, Brussels, Edinburgh, Dublin, Stockholm, Berlin, or Copenhagen. If you're not sure about booking, you can always cancel and get a good chunk of change back. (Here's how.) For example, the $69 flight from Los Angeles to Paris has $40 of taxes and only $29 of fare, so if you buy it and then cancel and email them for a tax refund, you'll get $40 back, only losing $29 on your unused fare. You may as well book!

Remember that once you're in Europe, there are super-cheap discount airlines like Ryanair offering $5-20 flights from country to country, so it's super easy to fly into one country and out of another, giving you a 2-for-1 vacation. WowAir also gives you a free stopover in Iceland if you book a round trip flight, so if that's more your thing, try that instead!

As always, WowAir is about as no-frills as it gets. Bring your own food, water, blanket, lack of dignity, etc., and somehow do this while bringing only one tiny personal item weighing up to 10 kg. (The baggage rules change sometimes. Check 'em here.) I recommend going the punk rock route with a carry-on vest, then repacking once safely on the plane. Vague instructions here.

around a bit, but you can snag a deal to numerous European destinations for $89-149 one-way from:

Washington D.C.
San Francisco
Pittsburgh
Miami
New York
Los Angeles
Chicago
Boston

WowAir sales tend to disappear fast, so GO! Flights start as soon as this month.

USA to Asia from $375 round trip this fall

UPDATE: There is also a sale from Los Angeles and San Francisco to multiple Asian cities for as low as $349 round trip! Go go go!

Check oWowAir is having another $69 flight sale! GO GO GO!
The prices are real, no added taxes or anything. I booked one of these flights for my honeymoon ($69 San Francisco to London one-way) and it was not bad at all, really. Well, it was what you would expect, at any rate. Book ASAP (these prices will disappear within hours, most likely); fly September through November. Fly from: BOS, BWI, PIT, LAX, SFO, MIA. Fly to: Paris, London, Brussels, Edinburgh, Dublin, Stockholm, Berlin, or Copenhagen. If you're not sure about booking, you can always cancel and get a good chunk of change back. (Here's how.) For example, the $69 flight from Los Angeles to Paris has $40 of taxes and only $29 of fare, so if you buy it and then cancel and email them for a tax refund, you'll get $40 back, only losing $29 on your unused fare. You may as well book!

Remember that once you're in Europe, there are super-cheap discount airlines like Ryanair offering $5-20 flights from country to country, so it's super easy to fly into one country and out of another, giving you a 2-for-1 vacation. WowAir also gives you a free stopover in Iceland if you book a round trip flight, so if that's more your thing, try that instead!

As always, WowAir is about as no-frills as it gets. Bring your own food, water, blanket, lack of dignity, etc., and somehow do this while bringing only one tiny personal item weighing up to 10 kg. (The baggage rules change sometimes. Check 'em here.) I recommend going the punk rock route with a carry-on vest, then repacking once safely on the plane. Vague instructions here.

ut this sale from New York or Chicago to Asia (India, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, or Indonesia) starting at $375 round trip. Fly Sept-early Dec. Come visit me!

New discount transatlantic airline: Primera!

Primera Air, an Icelandic airline, will be offering transatlantic flights from Newark/NYC and Boston to Europe starting at only $99!
These $99 flights go to Birmingham (UK), London, and Paris. If you want to see the rest of Europe, there areWowAir is having another $69 flight sale! GO GO GO!
The prices are real, no added taxes or anything. I booked one of these flights for my honeymoon ($69 San Francisco to London one-way) and it was not bad at all, really. Well, it was what you would expect, at any rate. Book ASAP (these prices will disappear within hours, most likely); fly September through November. Fly from: BOS, BWI, PIT, LAX, SFO, MIA. Fly to: Paris, London, Brussels, Edinburgh, Dublin, Stockholm, Berlin, or Copenhagen. If you're not sure about booking, you can always cancel and get a good chunk of change back. (Here's how.) For example, the $69 flight from Los Angeles to Paris has $40 of taxes and only $29 of fare, so if you buy it and then cancel and email them for a tax refund, you'll get $40 back, only losing $29 on your unused fare. You may as well book!

Remember that once you're in Europe, there are super-cheap discount airlines like Ryanair offering $5-20 flights from country to country, so it's super easy to fly into one country and out of another, giving you a 2-for-1 vacation. WowAir also gives you a free stopover in Iceland if you book a round trip flight, so if that's more your thing, try that instead!

As always, WowAir is about as no-frills as it gets. Bring your own food, water, blanket, lack of dignity, etc., and somehow do this while bringing only one tiny personal item weighing up to 10 kg. (The baggage rules change sometimes. Check 'em here.) I recommend going the punk rock route with a carry-on vest, then repacking once safely on the plane. Vague instructions here.

 really easy connections from London Stansted airport to ALL of the rest of Europe (and Morocco, too!) with prices as low as $2 (yes, that's two dollars) because Stansted is a major hub of the ultra-low-cost airline Ryanair. Both Ryanair and Primera are real no-frills airlines similar to WowAir, with no checked bag and no food included. It's looking like about $175 to come back from Europe with Primera, giving you a round-trip of as low as $274 (but probably a little more if you aren't super flexible on dates).

This would have been very convenient for me the past four years when my now-husband was living in Birmingham. Take these great discount flights because I can't!

