Flying from Germany.

Given the size and population of Germany, there are services from a lot of airports, but relatively few airlines are involved.  The situation is similar to Britain, and some of the same companies are involved too, so there are scheduled flights to Athens with onward connections, low-cost/no frills flights direct to Rhodes, and seat-only sales on charters direct to Rhodes.

Looking at the routes via Athens first:

From Berlin (Tegel), Aegean fly once daily

From Berlin Schoenfeld, EasyJet fly once daily

From Frankfurt, Lufthansa fly 3 times per day, and Aegean 2 times per day. They also code-share on each others flights, making it easy to book through onto Rhodes without the need to check in again.

From Munich there are again 3 Lufthansa and 2 Aegean flights, with mutual code sharing.

From Dusseldorf, Aegean fly once daily

From Stuttgart, Aegean fly once daily.

Aegean and EasyJet’s baggage and catering arrangements have already been discussed in the blog.

Lufthansa have the European standard 20kg hold baggage allowance included in the fare, and offer a snack and drinks too.

Now flying directly to Rhodes we have TuiFly, the sister airline to Thomson, Condor, an associate of Thomas Cook, Air Berlin, Germanwings (Lufthansa’s low-cost affiliate), XL Germany, and Hamburg International (which confusingly offer no flights from Hamburg to Rhodes, but lots from other cities).

Berlin-Tegel : Air Berlin: Thursdays 6^th May – 21^st October

Berlin-Schoenfeld: Condor :Thursdays  20 May to 14 October

Bremen: XL Germany: Tuesdays 4^th May – 26^Th October (sold through TuiFly)

Dresden: Air Berlin: Thursdays  13^th May – 21^st October; Hamburg International Thursdays 20 May – 28 October (also sold by Tuifly)

Dusseldorf: TuiFly: Tuesdays 20^th April – 30^th October, also Saturdays from 1 May and Thursdays from 29^th April; Hamburg International Sundays 2^nd May to 24^th October; Condor : Sundays and Thursdays 9^th May to 17^th October; Air Berlin: Thursdays 6^th May – 21^st October and Tuesdays 4^th May – 19^th October

Erfurt: Air Berlin: Thursdays 6^th May – 21^st October

Frankfurt International : Air Berlin: Saturdays 8^th May – 23^rd October; Condor: Sundays and Thursdays 9^th May to 17^th October; TuiFly: Tuesdays 20^th April – 30^th October, also Saturdays from 1 May and Thursdays from 29^th April

Friedrichshafen: Hamburg International : Thursdays 20 May – 28 October

Hamburg: Condor:  Sundays 9^th May to 17^th October; TuiFly: Tuesdays 20^th April – 30^th October, also Saturdays from 1 May

Hannover:  Condor: Thursdays 20^th May to 17th October; TuiFly: Tuesdays 20^th April – 30^th October, also Saturdays from 1 May

Karlsruhe: TuiFly: Thursdays 6^th May – 28^th October

Koln-Bonn:  Germanwings : Sundays  1 May – 28 August, Tuesdays  6 July – 31 August; TuiFly: Thursdays 6^th May – 21^st October

Leipzig-Halle: Condor : Sundays and Thursdays 9^th May to 14^th October; TuiFly: Tuesdays 4^th May to 28^th October (operated by XL Germany, sold by TuiFly) and Thursdays 4^th May – 28^th October (operated by Germania Express, sold by TuiFly)

Memmingen-Allgau:  TuiFly: Thursdays 6^th May – 21^st October

Munich: Air Berlin: Saturdays  1st May – 23^rd October; Condor: Sundays and Thursdays 9^th May to 17^th October; TuiFly Tuesdays 20^th April – 30^th October, also Saturdays from 1 May and Thursdays from 29^th April

Munster-Osnabruck: Air Berlin: Thursdays 6^th May – 21^st October

Niederrhein-Weeze: Hamburg International: Thursdays 15 July – 21^st October. Operates via Kos; Condor: Thursdays 15 July  to 21st October (this may be the same flight as above)

Nurnberg: TuiFly : Thursdays and Saturdays 1^st May to 30^th October; Air Berlin  : Thursdays  13^th May – 21^st October and Saturdays  8th May – 23^rd October

Paderborn-Lippstadt:  Air Berlin : Thursdays  13^th May – 21^st October

Rostock-Lange: Air Berlin: Thursdays  1 3^th May – 21^st October

Stuttgart: Condor: Sundays and Thursdays 9^th May to 17th October; TuiFly: Tuesdays 20^th April – 30^th October, also Saturdays from 1 May and Thursdays from 29^th April

Zweibrucken: TuiFly: Tuesdays 4^th May to 28^th October

Air Berlin include 20kg hold baggage, 8kg hand baggage, coffee/soft drinks and a snack in the fare.

