Flying to Australia via USA

[spicedmaple]

Has anyone flown this routing? Flights to Australia via Los Angeles are a lot cheaper than flights via Asia or the Middle East. We are talking a £600 saving.

The issue with that of course, is that the journey times are 28-30 hours via LA compared to say 21-23 hours via the Middle East.

It would be an 11 hour flight London-Los Angeles, a 3 hour wait, then a 15.5 hour flight to Australia.

Will be flying economy. Has anyone done it and survived?

I have flown to Oz loads of times (Far Eastern route) and wouldn't do it, because of the additional hours. 21 hours is bad enough. That's why it costs less - like Garuda in the 90s. Stopped everywhere and took 30 hours.

It depends what's more important. I realise £ 600 is a fair wedge of cash, but 28 hours in economy? 😩

Lurking because we are moving to Australia next year and I was wondering this myself

Check, but i think that transit via LAX is a bit of a mare. Basically interrogation and kept in a room like a criminal. A relative does uk-oz a lot and says she'd never transit via La again. Her fave is singapore.

I have a brother in Oz and my Mum often used to visit, going anticlockwise round the world. I don't think she has done it in one go, preferring to have a couple of days staying in LA with some excursions. I hate not having a break part way round (I've done it a couple of times and it takes me a couple of days to recover), so we tend to add a few days in Singapore or Thailand.

I've done the "hang about in LA for 3 or 4 hours" and get a flight to Auckland for work a few years ago. We were the only people in the club lounge apart from the cleaner.

I'd do it for £600, BUT take longer and pray I got an upgrade.

What about breaking your journey? This may actually use up the savings but you will see a bit of California (you don't have to stay in LA) and two shorter long haul better than one super long one. Or I'd bump myself up to premium economy with the extra money.

Cheap is not always cheerful and you would need to each have an ESTA to transit through the USA as you will be deemed as arriving into the US. A three hour stopover may not be enough time either as you may need to depart from another separate terminal particularly at LAX. It could well be memorable for all the wrong reasons.

I would pay more and go via somewhere like Singapore to get to Australia.

Three hours could be very tight in LAX, you'll have to go through immigration, customs and then security again. That could easily take all of your 3 hours, then of course you have to actually get to your next gate and board the plane.
You might get lucky and arrive at the airport at a quiet time and sail through all of the above but it's definitely risky!

Ah yes. I'd forgotten that you can't just waltz through transfers in the US. You have to pick up your bags and schlep in and out.
(This might have changed, but I don't think if has).

Get onto a flight forum and get a feel for how LAX is working for international flights.

We nearly missed a 3 hour connection in Atlanta many years ago, even though we'd landed early.

I wouldn't make that trip any longer than it already is, if you plan to fly straight there. Of course, if that £600 saving is the difference between going and not, then you'll survive! I was reading an article this weekend about a guy who wanted to fly to Melbourne in business class, but didn't want to pay the full fee. He flew via Copenhagen and Amsterdam and saved himself £5k. Might flying via a different European airport save you both time and money OP, without having to go via LA? This is the article, if you want some help: ]]www.thetimes.co.uk/article/we-flew-to-australia-for-less-than-half-price-jtpgjjcpc]]

I flew to Auckland return recently from LHR through LAX. Definitely not my preferred routing but it was way better than I thought. Had 4.5 hrs layover on way out and 5.5hrs on way back. Was fine actually. Flights were on time. Did have to go through immigration but queues were shorter than at LHR and quite quick considering. The new terminal at LAX is really nice so I had a fine time wandering about and just enjoying being off the plane.

Next time we're flying via KL but am not looking forward to that one. Air Malaysia's reputation is in the toilet!

I did this many years ago but I was going to Australia for a year so happy to take time getting there - I stopped in NY, LA & Tahiti for a few days in each place.

We had to transit through USA for a business trip to Mexico.
You need to buy an ESTA.
You are not kept in a transit lounge as we expected, you have to go through the whole immigration procedure - finger prints, eye recognition etc.

We were treated like criminals, and almost missed our connecting flight.

Coming back, we had the whole thing again. Completely unnecessary & very inefficient.