US to Paris direct with Norwegian $149

WowAir is having another $69 flight sale! GO GO GO!
The prices are real, no added taxes or anything. I booked one of these flights for my honeymoon ($69 San Francisco to London one-way) and it was not bad at all, really. Well, it was what you would expect, at any rate. Book ASAP (these prices will disappear within hours, most likely); fly September through November. Fly from: BOS, BWI, PIT, LAX, SFO, MIA. Fly to: Paris, London, Brussels, Edinburgh, Dublin, Stockholm, Berlin, or Copenhagen. If you're not sure about booking, you can always cancel and get a good chunk of change back. (Here's how.) For example, the $69 flight from Los Angeles to Paris has $40 of taxes and only $29 of fare, so if you buy it and then cancel and email them for a tax refund, you'll get $40 back, only losing $29 on your unused fare. You may as well book!

Remember that once you're in Europe, there are super-cheap discount airlines like Ryanair offering $5-20 flights from country to country, so it's super easy to fly into one country and out of another, giving you a 2-for-1 vacation. WowAir also gives you a free stopover in Iceland if you book a round trip flight, so if that's more your thing, try that instead!

As always, WowAir is about as no-frills as it gets. Bring your own food, water, blanket, lack of dignity, etc., and somehow do this while bringing only one tiny personal item weighing up to 10 kg. (The baggage rules change sometimes. Check 'em here.) I recommend going the punk rock route with a carry-on vest, then repacking once safely on the plane. Vague instructions here.



WowAir is having another $69 flight sale! GO GO GO!
The prices are real, no added taxes or anything. I booked one of these flights for my honeymoon ($69 San Francisco to London one-way) and it was not bad at all, really. Well, it was what you would expect, at any rate. Book ASAP (these prices will disappear within hours, most likely); fly September through November. Fly from: BOS, BWI, PIT, LAX, SFO, MIA. Fly to: Paris, London, Brussels, Edinburgh, Dublin, Stockholm, Berlin, or Copenhagen. If you're not sure about booking, you can always cancel and get a good chunk of change back. (Here's how.) For example, the $69 flight from Los Angeles to Paris has $40 of taxes and only $29 of fare, so if you buy it and then cancel and email them for a tax refund, you'll get $40 back, only losing $29 on your unused fare. You may as well book!

Remember that once you're in Europe, there are super-cheap discount airlines like Ryanair offering $5-20 flights from country to country, so it's super easy to fly into one country and out of another, giving you a 2-for-1 vacation. WowAir also gives you a free stopover in Iceland if you book a round trip flight, so if that's more your thing, try that instead!

As always, WowAir is about as no-frills as it gets. Bring your own food, water, blanket, lack of dignity, etc., and somehow do this while bringing only one tiny personal item weighing up to 10 kg. (The baggage rules change sometimes. Check 'em here.) I recommend going the punk rock route with a carry-on vest, then repacking once safely on the plane. Vague instructions here.



WowAir is having another $69 flight sale! GO GO GO!
The prices are real, no added taxes or anything. I booked one of these flights for my honeymoon ($69 San Francisco to London one-way) and it was not bad at all, really. Well, it was what you would expect, at any rate. Book ASAP (these prices will disappear within hours, most likely); fly September through November. Fly from: BOS, BWI, PIT, LAX, SFO, MIA. Fly to: Paris, London, Brussels, Edinburgh, Dublin, Stockholm, Berlin, or Copenhagen. If you're not sure about booking, you can always cancel and get a good chunk of change back. (Here's how.) For example, the $69 flight from Los Angeles to Paris has $40 of taxes and only $29 of fare, so if you buy it and then cancel and email them for a tax refund, you'll get $40 back, only losing $29 on your unused fare. You may as well book!

Remember that once you're in Europe, there are super-cheap discount airlines like Ryanair offering $5-20 flights from country to country, so it's super easy to fly into one country and out of another, giving you a 2-for-1 vacation. WowAir also gives you a free stopover in Iceland if you book a round trip flight, so if that's more your thing, try that instead!

As always, WowAir is about as no-frills as it gets. Bring your own food, water, blanket, lack of dignity, etc., and somehow do this while bringing only one tiny personal item weighing up to 10 kg. (The baggage rules change sometimes. Check 'em here.) I recommend going the punk rock route with a carry-on vest, then repacking once safely on the plane. Vague instructions here.



Norwegian has been expanding their network fast, and they just announced nonstop flights from the US to Paris for $149 one-way! This is very exciting

, particularly because it flies to the most convenient airport in Paris, Charles de Gaulle! $149 direct from Boston or New York JFK; $175 direct from Fort Lauderdale, Orlando, Newark, and Los Angeles; and $229 from Denver and Oakland. Paris's second-most-convenient airport, Orly, has cheap flights to the rest of Europe with Vueling, Air France, and EasyJet, and of course there's also the train and Megabus/other cheap European buses, so you have no excuse to not go and drown yourself in baguettes. Venture forth!

$89-99 one-way flights from US (many cities) to Europe (many cities)!

WowAir is the airline I have the most unhealthy relationship with. I hate flying with them, but I can't say no to prices like $89 FLIGHTS TO EUROPE! This is incredible, especially because you can fly from Chicago, San Francisco, LA, and Miami with this flight. Fly to France, the UK, Germany, Belgium, and more,
and don't forget that you get a free stopover in Iceland if you book round-trip. This is super duper exciting for those of you in the oft-forgotten Midwest. GO GO GO! It will probably sell out quickly. Sale prices start as soon as July. Check it out!

Weird politics in Qatar = super cheap one-ways with Qatar Airways?

About a week ago, in a rather surprising move, a whole bunch of Arab countries severed ties with Qatar, claiming it destabilizes the region by supporting terrorist groups. Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and the UAE cut all flights to/from Qatar, which includes major gulf airlines like Etihad and Emirates. The US has just said it's a complicated political situation and hasn't issued any travel warnings or cut off flights (other than the widespread carry-on laptop ban), so I wouldn't worry about traveling to Qatar unless you're from the aforementioned countries.

