A Week of Travel Updates and Tips
Happy Friday from New York. The good news: My hotel room was under $200 a night. The bad: cold, rainy weather that won’t make any I Love New York highlight reels. On the way here I tried Clear’s new biometric gates, and it was a much smoother process.
The big travel news this week, of course, is the severe disruption in flights due to the war in Iran. Stranded travelers have struggled to get home from the Middle East, a major international aviation hub and home to airlines including Emirates, Qatar and Etihad.
In lighter news, Disney christened its newest cruise ship, Disney Adventure. The ship, the company’s eighth and largest, will start sailing from Singapore next week.
Here’s a PSA if you’re flying Sunday: Don’t forget to change your clocks when you go to bed on Saturday. (Unless you’re in Arizona and Hawaii, which don’t spring forward or fall back.)
A note of clarification on last week’s tip on the increased enforcement of the U.K.’s Electronic Travel Authorization. Connecting passengers only need an ETA if they are connecting to a flight within the U.K. Those connecting to flights outside the U.K., say from London to Paris or Rome, do not, according to the British Embassy.
Finally, thank you to everyone who came to our inaugural WSJ Travel Talks on Tuesday. It was wonderful to meet so many readers. It was such a success we hope to hold events in other cities, so stay tuned.
Flight Rebooking 101
It’s been a doozy of a year for major flight woes and it’s only early March. The year started with travel trouble in the Caribbean due to military action in Venezuela, followed by major snowstorms in the Northeast and cartel violence in Mexico. Now we have the war in Iran.
The degrees of travel trouble vary, but they have one thing in common: They are largely outside our and airlines’ control.
That doesn’t mean you should sit back and wait for the airline to sort it out and rebook you. My niece isn’t a frequent flier and was grateful for my help getting her new flights home from Florida without paying a cent during last month’s blizzard. So I figured everyone could use some reminders.
Here are my general tips:
- Keep an eye on the weather and major headlines ahead of your trip. And I don’t mean the morning of your flight, especially if you’re not a news junkie. Tuning in well ahead of time will help you get ahead of any disruptions and allow you to proactively change or cancel your flight.
- Research other flight options in advance and don’t overlook secondary airports.
- Jot down the airline’s customer service number, chat info or any social media direct-message options. (Budget airline Breeze, which my niece was flying, doesn’t have a phone option.)
- Sign up for flight alerts on an app like Flighty.
- Watch for emails from your airline. That might be one of the first places you’ll hear about opportunities to change your flight to get out earlier or delay or cancel your trip, often without penalty.
- Check the airline’s website for travel waivers. These can be hard to find but are usually at the top of the page if it’s a major event. They can be called travel alerts or advisories, among other things.
- Pounce as soon as a waiver is available. You’ll have your pick of routes and dates and avoid being stranded for days or facing a two-stop red-eye flight. After some searching, I found Breeze’s waiver on the airline’s website, along with chat and text options. I sent my niece screenshots and she quickly changed her flight. She used it again when the storm lingered. One of the flights was better than her original, all at no extra cost. She had planned to buy seats on another airline to ensure she got home. She Venmo’d me $20 as a thank you!
This is an edition of the WSJ Travel newsletter, a weekly source of inspiration and advice for navigating your vacations and business trips, along with the latest travel news. If you’re not subscribed, sign up here.
Notes From the Road ✈️
Lobster rolls, avocado toast and a time clock. Meet the new class of tiny airport lounges.
Good news for Gen-Z skiers: Vail Resorts is offering pass discounts for next season.
Seeking the opposite of a soul-sucking tour? Try a flower arranging retreat in Belgium.
One Good Tip 🎯
Having trouble finding solid points deals for business-class flights to Europe? Book a cheap flight to the Caribbean or South America first, then use points for flights from there. My colleague Chip Cutter says he’s found good availability, for example, on Delta and its partners from Martinique to Paris or Cartagena, Colombia, to Amsterdam.
Travel Math 🧮
The per-person price to create your own “Traitors”-like experience at a private Scottish castle. The package from Pelorus Travel doesn’t include flights.
And We Quote 💬
Cheers and Jeers 🤷
Cheers to the American Airlines customer-service employees in Charlotte who saved the day for me on Monday. My connecting flight to LaGuardia was delayed a few hours. I could have changed to an earlier flight on the airline’s app but was worried my checked bag (long trip!) wouldn’t make it. I certainly didn’t want to trudge back out to LaGuardia. A gate agent named Angie called the ramp with my bag-tag number and a description and asked for it to be transferred to my earlier flight and rebooked me.
Jeers to the lack of lighting in my (aforementioned inexpensive) Midtown Manhattan hotel. I actually called the front desk to ask if it was me or was the bathroom really that dark. It wasn’t me.
About Us
Dawn Gilbertson writes WSJ’s Carry On column covering all things travel. You can reach her at [email protected] or on X at @dawngilbertson. Sign up to get an alert every time Dawn publishes an article.
