I spent most of my day yesterday looking for a plane ticket to Cairo. I had already looked before leaving California but I did not want to buy before knowing how long it would take to get my visa to Syria. Now that I knew, I was able to buy it.

When I looked last time, I had found a one-way ticket with Olympics for $350 but I did not really like arriving at 2AM in Cairo and also, reviews for Olympics are not very good. I also had found out that I could get to Luxor via Munich with Air Berlin, a discount airline based in Germany, for around the same price and with more confidence in their quality :). And I was entertaining the idea of staying a couple days there and go visit Neuschwanstein Castle at the occasion. But, looking again yesterday, there was no more planes scheduled from Munich after the 30th so this option was dead :(.

So, I started looking for more options.

After Olympics, the cheapest one-way tickets to Cairo are at least $650 with companies like Jordanian Airlines and Czeck Airlines.

I then investigated vacation package (that use charters to get you there) that are advertised as low as $415 but when you add the airport charges, taxes, single surcharge, fuel surcharge, compulsory tip(!) and other fine prints, it ended up being more like $800.

But then, I remembered that sometimes, roundtrip tickets cost less than one-way (if like me, you always wondered why, go read this) so I checked for that and found out many options for around $500. Some airlines I would prefer not to fly with but I liked the reviews of Austrian Airlines. As usual, I went on their website (less expensive than the portals like Expedia, Orbitz or Travelocity that I use to identify options) and got rewarded when I found out that they had specials if you where flying on specific days. I ended up buying a roundtrip leaving Sunday 2nd for $400. Of course, I will not use the return ticket since it is for the 11th but well!
Only one more week to go with the great Parisian weather as shown on the following pictures… 🙂