Traveling From the U.S. to Thailand

More questions and answers today that were generated  by the post What Do YOU Want to Know About Thailand?  Keep the questions coming and I will be answering as fast as possible.

My travel abroad has been limited to European destinations, so I have never traveled to Asia.  I understand that the flight time is quite long.  I’d be interested in learning the best way to get there. I assume that you depart from New York westbound, but I really don’t know.

Answer:  Yes, the flight is long.  Thai Airways runs a 17 hour flight non-stop leaving from JFK airport.  They fly east (well actually north as they go over the north pole).  As you can imagine the flight is not fun, but Thai Airways makes it as bearable as possible.  The cost is around $1600 round trip last time I looked.

Alternatively you can look for cheaper flights with connections, but that usually pushes the flight over 20 hours and you typically don’t save that much, maybe a couple hundred dollars.  I remember I once took a flight on Gulf Airlines that connected in Paris (CDG) and then again in Dubai (no idea what the airport is).  The total flight was 24 hours, but the cost was just $850.  At the time I could have flown non-stop with Thai at $1200.

Thinking back on the experience I would have been better off paying more for the convenience of a non-stop flight.  Of course if you don’t want to be cooped up for 17 hours straight then connecting flights might be the better way to go.  Needless to say, my last 4 flights have been non-stop on Thai Airways.

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