Is there another way to get where you’re going other than the most obvious route? Can you find a cheap flight to somewhere nearby instead using an alternative airport?
Often the answer is yes, and it can save you a small fortune if you’re a bit flexible.
I pull this trick several times a year and it saves me a lot of money. When I went to Europe last year my plans were to hit Berlin, Prague, and Budapest at the beginning. But I flew into Amsterdam because United was running a great special using frequent flier miles. Then a couple of nights later we took a train. When we came home it was from Madrid, not our last stop of Barcelona, because that shaved $200 each off the flight home.
The year before we ended our trip in the Czech Republic but we didn’t fly out of Prague. Instead we hopped a train to Munich to head home because we got a much cheaper flight from there.
Options like this aren’t limited to Europe, however. I’ve pulled similar moves to get cheaper flights to Asia, South America, and back home to Mexico. In the USA, finding an alternative airport could save you quite a bit if you’re headed to the right city. NYC has three airports plus Philadelphia not too far away. Chicago has two plus others nearby. D.C. has three airports and you can reach all of them now on a train or metro.
Only a Few Countries Have a Singular Flight Option
If you want to go to Antigua in Guatemala, you must first fly to Guatemala City. For Las Vegas it doesn’t make much sense to look at other airports. The only way you’re getting to the Galapagos Islands is through Quito or Guayaquil. But in plenty of other locations you have alternative airports you can use, so don’t give up if the obvious choice is expensive. Get creative and you might find another cheap flight option in your budget.
When talking with other travelers, especially the kind who take short vacations instead of long journeys, I often run into a curious mind block. They think of a destination as being where the airport is, and can’t get their head around the fact that you can easily travel elsewhere—without being on an organized tour.
I’ll say something like, “You can get a cheap flight to Cancun and then just take a bus or the Maya Train to Merida.”
“Whaaaatt?! How would I do that?!” is a typical reply, like I’ve just told them they have to navigate a giant obstacle course filled with alligators.
I’ve heard people say they haven’t been to Place X because the flights there are expensive, yet they could fly to the city two hours away in another country for hundreds of dollars less and cross over. They just can’t fathom how to connect the dots.
Overland Transit Information Is in Your Pocket
I found this attitude odd in the days when all that info was available in guidebooks, but I find it even stranger now when a properly worded search query can turn up instructions after a few clicks. There are sites/apps out there like Rome2Rio and 12Go that have already figured it all out for you.
Sure, you may have to take a taxi to a bus station, or make your way to the shuttle window in the airport, but it’s akin to level 3 of Candy Crush, not solving a calculus equation.
Savvy long-term travelers know to always “look for the second right answer” as Roger Van Oech said in his classic creativity book A Whack on the Side of the Head. Just because you grab a cheap flight on Kayak to busy San Jose del Cabo airport doesn’t mean you have to spend your vacation in expensive Los Cabos. You can take a bus at 4:00 and be having a sundowner in La Paz a few hours later.
The next morning you can be swimming with whale sharks or be on an excursion like this:
Finding a cheap flight to Cancun doesn’t mean you have to spend more than an hour in Cancun. Take the airport bus to the station downtown or the free shuttle to the Maya Train station and you can be off on your own to somewhere amazing.
The train will take you all the way to Bacalar or Palenque if you’re feeling adventurous. And the prices in those other locations will be a better deal too. Heck, you could even hop a domestic flight from a different terminal and go just about anywhere else in Mexico for cheap on one of the Mexican domestic airlines.
If you’re fortunate enough to live in Europe, you’ve got some crazy cheap air options to choose from. I pulled up a month from now on Google flights and here are just a few of the one-way options from London, in U.S. dollars.
Dublin ($20)
Edinburgh ($22)
Prague ($32)
Vienna ($32)
Krakow ($59)
Madeira ($89)
Vilnius ($44)
Kosice ($31)
Kutaisi ($137)
I’m practically salivating looking at that. Yeah, some are on budget airlines so you’ll have to pack light and cough up some fees, but you could justify a spontaneous getaway at those prices. Why would you not go?
Or if there’s anywhere near that you’ve had on your list, snag that cheap flight and then go the rest of the way overland. It’s not going to cost you much. And if you’re coming from the USA or Canada, if you can find a cheap flight to the right airport in London, then you can hop on one of these other flights and come out ahead of what it would have been on one airline.
Use Google Flights or Skyscanner to open up your options and see the big picture for a region instead of just searching A to B. Then visit the individual airline sites that are not on those, such as some of the budget airlines in Europe and Allegiant or Southwest in the USA.
If you don’t overpack, you can also tap into these cheap European flights to get where you want to go in Europe on vacation. If you just search your home airport to your ultimate destination, it might be more than $1,000. But if you use the map view in Google Flights or Skyscanner to search everywhere from your home airport, you’ll inevitably find some deals. Then take a train or a local budget airline for the last leg—or just take your time and explore more places.
This can work in the USA too. Maybe you were planning on going to Miami for a sun and fun getaway? Don’t forget to search flights to Fort Lauderdale, a Southwest Market. You can take a local Tri-rail train from there to Miami.
For Tampa there are two airports and the smaller one (PIE) is served by Allegiant and Sun Country. Going into there can sometimes be significantly cheaper.
In places where there’s not a train connection, just rent a car. The cost is usually reasonable in the USA and in popular tourist regions like Florida and California you can even do a one-way rental.
Find a Cheap Flight to an Alternate Airport
Cheapest flights prices from London in March
The way to really open up your options is to look beyond your ultimate destination. Just because you want to spend some time in Lisbon doesn’t mean you have to fly into Lisbon to start with. Fly to the Algarve or Porto first, which sometimes have cheaper flights, then go exploring the country, including the capital. Or the Alentejo wine and castles region.
So what if you don’t want to go to Bucharest, or Athens, or Casablanca? Take the cheap flight to one of those airports and then you can easily go overland to a dozen fantastic places. It’s not much of a drive from Athens to get to a place like this:
From Athens you can even make a short public transportation hop to the ferry port and then you’ve got all the Greek islands at your fingertips.
Take a bus, grab a train ticket, or just rent a car and hit the countryside. If you see a $424 round trip from Toronto to Lima like I saw recently, grab it! Head to Paracas, or Trujillo, or Arequipa on a bus. If you see a $299 round-trip to Bogota from Miami, like I have seen multiple times, take that and just add a local flight or bus ride to where you really want to go in Colombia. It’ll likely be less than 50 bucks.
At worst you have to spend a night in that arrival city because your flight arrives late or it’s already too much time in transit. So what? Get a cheap hotel deal, see the local sights, and then take off a day later to your ultimate destination. If you’ve got the right kind of hotel credit card, it’s even easier because you can just cash in points. Airport hotels usually have a low redemption level.
Use the sites I mentioned earlier for a good map search, or just check prices on Kayak to get a baseline cost for where you want to go. Occasionally you’ll find it’s not worth the extra time and effort to go to an alternate airport. The cheap flight is not cheap enough to make up for what your time is worth. In that case, just pay up and go. Or get flexible with your dates instead.
Other times, however, you can literally cut your flight cost by more than half—and probably have a more interesting trip in the process. Find a cheap flight, then branch out from there.
Where have you ended up after booking a cheap flight to an alternate airport instead?
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