Affordable Wanderlust
Looking for international flights but don’t want to shell out thousands of dollars for a single round-trip ticket? Don’t want 10 layovers just to get to one location? Well, I know a guy—a guy online named Scott Keyes.
Scott runs a website called Scott’s Cheap Flights, dedicated to finding the best flight costs from whichever US departure airport you choose. It’s easy to use, and best of all, it allows you to see all the airports that have similar deals for the same flight.
For example, the first week of July I received an email from Scott’s site informing me that, out of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, airport, I could go to Frankfurt am Main, Germany, for an incredible price of only US$415.93. It was round-trip on American Airlines with no layovers during the week of Oktoberfest—a definite steal compared to the US$600 it usually costs.
Be alert, though, because these deals are not set in stone; the deals are only available through Google Flights, and the deals could be gone within hours of receiving the email.
Signing up for these deals is easy. Go to the website scottscheapflights.com, create an account using your email, and choose your home airport (the site will show if that airport gets frequent deals or not). Then you’ll be added to the email list.
I chose the Chicago O’Hare airport in Illinois as my home airport, but the site allows you to choose from a variety of other airports. Milwaukee showed up, as did the other Chicago airports. Some options are from across the US, and there’s an “add airport” button that lets you choose any airport in the US.
Unfortunately, not all airports are available for deals due to the fact that they’re only regional airports, not international. Regional airports are just that: regional. Scott’s Cheap Flights are of the international variety.
The website offers a premium option, which allows you to receive up to five times as many deals for US$49 per year. That’s only four dollars a month—less than your average dinner out to even the cheapest fast food places—and the cost can definitely be made back after just one flight. And if you find the offers are not really your style, you can cancel at any time.
Just looking at the website can give you wanderlust for new and exciting places. You can check the site for other destinations as well: from the US to Beijing for about US$350, or from the US to Kenya for about US$550.
If you know a thing or two about ticket prices, you know that these are amazing. Flying to Beijing is usually over US$800, and flying to Kenya is easily over US$1,000.
Scott’s Cheap Flights is a new way of finding affordable flights, especially if you don’t have a set schedule for when you want to travel. You may not always be able to choose the destination, but the fun you have wherever you go will stay with you for the rest of your life.