Now, modern Middle Eastern politics may not be my forte, but cheap flights are,
and I couldn't help but notice some unusually cheap one-way flights between the US and Asia this summer with Qatar Airways, as low as $341 from New York to Bangkok. This is exciting because one-way flights are often the same price as round trip on Qatar and other major airlines, meaning you can't easily fly into Asia and hop around countries, which is a shame because of the super-cheap flights (like, $15 is not unusual) between countries in Southeast Asia. But now you can! Even better, it's not a whole lot more to fly from a non-hub airport. I found a flight from Philadelphia to BKK for $471 one-way, and there may be more. The website is not super helpful, but try searching on google flights or kayak for your ideal flight. It's unclear how extensive this sale is and when it will end, but my guess is that it may coincide with their sale ending the night of June 16, so book soon.


All Qatar Airways flights between the US/Europe and Asia (to my knowledge) stopover in Doha, and Qatar Airways advertises a free visa AND free tour AND free hotel stay for all passengers, and I have found them to have a pretty enjoyable economy-class flight experience, so this is a pretty sweet deal. Check out my review of Qatar Airways here.

June flights US to/from Europe $127 round trip!!!! (Even less with promo code??)

UPDATE: This is dead. Died fast. RIP.



WowAir is having truly the most killer flight sale known to mankind. $55 flights from many US hubs (San Francisco, Boston, LA, DC, etc.) to multiple cities in Europe (Ireland, UK, Germany, etc.), and 65 euros ($72) to come back. Or you can book from Europe! Same same.

Because the flights are booked one-way, you can easily book yourself a lovely Euro-adventure (or Americadventure): fly in to Berlin, take a discount airline to say, Dublin for like $10, then fly home from Dublin. AMAZING! OMG! Plus the 30% off coupon code WOWBDAY should work until midnight June 1. SELLING OUT FAST. Go!

My Workaway experience

Howdy, blogobuds. I’m writing this on the plane away from my first “real” Workaway experience. I’ve had a couple of fun WWOOF day trips to a farm, but this was my first time staying over with a Workaway host in exchange for labor. In case you don’t know, here’s a quick rundown on what Workaway, WWOOF, and HelpX are all about.

WWOOF stands for WorldWide somethingsomething Organic Farms. Basically, you provide maybe 5ish or more hours of work a day on someone’s organic farm, and in exchange, they host you, provide some tasty, tasty cultural exchange, and usually feed you. Workaway and HelpX are basically the same idea, just expanded to more activities; maybe someone needs an au pair, web design help, carpentry assistance, hostel receptionist, or, in my case, help starting a garden. You typically work 4-5 hours a day, and your lodging can be anything from a spot to camp on to a hostel bed to your own bedroom. You typically get two days off each week, when you can explore the town or go on day trips.

Without further ado, here’s a summary of my Workaway experience in Montreal. I stayed with a bicycle and sustainability enthusiast near downtown Montreal, along with his two teenage kids. He was a really sweet guy, and I never felt like he was taking advantage; we often worked side by side, and he seemed happy for any help. And yet...it was hard. Workaway really made me face my mediocre-at-best health. The first day was an “easy” day, where I just spent a couple hours helping with spring cleaning, but spending all that time on my feet just wiped me out and destroyed my often-sore back. After my two or three hours of work, all I could do was lie in bed until I passed out. So much for my first day of exploring the city.

My second day went similarly. I had bad cramps, but I didn’t want to seem lazy, so I worked through it, feeling utterly miserable. I’m sure if I had asked to lie down, my host would have been thoroughly accommodating, but that’s the thing: I didn’t want to take advantage. By using Workaway instead of AirBnB, I agreed to work for five hours a day, and I didn’t want to seem lazy on my second day there. Again, after the work was finished, I went to my room and lay in bed until I fell asleep early.

On these days, I was tired, but I was also all out of spoons. (Google “the spoon theory.” The tl;dr version, as I see it, is this: Everyone starts each day with a certain number of figurative ‘spoons’ that they can use up, with the number varying from person to person. Every activity costs a certain amount of spoons. So if you’re sick, you may have only three spoons and you use them up by showering [one spoon] and cooking breakfast [two spoons] and then you’re basically exhausted for the day. Another person might still have lots of spoons after this, but on that day, you don’t.) I’m largely an introvert by nature, and the whole Workaway experience took WAY more social spoons than I expected, leaving me with no spoons to go out exploring alone. For one thing, I had some idealized vision of living harmoniously with a host family, as if I was a long-lost sister suddenly adopted. I didn’t realize how awkward it would be invading some kids’ house, constantly wondering if they found me to be an annoyance, simply the “hired help” trampling on their turf. Going to the bathroom in the middle of the night and knowing my footsteps could wake up my host’s kids took up spoons. Eating breakfast in the kitchen, hoping I wasn’t doing anything wrong, took up spoons. Eating family dinners took up a LOT of spoons, because the portions were way way way too small for me, but I didn’t want to take more than two servings when nobody else took even two, especially being the only American AND the only non-skinny person there. Despite having a very friendly host, spoons were flying left and right, and this coupled with hours of physically demanding and boring work just left me dead before dinnertime (which sounds like a Lemony Snickett book). I did have a day off to explore, but this was only because it was cold and stormy so we couldn’t work outside, so it wasn’t an ideal sightseeing day and I ended up mostly just sitting in a mall.