Condor include 20kg hold baggage, 6kg hand baggage, coffee/soft drinks and a snack in the fare. Meals can be pre-booked for 7 euros.

Hamburg International include 20kg hold baggage and 5kg hand baggage in the fare. Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

TuiFly include 20kg hold baggage, and  5kg hand baggage in the fare. Meals can be prebooked at a charge.

Flying from Switzerland

I’ve already covered the border airports of Basel-Mulhouse and Geneva in the French section of the blog, so this leaves Zurich:

Scheduled flights to Athens are operated by Swiss:  2 flights daily, with a third flight every day except Wednesdays. You will need to book onward tickets separately and check in again in Athens. This may change later in the year as Swiss and Aegean will then work more closely together.

Direct flights to Rhodes are operated by:

Air Berlin: Saturdays  22nd May – 23rd October (may be operated by Swiss subsidiary Belair)

Edelweiss: Tuesdays and Saturdays 15 May to 23 October; Sundays 11 July – 24 October. Edelweiss include 20kg hold baggage, 8 kg hand baggage, and a meal and coffee/soft drink in the fare.

Flying from Austria

Scheduled flights to Athens are operated from Vienna by:

Austrian Airlines and Olympic, who each have a daily flight, and Aegean, who have a flight 5 days a week (not Tuesdays and Saturdays).  As usual, the two Greek carriers will sell through tickets to Rhodes and baggage will be checked through.

Direct Flights to Rhodes are operated by

Graz:  Niki: Thursdays 27th May – 23^rd September

Linz: Niki: Thursdays  30th^th May – 30th^t September. A second flight operates from 6^th June

Salzburg: Niki: Thursdays  20th^th May – 7th^t October. A second flight operates from 27^th May

Vienna: Niki:  Thursdays  1 3^th May – 30^th September; Austrian Airlines: Sundays 2 May to 10 October (2 flights from mid-June, one returns Monday mornings), also Thursdays 17 June to 30 September , returning Friday mornings

Niki is associated with Air Berlin and share a booking system (whichever website you use, you end up in the same place) and have the same baggage and catering arrangements.

Austrian Airlines include Hand Baggage 8kg, Hold Baggage 20kg, snacks, and drinks in the fare.

Well, this is mainly help for the Czechs, to be honest, because the airlines operating from Slovakia to Greece last year have all suffered financial crises and ceased operations. Unless someone comes along and picks up the routes, a land journey to Vienna looks like the best way to start the holiday.

From the Czech Republic, the situation is much better.

CSA-Czech Airlines operate twice daily from Prague to Athens. You will need to buy Greek domestic travel separately and check in again in Athens.

20kg hold baggage, 12kg hand baggage and snacks/drinks are included in the fare, more for business class.

Smartwings, the Czech low-cost carrier, operate direct to Rhodes during the summer:

From Prague every day except Saturdays (two flights on Thursdays), starting 27th May,  up to 19th October, with extra flights on Tuesdays and Fridays from  8th June to 5th October.

From Brno on Tuesdays and Fridays 8th June to 1st October

From Ostrava on Tuesdays and Fridays 8th June to 1st October

Smartwings allow 5kg handbaggage and 20kg hold baggage. Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

I’m able to update frequently at the moment because the airlines have at last finalised their summer timetables and route announcements are flooding in.

Firstly, having said two posts back how few flights there were from Italy to Rhodes, I’m pleased to have found another airline and some more flights. The Italy section has been updated.

Now for the promised Nordic flight information:

From Finland, Finnair fly from Helsinki to Athens on Mondays and Fridays, and also from Helsinki direct to Rhodes on Saturdays only starting 1^st May and running up to 31^st October.  With the Athens flights you would need to arrange your own domestic flights to Rhodes and check in again.

Finnair allow 20kg hold baggage (more in business class) and this plus a hot meal and soft drinks are included in the fare.

