Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents • Hacker News Board

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#11

Post by todsul » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 5:03 AM UTC

HorizonXP wrote: post #10

todsul wrote: post #2

Odd fact, the flights to 5 music festivals around the world cost less than the tickets to the festivals (incl camping). Note: This contest was hosted by us (not a customer) to showcase our experts' flight hacking skills. It's in the same vein as our previous round-the-world itinerary to 6 continents all in business class, which came to as little as $2659 http://flightfox.com/rtw

So I have a unique situation, and I was actually considering using your site to help me solve it. My girlfriend is flying to Prague and Rome for 2 weeks, just before our 7 year anniversary. My plan is to show up in Rome on Oct. 24, surprise her, and pop the question. I'm trying to figure out the fastest and most cost-effective way to get to there from Toronto. The other constraint is that I'll likely be in San Franci…

Hope she doesn't ready HN :) Yes, we can absolutely handle that. Are you just looking for your flight, or also your gf's? If both, it's usually better to run 2 contests if the departure/arrival place is different. Either way, this is where using humans over machines excels (i.e saving the time of searching yourself and having peace of mind you're getting the best flights).

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#12

Post by dreamr » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 5:13 AM UTC

Roskilde gets my top vote. Best sound engineers of any festival I know; and just a great scene all around. Best of the best, in my humble opinion. I'm not familiar with the one in Barcelona. How does it compare?

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#13

Post by HorizonXP » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 5:16 AM UTC

todsul wrote: post #11

HorizonXP wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I have a unique situation, and I was actually considering using your site to help me solve it. My girlfriend is flying to Prague and Rome for 2 weeks, just before our 7 year anniversary. My plan is to show up in Rome on Oct. 24, surprise her, and pop the question. I'm trying to figure out the fastest and most cost-effective way to get to there from Toronto. The other constraint is that I'll likely be in San Franci…

Hope she doesn't ready HN :) Yes, we can absolutely handle that. Are you just looking for your flight, or also your gf's? If both, it's usually better to run 2 contests if the departure/arrival place is different. Either way, this is where using humans over machines excels (i.e saving the time of searching yourself and having peace of mind you're getting the best flights).

The flight would be just for me, since she's in the dark about what's going on, and she's handling her own bookings.

She definitely doesn't read HN. Heck, I could post it on twitter and she still wouldn't read it.

I'll see if I can put up a contest this week.

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#14

Post by subs » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 5:42 AM UTC

I would like to know why humans are required to search for flights? Are there significant technical problems that one would face if he tries to write a computer program to do the same? I assume an automated search would be more thorough, and would produce better results, and would also be cheaper. In fact, services like Hipmunk could offer this kind of optimization to travellers for free.

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#15

Post by shennyg » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 6:53 AM UTC

dreamr wrote: post #12

Roskilde gets my top vote. Best sound engineers of any festival I know; and just a great scene all around. Best of the best, in my humble opinion. I'm not familiar with the one in Barcelona. How does it compare?

Roskilde is bananas!

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#16

Post by Roelven » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 8:14 AM UTC

Woah this is awesome. I've been terrible with flight planning but this is a great read.

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#17

Post by ast4 » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 3:42 PM UTC

Date a management consultant and use his/her FF miles + starwoods points = almost free trip.

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#18

Post by thurn » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 4:15 PM UTC

I wish flightfox.com would let us (regular users) run cool contests like this. The options for running a contest are much more limited than this.

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#19

Post by todsul » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 6:09 PM UTC

thurn wrote: post #18

I wish flightfox.com would let us (regular users) run cool contests like this. The options for running a contest are much more limited than this.

Hi thurn, you can absolutely run the same contest. We just had a school contact us about running a contest to fly 50 students across the world; they'll run that themselves. If you have a particularly cool contest, let us know and we can help generate interest and maybe even run it for you as a showcase contest.

Re: Flight Hacking: 5 Music Festivals, 6 Weeks, 3 Continents

#20

Post by todsul » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 6:11 PM UTC

ast4 wrote: post #17

Date a management consultant and use his/her FF miles + starwoods points = almost free trip.

There are some easier ways to attain a lot of FF miles. We moving to award flights next, them mileage runs, soon followed by contests to help you earn the most FF miles. Stay tuned.