Now, my experience is of course not everyone’s. But at any rate, here are some questions to ask yourself if you are questioning whether Workaway/WWOOF/HelpX is for you:

1. Do you want a full cultural and linguistic immersion? I spent basically all my time in the house with the family, not all of whom spoke English, so if I had been looking for a full French immersion experience, this would have been a great opportunity. My French is pretty terrible, so this didn’t end up being a positive thing for me.
2. Are you extroverted?
3. Are you physically healthy and strong? I don’t consider myself especially weak or medically unable to do work, but I really felt it when I had to stand, walk, bend, or really do anything at all for hours on end, and it sapped my energy.
4. Are you a night owl? I tended to work from 10 AM to 4 PM. This would be good if you want to nap in the afternoon and then go out at night. I am not a night owl.

All in all, I would say #1 is the biggest question. I’m used to Couchsurfing and spending my days exploring the city, maybe going out with my hosts on trips or to bars. Workaway hardly left me any time to explore the city; what I really did was spend a lot of time with my host family. And while I love getting to know my Couchsurfing hosts, this was a completely different vibe, and it took way more spoons than Couchsurfing.

Would I do it again? I’m not sure. I sure don’t have the same feeling of having lived in the city as I usually do; I feel as if I barely saw it. If I do, I’ll bring a friend next time to smooth things over socially, and because it takes fewer spoons for me to go out with a friend. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this and found it informative.

20% off Norwegian flights: under $85 one way US to Europe!

Norwegian is having a Mother's Day sale with 20% off flights! That puts it under $85 one-way for their flights to Europe from the out-of-the-way Boston/Providence or New York/Newburgh airports. Flights are any time from June to December. Heck!

How to get a refund on a nonrefundable flight

If I had a penny for every time I booked a nonrefundable flight too far in advance, plans changed, and I couldn’t take the flight, I would have a handful of pennies and still no refund.
Refundable flights tend to be at least twice as expensive as the no-frills nonrefundable fee-to-change flights, so I never buy them. You can usually change a flight for a fee of $100-200 plus the fare difference, but this is often not practical: I usually end up finding my new flight from a different airline, so I can’t change, and at any rate, if my original flight cost $150 and the change fee is $150 plus the difference in fare, well, there’s really no reason to change the flight instead of just buying a new one.

HOWEVER, it turns out there IS a way to get a partial refund on nearly every flight (at least for non-North American carriers): a tax refund (but not in the way you’re thinking). If you just shoot an email to the airline and ask for a refund of the taxes on your unused flight, almost every airline will give you a refund; at least, it’s worked for me with as varied airlines as European discount carriers Ryanair, WowAir, and Norwegian, along with a travel agent that booked a Qatar Airways flight for me. (However, when I contacted the Canadian carrier, WestJet, for a tax refund, they had no idea what I was talking about, and the Chase travel agents were also confused.) Now, they’ll never give it to you if you don’t ask, but I’ve found that after asking, they automatically process it, no arguments. Many airlines will even do this YEARS later! Those taxes can range from $5 for a domestic flight to over $100; I recently got (well, narrowly missed, more on this later) a $40 refund on a one-way unused flight from three years ago with Norwegian, with the ticket originally costing only about $140, and even a sort-of-sketchy travel agent that I got a great deal with is currently processing a 96 pound refund on a round-trip flight between the UK and Thailand, which originally cost only 323 pounds. That’s nearly ⅓ of my money back!

The only real caveat here is that some airlines give you a short time limit (such as Ryanair’s one month allowance) to ask for this refund. Additionally, they will refund the account with which the originally ticket was bought; this was pretty frustrating when I tried to get my taxes back from Norwegian, but I had closed the account a month before and the bank couldn’t reopen it, but hey, as they say in Thailand, mai pen rai, it’s all good, c’est la vie.

tl;dr: Go through your backlogs of unused or cancelled flights and email the airline or travel agency for a tax reimbursement. You will probably get about $50 back per leg.

Norwegian to begin flights from London to Singapore for $200ish one-way

Norwegian has just announced that, this September, they will start flying from London to Singapore for about $200 one-way (some say $230, some say $140, I say...wait and see.
They have frequent sales that wiggle the prices around anyway). This is exciting if you live in London! They already fly for insanely cheap (often $130 one-way if you use their low-fare calendar) from Bangkok to Scandinavia (or connecting to other European destinations). Singapore is connected to the rest of Southeast Asia by some impressive ultra-mega-low-cost airlines like Nok/Scoot and AirAsia ($15 flights? Yes, please), meaning you can make a whole adventure of it for pretty cheap, flying into Singapore and then flying back from Bangkok, or vice versa.


Scoot Airlines has already started their flights between Athens and Singapore, which is exciting if you live there. Very exciting. I am no longer living in Asia, so it is less exciting for me.

Norwegian connects London to Denver and Seattle this September

Norwegian just announced flights connecting London to Denver and Seattle, starting at only $199 one-way! This is pretty exciting for those of you who live in Denver and Seattle, as they have not yet been served by a discount transatlantic airline. To get the promotional price, buy ASAP but definitely before April 12, and fly between September and March. Check it out!

1 month Canadian UNLIMITED train pass for youth, only $150!

There is an incredible sale on right now for an unlimited rail pass for only $150,
good for travel all over Canada in the month of July, as many rides as you want. You could travel all the way across the country, stopping off anywhere you want. Goodness gracious! You have to be ages 12-25. The website says you can't buy one right now due to technical difficulties--probably a huge number of people flooding the site--but hopefully they'll be up and running soon. Check it out! A two-month youth summer pass costs $699, so this is like, a mega good deal. Also, I would assume these prices are in Canadian dollars, so $150 CAD is actually $112 USD. AMAZING! I couldn't find anything about whether it's only for Canadian citizens, so I'm going to assume it's not.