From Sweden, there weren’t any flights to Athens since SAS gave up the route in January this year, but  from 24th April CityAirline will start operations from Gothenburg to Athens. They will fly on Saturdays only until 30th October. This airline is new to the route this year, and allows 20kg hold baggage/8kg hand baggage included in the fare. Drinks and snacks are sold on board. You will need to arrange your own domestic connection to Rhodes, and check in again for this in Athens.

On other days of the week you will need to fly via another European city – Frankfurt and Munich seem to offer the best connections.

There are direct flights to Rhodes, too, operated by Norwegian Air Shuttle. From Stockholm (Arlanda) there are flights from 29^th June to 12^th August on Tuesdays and Thursdays; and from Lulea starting 1^st July up to 13^th August on Wednesdays, returning on Thursdays.

Norwegian allow the most generous total hold baggage limit of any carrier, (2 bags weighing up to 20Kg each) but charge 7 euros per bag in each direction.  One 20kg bag is carried free on fully-flexible tickets, which are much more expensive .Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

From Norway, Norwegian Air Shuttle operates both to Athens ad direct to Rhodes, departing Oslo (Gardermoen).

The Athens flights start on 28^th March, and operate on Thursdays and Sundays up to 18^th May, when Tuesday flights start as well, and continue at 3 flights per week up to 28^th October. With the Athens flights you would need to arrange your own domestic flights to Rhodes and check in again.

Norwegian allow the most generous total hold baggage limit of any carrier, (2 bags weighing up to 20Kg each) but charge 7 euros per bag in each direction.  One 20kg bag is carried free on fully-flexible tickets, which are much more expensive .Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

The Rhodes flights start on 26^th June and run to 13^th August, outbound on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays, returning on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

From Denmark, SAS continue to  operate from Copenhagen to Athens, once per day.

SAS allow 20kg hold baggage included in the fare, (more for business class passengers).  Passengers can buy food and drink onboard,  people with the most expensive type of economy tickets or business class tickets receive free food and drink.

Cimber Air fly from Copenhagen to Athens on Wednesdays and Sundays. Passengers on expensive “Fully-flex” tickets have a 30kg baggage allowance included, otherwise a fee of DKK50 for a 20kg allowance is payable in each direction. For some reason this is collected at checkin instead of being payable at the time of booking. Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

Norwegian Air Shuttle operate direct from Copenhagen to Rhodes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 30^th June to 15^th August , returning on Mondays Thursdays and Saturdays.

Norwegian allow the most generous total hold baggage limit of any carrier, (2 bags weighing up to 20Kg each) but charge 7 euros per bag in each direction on their lowest fare tickets. One 20kg bag is carried free on fully-flexible tickets, which are much more expensive .  Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

Today I’ve added some extra information about Viking flights from the UK to Rhodes, and Thomas Cook from Belfast  to Rhodes, these appear as edits in the original blog posting.

Coming later in the week, travelling from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, and hopefully at the weekend, from Germany and Switzerland.

I’ve just booked my first flights to Symi of 2010, and because I persist in travelling out-of-season I’ll be going scheduled from the UK via Athens.

Olympic Air had the timings that suited me best – their very old established flight from Heathrow at 10:15 at night eventually brings you, with an early-hours connection in Athens, to Rhodes at about 6:30 the following morning, in good time for a taxi transfer to whichever of the 3 harbours in Rhodes Town has the first boat out to Symi, with time for a quick, or even leisurely, breakfast as well. For those trying to save annual leave entitlement this means you can do a full day’s work before leaving and don’t get caught in the London rush hour. Aegean and BA both have flights that leave earlier in the evening, but you won’t get to Symi any sooner.

They do a nice mid-morning flight from Rhodes (so you can catch an early morning boat from Symi if there is one) which connects onto a London flight arriving at 3:30pm, so home in time to get unpacked and start the washing!

I checked a whole series of online booking sites, and Olympic’s own website, and on this occasion the cheapest fare was with Opodo. It is always worth checking Skyscanner (which webmaster Mike usually displays alongside this blog) as this uses “screenscraping” technology to search dozens of websites to see what the best fares available are. You always need to read the detail on the websites it links to, though, as different airlines have different things as extras on the fare – very few people would travel to Symi with only hand baggage, for instance. Skyscanner never shows Ryanair fares as Ryanair took out a court injunction to stop them from doing so.

I was very surprised when I researched the flights from Italy to see how few direct flights to Rhodes there were. However what does appear is something very common in other parts of the world but rare in Europe, the “one-stop” flight, where an aircraft operates a through service between two places, calling at a third on the way, with seats being sold for the through journey and for both of the two shorter journeys, all on one flight number.

