Sept - November 2013? Travel ideas - need suggestions

[danielboldea]

With only being able to do 5 nights the options are limited.
No where near enough miles for award travel (only have around 28,000 and these days that gets you nothing - only get my miles through flying and don't do that enough to really rack up the miles)
A friend mentioned it may be less expensive to fly to the UK and then get a local flight from there to one of the destinations, however, having never spent time in Europe I am not sure if this would be a good alternative? My only Europe experience was Paris for 5 nights in 2001.

That doesn't sound like a desirable scenario if you are limited to 5 nights. I have combined regular airlines with low-cost/local flights before, but have always left a day between them just in case of delays or weather issues.

Maybe save Europe for a two week trip and cover more terrain?

That way you could plan using euro budget airlines and get around very inexpensively. (I have flown round-trip from Bucharest to either Rome/Venice/Paris for less than $100 for both of us. That of course just covered the taxes (when they were cheaper), so the actual cost of the ticket was 1 euro cent.) Tickets were booked almost a year in advance during a very special promotion.

Flying so cheap is a huge perk when living in Europe! (UK residents seem to be the most blessed with low cost flights going everywhere). Add LL to the mix and we have ourselves quite the travel temptation.

[omegaet]

...denise, actually, if you and your 'hubby' sign up for one or two credit cards each, offering a mileage bonus for minimal spending and a no fee charge for the first year, you could easily have enough miles.

If we didn't 'churn' a few credit cards each year and gain some bonus miles, our flying habits would change dramatically and our hotel stay would be different.

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Will not be able to get any of those credit cards - don't ask.

Rethinking the Europe thing - not good for just 5 nights and the airfare is ridiculous. Sticking to Latin America - a new place popped up in Belize for 5 nights and am bidding on that!

[omegaet]

Will not be able to get any of those credit cards - don't ask.

Rethinking the Europe thing - not good for just 5 nights and the airfare is ridiculous. Sticking to Latin America - a new place popped up in Belize for 5 nights and am bidding on that!

denise....American Airlines flies to Belize.

[bonniejoy03]

Have you thought about Panama? If you want to do 5 nights in Europe, think about Spain. USAIR has direct flights from Philly to Madrid. During the off season, air is less expensive.

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I did not see any 5 night LL packages to Spain or Panama. Europe can wait - hubby is not in any big hurry to go there.

Many flight options from Philly to Latin America so not worried about that at all!