I will be working for the entire month of July, so I will just cry into my wads of cash while all you exciting youths enjoy your Canadventure.

WowAir now flies Chicago to Europe for $99-149

WowAir, the ultra-low-cost Icelandic airline, has just announced flights from Chicago to Europe, with promotional fares starting at $99
to Iceland and $149 to many destinations in Europe (including London and Paris), one-way. Snatch this up! Always check WowAir's baggage policy, as it changes somewhat frequently. Currently, you can only bring a lightweight personal item without paying extra, so either pack super, suuuuper light, or give in and check a bag.

US bans large electronics from carry-on luggage from major Arab airports

Update: The UK has followed with a similar ban, and has warned that other EU countries may follow suit. This seems to indicate that there is some kind of real security concern.

The US government has once again wowed the world by initiating a ban on large electronics, including laptops and anything else bigger than a phone, on all flights that go directly to the US from the following airports:

1. Mohammed V International, Casablanca, Morocco
2. Ataturk Airport, Istanbul, Turkey
3. Cairo International Airport, Egypt
4. Queen Alia International, Amman, Jordan
5. King Abdulaziz International, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
6. King Khalid International, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
7. Kuwait International Airport
8. Hamad International, Doha, Qatar
9. Abu Dhabi International, United Arab Emirates
10. Dubai International, United Arab Emirates

Note that this list includes some of the major transit airports, and if you're flying in from Asia or Africa, you're pretty likely to stop over at Istanbul, Doha, Abu Dhabi, or Dubai. You're still technically allowed to pack them in your checked baggage, but you're not allowed to check a lot of things that have big batteries, (I've been told to remove my computer in the past), so I'm not sure how well this would play out. Is security really going to make the ultra-rich, ultra-important businessmen from the gulf states throw away their laptops because they can't be checked or carried on? I guess we'll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, you can try to schedule a stopover somewhere else, as this ban is only on flights directly from those airports to the US. Consider a day in Europe, Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica, literally anywhere else.

Norwegian Air Saint Patrick's Day sale

Norwegian Air is having a sale on most flights in honor of Saint Patrick's Day, with up to 20% off many fares,
including both the super-cheap fares and the swankier Premium fares. At this point, Norwegian has a huge number of destinations both in the US and in Europe, including but not limited to California, Florida, East Coast, UK, Ireland, Germany, Spain, Scandinavia, and more. Buy by the end of March 19. Example one-way prices: New York to Stockholm in May for $149; New York to Stockholm in October for $117; Boston to Copenhagen in April for $117; Providence to Bergen (Norway) in September for $84 (yes, $84!); etc. Go do the thing! If you're in the US, check out sale prices at a glance here. If you're in the UK, check it out here. I believe it's cheaper overall to book on the US site, but don't quote me.

NEW low-cost transatlantic airline: Level. Sort of.

British Airways has just announced a new low-cost sister airline called Level that will start off with direct flights between the Americas and Barcelona from $149/99 euros
(which is, in fact, only $106, so book in euros) one-way! This is very exciting. As of now, you can book flights to Barcelona from Los Angeles, San Francisco/Oakland, Punta Cana, and Buenos Aires, but you can't fly between those destinations in the Americas, only to Barcelona. When you book a flight, it redirects you to Iberia Airlines's website, with "Level" being the lowest fare option, so it seems like this may not be a new airline, but rather a new fare level, hence the name "level," I suppose. It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Flights are scheduled to start in June 2017. Check out the website here!

Megabus $1 tickets for travel 'til May 22 on sale NOW!

Just this minute, Megabus released a new batch of tickets. Book US-based Megabuses up until May 22, and snatch up those $1 tickets! You can't do a search by price, but since the tickets were just released, you should be able to search for any given date and find $1 tickets. Go do that!

Error pricing: Fancy 4* hotel in New York for $44 in March

The excellent SecretFlying.com has brought to my attention this pretty exciting hotel misprice: $44/night to stay at the Roxy Hotel Tribeca on select dates in March. Book ASAP before the hotel notices their mistake, and they may well give you the room for the low price. As with all error fares and misprices, there is a possibility that they will cancel the booking and refund your money. So basically, as long as you don't have your heart set on it, you can't lose! Check it out here.

Greyhound's loyalty program: Road Rewards

Greyhound bus has a pretty awesome loyalty program, the only downside being you have to ride Greyhound buses. Ha I kid, I kid. Or do I?

<<

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OK anyway, you can check it out here, so I won't bore you with what's already clearly on the website. What it means, though, as far as I can tell, is that you could take 8 short/cheap round trips, even as a daily commute (for example, 45ish minutes between Delaware and Philadelphia), and then get a free round trip ticket across the country for you and a free companion. Not sure if you can stack the companion award on top of the free ticket like that, but the fine print never says you can't. So you could theoretically take 16 one-way $10 trips and then get a free trip across the country for you and a pal, round trip (worth maybe $300-400 per person), which is awesome as long as you don't mind being on the bus for like 30 hours. Or you could go somewhere else closer. Whatever tickles your fancy. Pretty awesome though! Points all expire after 1 year though, so I've never gotten that far. I have gotten the companion pass at the lower levels, though! Pretty neato.

So you wanna get across the US...

So you heard about some sweet travel deals on the coasts (WowAir's Valentine's Day $69 flight sale from San Francisco to London or Norwegian's just-announced $65 flights from the East coast to Scotland and Ireland, for example), and now you gotta get there. Now, each airport has different requirements regarding public transit, and I'm not going to go into that too much. Here is a basic guide on some ways you can get across America on the cheap, roughly rated from cheapest to least cheap.


