Tips for Planning / Booking a Major Trip?

[Octoposse]

We have travelled quite a lot over the years, but it’s always one-destination simple . . . flights to Malaga, say, and one hotel via Expedia, or apartment. Not too many variables except the odd day either way flexibility.

Summer 2025 I want to take my teenager on a more complex trip - Australia (to see family he’s never met), and Bali for some combination of surfing / paragliding / scuba diving / chilling.

So many variables! Routes and dates (within school holidays) being the particularly complex ones. Might also want to drop into Malaysia to see one of my wife’s besties.

How does one start nailing jelly plans to the wall? Exhaustive banging into Expedia of trial-and-error possibilities, and then record multiple options on a spreadsheet?

Or are there reliable specialist travel advisors?

[StevieBee]

Bricks and Mortar Travel Agents do still exists and are well worth talking to for trips like this.

I've used Flight Centre and Kuoni for a couple of complex business trips.

Good ones can suggest options you wouldn't have thought about and they can take a lot of aggravation out of what should be an enjoyable process.

Also, the more complex a trip, the higher the chance of something going pair shape. Travel Agents will not stop this happening but do offer an added level of protection for you if they do.

[superpp]

Flight search engines have multi city options, I would start there as this is the biggest expense.
Try Skyscanner

As nice as Bali is, Australia is awesome and after flying to the other side of the world I would make the most of your time there.
If Malaysia is required, look at flying with Malaysian Airlines to see if you can do a 'free' stop over on route to Oz, rather than buying a dedicated separate flight.

[Old Merc]

We did a “trip of a life time”, three countries, six flights, hire cars, hotels etc. We left it all to Trailfinders, it all went without any problems, not very expensive.

[chip*]

superpp said:

Flight search engines have multi city options, I would start there as this is the biggest expense.
Try Skyscanner

As nice as Bali is, Australia is awesome and after flying to the other side of the world I would make the most of your time there.
If Malaysia is required, look at flying with Malaysian Airlines to see if you can do a 'free' stop over on route to Oz, rather than buying a dedicated separate flight.

Malaysian Airline fly to Sydney via KL so you can have an extend stopover in KL while you do your stuff in Malaysia and to visit Bali (you can buy cheap return flight from Air Asia or equivalent budget airline). Alternatively, do the Bali trip on an extended KL stopover from the return journey (does mean flying back on yourself a bit) using a budget Asian carrier. Fly back to KL to return to the UK. Only 2 flight tickets to book, but need to pay attention to the Bali connection flight to avoid waiting time/missing your return flight back to the UK.

Edited by chip* on Thursday 7th November 12:16

[JQ]

StevieBee said:

Bricks and Mortar Travel Agents do still exists and are well worth talking to for trips like this.

I've used Flight Centre and Kuoni for a couple of complex business trips.

Good ones can suggest options you wouldn't have thought about and they can take a lot of aggravation out of what should be an enjoyable process.

Also, the more complex a trip, the higher the chance of something going pair shape. Travel Agents will not stop this happening but do offer an added level of protection for you if they do.

This. We did a month long multi destination trip with the family and Flight Centre were superb. It's the added extras that made the difference - for every flight we were collected by our own mini-bus and for some transfers this was by boat. Takes all the stress out of it and means you get more time to enjoy the trip.

[Octoposse]

Booked - three weeks Australia (no accommodation - combination of surf camp for the teenager, paragliding for me, and visiting family I have never met), one week hotel in Bali for chilling or more activities. Big flights Malaysian, Qantas Sydney —> Bali.

All booked in a Kuoni branch - quite impressed.