0. Hitchhiking? I've never done it. Some friends have. They like it. I can't speak to it, and I probably wouldn't recommend it if you have a flight to catch as it's a slow process. But hey, I figured I'd include it so I don't look like a capitalist square.

1. Megabus, baby! Megabus releases at least one (but usually more than one) $1 ticket for EVERY bus, including the super-long-haul Dallas-to-Chicago and Chicago-to-New York. Megabus has routes along the West coast, and it connects the East from the coast all the way to Nebraska. So you can NOT Megabus all the way across the country, but you can get pretty close. You can find these if you're lucky sometimes, or you can get notified when they release a new batch of tickets and be pretty much guaranteed to snatch them up then. You can join my email list at the top of this page to get notified. You can also join the Megabus email list and they will occasionally notify you about other fun things, like the just-ended Marry-Me-on-a-Megabus contest. (Yes, really, you can enter to win to get married on a Megabus. Isn't that more like losing the sweepstakes? Even if it has fun decor. On the other hand, you can now get married at Taco Bell in Las Vegas, which sounds pretty ace.) Personally, I'd do a $1 miserable ultra-long cross-country Megabus trip if it would save me a hundred bucks. But boy, if you get motion sick like I do, you're better off Megabusing for like 9 hours or less.

2. Frontier and Spirit Airlines sales, brah! These are a lifesaver, and by that I mean I booked a $1 Megabus ticket from New York to Chicago, and then a $20 Frontier sale showed up, and I said, well hey, for $19 more I will not have to sit in a bus all night. Frontier and Spirit sales happen constantly and generally change multiple times a week. Know your hub! That would make a cool bumper sticker, and what it means is that these aren't the big guys, and they don't fly from every airport. So check their websites and see where they fly from, and where the sales tend to go to. For example, Frontier nearly always has some kind of sale to Orlando and Denver, and Spirit has some great deals to Las Vegas pretty often, so your cheapest bet to get fully cross-country without killing too much time on a bus would be flying Spirit to Las Vegas and then taking a Megabus or Greyhound from there to LA or wherever. Frontier usually has deals for flights on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Sometimes these show up the day before, sometimes a couple months. It's a bit of a crapshoot, though, because the regular flight might cost over $100 and you may not catch a deal.

3. Greyhound, amigo! I don't really love taking the Greyhound bus. I've had some bad experiences with shockingly rude staff and incompetency that nearly got me and another rider stranded on two separate occasions, and the prices aren't as absurdly cheap as Megabus - a cross-country ticket will set you back up to $259 one way, and no less than $100 no matter when you book. That said, they really go everywhere. So if you don't live anywhere near a Megabus stop, Greyhound can be a good bet. They also have a really kickin' loyalty program, which you can hack to get basically a free ticket anywhere. More on that later.

4. Er...am I forgetting anything? I think that's basically it. America doesn't have much in terms of rideshare sites, as far as I can tell. Sometimes people post rideshares up on Craigslist. You can keep an eye on sites like theflightdeal, Secret Flying, and Fly4Free for occasional big-airline deals, but you have to be lucky to catch one if you're not flexible. Amtrak is so expensive, I've never seen it as a cheaper option to flying.


Any other things I'm missing? Comment to let me know! Also, sign up for my email list at the top of the page if you want to get an auto-email every time I post, which is only sometimes, but always quality.

NORWEGIAN $65 TRANSATLANTIC US -> UK/IRELAND FLIGHTS ARE ON!!!!

HO MY GAWD YOU GUYS, NORWEGIAN HAS FINALLY RELEASED THEIR $65 TRANSATLANTIC FLIGHTS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Here's the lowdown: fly from a few lesser-used US airports near New York, Boston, and Hartford into Edinburgh, Cork, Dublin, Belfast, or Shannon for literally $65 on select dates starting in mid-June. Lining up a cheap return ticket can be hard, but if you check the fare calendars, you'll see that there are tickets coming back for only 69 GBP, which is like $86, or maybe a few dollars less if you can pay in euros instead. Fly mid-June until next February. Check it out!

We have been waiting for this for over a year, so this is SO EXCITING!

In case you're new to Norwegian, here's the lowdown. There are NO hidden taxes or fees, but neither are there any freebies. Expect no free meals, no free checked bags, no free cancellation or free changes, and no free seat reservation. You do get a free carry-on and personal item, with a combined weight of only 10 kg. I am like 95% sure you also get free movies, and they advertise free wifi on flights within Europe, not sure about long-haul. I've found their planes to be pretty comfy, as planes go. For the $65 flights, they picked airports that are a bit of a hassle to get to, but Google Maps and Rome2Rio know how to get anywhere, so use those if you get stuck!


P.S. You can now subscribe to this blog by typing your email address at the top of the page where it says "follow by email!" I've never had a mailing list before, so please let me know what you think of it, good/bad/etc.

WowAir Valentines $69 sale US to Europe all through 2017

Check out this awesome $69 flight sale between the US and Europe, with flights from all of WowAir's hubs (including San Francisco, Boston, Miami, Copenhagen, Edinburgh, Berlin, and more). All round trips include a free stopover in Iceland, too. This will probably sell out very quickly. Get on it! Note that all of their flights to/from the US are fully refundable within 24 hours of booking, so you can buy now and think later! But like, think within the next 23 hours.

ESL Scam: Globaltefl.uk.com

Oh hey there, blogopals, didn't see ya there. Let me tell you a little story about GlobalTEFL.uk.com.

As some of you know, I got my TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) certification through an online course I bought off of Groupon. That course, which you can read about here, was pretty comprehensive, although there were some significant typos towards the end. Before I bought that, I had accidentally purchased a non-accredited TEFL course, but I quickly realized that it wasn't accredited, and I got a refund.

Fast forward two-and-a-half years to now.
I've been putting that online TEFL certification to good use, teaching English and test prep classes ever since I got certified. I found a Groupon for an IELTS specialist course that seemed to check out: it's accredited through what seems to be a legitimate body (ACTDEC), a couple hours of Googling "GlobalTEFL.uk.com scam" didn't really come up with anything, and the site has some good reviews. So, for $19, I figured hey, why not? My TEFL course was only around $79, so it wasn't too unreasonable to think that this much shorter, non-certification course might be legitimate for $19.

Then I started the course.

First of all, I noticed after the fact that it's a little weird to have .uk.com rather than .co.uk, which makes it seem like they're pretending to be a .co.uk and hoping people won't notice. But mostly...Well, I'll let these screenshots from the first few pages speak for themselves:

This is the very first thing I saw when I started the course: the course outline. Tell me, why IS so effective about preparing for the exam?

From the section on pacing. This sounds like a non-native English speaking high school student who didn't do the reading. I'm pretty sure that when you get down to it, the crux of the "training" on pacing is that pacing is good and you should do it. Thanks, Global TEFL! Who knew?

I spent about ten minutes giving it the benefit of the doubt, watching the Youtube videos that clearly aren't theirs, before asking for a refund, which, thankfully, I got. They refunded me in Groupon bux, which for me is fine, because I like Groupon in general.


tl;dr: GlobalTEFL.uk.com is bad and the material sounds like it was written by lazy high schoolers who are scraping by with a C in English in some country where English isn't spoken and workers aren't paid a whole lot. I haven't tried any of their other courses, but I sure wouldn't trust them or their accreditor, ACTDEC.

WOWair sale: $69 California to Europe!

Well, it looks like WOWair is upping their game what with all the news about $69 flights with Norwegian...because right now, they are offering $69 one-way flights in January through May
from LA and San Francisco to various locations in Europe! Yes, that's $69 including all fees and taxes. Holy guacamole! It's only $129 one-way from various East Coast cities, too. Check it out! These fares will probably get snapped up fast. Check the low-fare calendar for each city here. You can change the origin city at the top of the page.

HUGE Qatar Airways 40%+ off sale, now til Jan. 16

Qatar Airways is having their semi-annual massive 40% off sale, plus an extra 15% off for buying with a visa card and promo code VISA, plus a possible extra 10% off
for members of the Privilege Club with a code (join for free). I believe you can stack some of the discounts, but not the promo codes. Fly from the US, Europe, Australia/New Zealand, Asia, Middle East. Think $402 from Philadelphia to Kuala Lumpur (round trip). This is amazing, with actual fares sometimes even lower than what they list here. Check it out!

NOTE: You can get tickets for even cheaper than they list on their website if you check your preferred flights on Momondo.com.

Get some ideas for where/when to go here.

$69 transatlantic flights loom nearer: Norwegian adds 130 jobs in Edinburgh

Well, I'm sure you're all watching with bated breath to see how this unfolds. Are those $69 Edinburgh - New York flights real, or just a spectre?
Norwegian has added 130 jobs in Edinburgh, saying that they will be launching new "transatlantic routes from other UK cities, including Edinburgh Airport." Will those flights be $69? We should find out more details in "early 2017." Well, it's early 2017 and I'm waiting! Check out the whole press release here.

Middle Eastern airline comparison (economy): Etihad, Qatar, Emirates

UPDATE: Well, over a week ago, Emirates, the so-called best airline in the world, mutilated my suitcase and promised that someone would come by the next day to fix it. After I didn't hear from them, I emailed them and was told it might take a few weeks, as there have been a lot of damaged bags lately. The big airlines really don't feel they need to do anything for the economy customers, do they?

If you're making the trek between Europe and Asia for cheap, chances are you're thinking about taking one of the gulf state carriers. The big three are Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways, and Emirates.
(Notice that all of them except Emirates have "Airways" in the title, because Emirates knows you know who they are. So suave.) As of this week, I have flown each of the three airlines from the UK to Bangkok at least once, so here's my review, from worst to best. Each one has a stopover in the Middle East, which can be short or long enough to visit, depending.

Worst: Etihad. Flying Etihad is fine. It gets you from A to B. But it sure ain't a good time. I've flown them twice now (well, one round-trip), and they just pack you in there like sardines - without a low price to match. Some of their planes are clearly packing in 10 people into a 9-person-wide row, such that even I, with my narrow ladyshoulders, am literally touching my shoulders against a stranger's shoulders the entire time. This sucks for a 14-18 hour flight (with stopover). The space issue, uncomfortable seats, and tiny, kind of unclean bathrooms, make this pretty unpleasant.

Food: They feed you with some frequency, and the food is fine, but not impressive.
Movies: The movie selection is OK, but is sort of like going through your cousin's DVD collection. There are probably a couple movies you want to see, but it's not exactly a smorgasbord. When I flew, my touchscreen was glitchy and kept skipping around the movie. They also play like ten minutes of annoying ads every time you start a new movie or TV episode, which is pretty annoying when you're trying to watch a 20-minute episode of something. The screens are small.
Sleepability: I couldn't sleep much, even when I had the row to myself.
Free tour/stopover? No. Stopover is in Abu Dhabi.

Middle: Qatar. Flying Qatar is fine, and the bathrooms are kind of nice, wood or wood-looking floors, I like wood-looking floors, and the doors don't always squash you against the toilet when you're walking in, and they're cleaner. Seats are way less cramped than Etihad.

Food: They feed you about the same as the others, and the food is fine.
Movies: The movie selection didn't stand out to me, and I kind of forget. I think it was reasonable. They play an annoying amount of ads, though, like Etihad.
Sleepability: I couldn't sleep much.

Free tour/stopover? Yes! This is a very big draw. I have not been able to take it yet, but Qatar Airways offers a free tour (complete with a free visa) of Doha if your layover is over 5 hours. It's easy to book a layover of over 5 hours, so this is great!

Best: Emirates. Flying Emirates is great...until you get off the plane! The plane looks big and airy (ha, air, because it flies in the air), and the seats are actually comfortable. It's just a pleasant time. The bathrooms on the plane I took weren't as delightful as on the one Qatar plane with nice bathrooms, but c'est la vie. We did have about 1-2 hours of delays, but I feel like this happens to everyone regardless of the airline. However, when I went to pick up my bag, I found it just demolished; there is no reason for luggage to ever be that beat up. When I went to baggage services, they took down my info and said someone would contact me to come by and fix it at 2 PM the next day, but I didn't hear from anyone and had to call them myself, and it also doesn't look fixable. There were also delays on not one but both legs of the journey, as well as delays in landing and getting off the plane. It was a busy travel day, but still.

Food: They feed you about the same as the others, but the food is good! Very good! My sticky toffee pudding was a great experience all around.
Movies: Wow! Movies! So many movies, and so many movies that I want to see! And big screens! And minimal ads! But I didn't get to watch many movies, because...
Sleepability: I slept so much! I was lucky enough to get almost the whole row to myself, and the seats are so comfy! Sleeping lying down! Sleeping sitting down! Sleeping leaning! All kinds of sleep!
Free tour/stopover? No, but they do offer kind of expensive tours of Dubai.


So there you have it! My personal reviews of each of the big three gulf carriers. Comment with your own experiences!

WOWair 20% off sale until Jan. 5

WOWair, the uber-discount Icelandic airline, is having a 20% off sale between now and January 5, flying any time up to May 31, 2017. With one-way flights as low as $99 from many US cities to Iceland as well as many European cities, this is a heck of a deal. Use promo code WOWSALE. Check it out!

Greyhound buses: 40% off, buy TODAY ONLY

Greyhound bus, America's iconic crappy interstate bus experience, is having a 40% off sale
on travel between January 9 and February 28, but you have to book before midnight on January 3. Greyhound ain't fancy, but it gets you there: there are Greyhound stations in nearly every large town and city in America, and it even goes to Mexico and Canada. To get 40% off, your trip has to start in the US. There are a limited number of seats, so go now!

£289 round trip UK to Asia with Qatar Airways

Hi, all! I'm sitting in Dubai International Airport on a short layover between Birmingham, UK and Bangkok, and I found this gem of a sale.
Qatar Airways is flying from various UK cities to various cities in Asia starting at £289 round trip. I just snagged a flight for April from Manchester to Bangkok for £327 round trip, using skylordtravel.com. It's worth noting that you can fly to Kathmandu, Nepal, for only £303 round trip with this sale, which is pretty incredible. Fly any time from January to May 2017.


I can't tell if they're the same sale, but Qatar also has a sale on for economy and business class flights all over the world, flying any time up until November 2017, buying by January 3. Check it out!

Angloville: Get a free TEFL certification in exchange for chatting in English in Central/Eastern Europe

Last time, I told you about my experience with an online TEFL course, but maybe you want something a bit different. Angloville is a cool program that a friend of mine did and highly recommends. Basically, you (a native English speaker who may or may not have a certification or experience) apply/volunteer to spend a few days to a few weeks chatting in English (NOT teaching formally, just hanging out) with some folks who want to improve their English
and paid a bunch of money to do so. In exchange for hanging out with different people all day, Angloville puts you up in a fancy hotel in Poland, Hungary, Romania, or the Czech Republic, gives you a free tour, free meals, and otherwise treats you real nice. You can wander around the lovely fancy hotel grounds with your English-learning pal, get some drinks, maybe even splash around lavishly in a lavish pool. My friend claims that the people who you talk to are real nice, too, and it's basically just a big fun hangout party. The only potential problem is that you are scheduled basically all day long, from breakfast to late night, so if you go with another English-speaking pal/husband/wife, you may not really see them for most of the day.

Now how does this get you certified? Well, Angloville has partnered with an online TEFL certification provider, Premier TEFL, and if you apply and get accepted, they'll pay for your online TEFL course in exchange for you doing three weeks of Angloville. You do have to pay a £15 fee, but that's pretty reasonable considering you get treated like a prince for three weeks and get a certification for not only a 120-hour course, but also for 210 hours of "teaching." Sounds pretty fancy to me! Angloville is relatively well-known, too, so having that on your resume would definitely help. Check it out here!


Angloville also offers a short weekend business English TEFL certification course, but it looks like it costs £304, which is not free. I think it used to be free, though, so maybe that will change. Who knows.

Fly one-way Boston to London for $80! + a suggested 2-city Europe vacation for $218

Norwegian is having a heck of a sale, with one-way flights from Boston to London for only £65, or $80!
It's a bit more to come back (£134 or $165). The £65 flights are only in January and February, but prices for later months start at only £99, so that's not so bad! Check it out on the UK site here!

Suggested itinerary:

Boston to London, January 22 (£65, Norwegian)
London to Gothenburg, Sweden, January 26 (£15, Ryanair)
Gothenburg, Sweden to Boston, January 29 (£97, Norwegian)

Total cost of two-city vacation: £177 or $218. Not too shabby!

From Gothenburg's tourism site: http://www.goteborg.com/

Note that these are discount carriers, so you will have to pay extra for things like checked and overweight bags, food, etc. The links will direct you to book in whatever currency is cheapest.