So, following the pattern for other countries, first the flights via Athens.

Aegean operate two flights a day from Rome Fiumicino, one of which is advertised as a one-stop service to Rhodes. In the opposite direction, both flights start back at Rhodes for one-stop service to Rome.
They also provide two services a day from Milan Malpensa to Athens , with connecting flights on their domestic services to Rhodes.

Olympic have two flights a day from Milan Malpensa to Athens, and two flights from Rome Fiumicino to Athens, with connecting flights on their domestic services to Rhodes.

Alitalia have four flights a day between Rome Fiumicino and Athens. You would need to book the Athens- Rhodes section with another airline and re-check your baggage in Athens.

All 3 airlines have 20kg hold baggage included in the fare, along with snacks and drinks. Olympic and Aegean offer light meals on certain flights.

EasyJet have two flights a day from Milan Malpensa to Athens, and one flight from Rome Fiumicino to Athens. You would need to book the Athens- Rhodes section with another airline and re-check your baggage in Athens.
EasyJet’s baggage charges and in-flight service details are detailed in previous blog postings

Meridiana have a flight on Saturdays from 29 May to 11 September from Milan Malpensa to Athens, and for the same range of dates from Verona to Athens.
Baggage allowance is 20kg hold baggage plus 8kg cabin baggage, included in the fare except for the cheapest fares “web-fares” when there is a 10 Euro charge.

You would need to book the Athens- Rhodes section with another airline and re-check your baggage in Athens.

Direct (non-stop) flights to Rhodes are far fewer:

Ryanair will fly on Thursdays and Saturdays from May to September from Bergamo (Milan Bergamo, as they call it) and also from Pisa direct to Rhodes.
As always with Ryanair, although the total price may well be extremely good value, it is going to be a lot higher than the first price you see (which is probably VERY cheap), because there are additional charges for hold baggage, for checking in (even on-line now) and for using a credit or debit card (unless you have a prepaid Mastercard), and these charges are per passenger journey, not per transaction. As a Low Cost Carrier food and drink is available for purchase on board. You will need access to a computer and printer to produce your boarding passes in both directions.

EasyJet will fly on Tuesdays and Saturdays from 26th June from Milan Malpensa to Rhodes.
EasyJet’s baggage charges and in-flight service details are detailed in previous blog postings

Blu-Express will fly from Rome Fiumicino to Rhodes on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 21st June, also on Thursdays from 29 July, the service ends for the season on 3rd September. They are a low-cost carrier, hold baggage allowance is 15Kg (included) plus 5Kg handbaggage. Drinks and snacks are sold on board.

Last year several other Italian airlines served Rhodes, some of these have since merged into Alitalia or Meridiana, neither of which advertise Rhodes flights this year.
It is possible some were true charters without the possibility of buying seats separately.

Ryanair have just announced their first flights to Rhodes, flying direct from two airports in Italy. Starting in May they will operate from Pisa and from Bergamo (which in typical Ryanair fashion they call Milan).
I’ll include these flights in the Italy section which I plan to post this weekend. For Italian readers, these flights will be on sale from tomorrow, 26th February, only on Ryanair’s websites. Watch out for all the extra charges if you book!
There will also be flights from Bergamo, and from Hahn (Ryanair call it Frankfurt) to Kos.

It has now been officially been announced that Aegean Airlines and Olympic Air will merge using the name of Olympic Air. Approval will be needed from the EU Competition authorities, and so nothing will actually happen until that is given, assuming that it is. This is likely to take several months, so shouldn’t affect flights anyone has already booked.

A quick post to advise travellers that merger discussions are ongoing between Olympic Air and Aegean Airlines.
The Greek press is fairly confident that a deal will be done if EU competition regulators permit, the merged business would use the Olympic brand name but the Aegean shareholders would probably have a majority stake. Given that competition approval will be needed – the “new, new” Olympic would have 97% of Greek domestic business, but a much lower percentage of the combined domestic and international business – it will be many months before anything happens, even if agreement is formally reached this week.
I’ll carry on treating them as separate businesses in this blog until something happens. They are most unlikely to make significant changes to where they fly or how often until the EU has made a ruling as this would affect their market percentages and possibly cause the investigation to start from the beginning again.

As might be expected, France has mainly flights from Paris.
Scheduled flights to Athens go year-round from Charles de Gaulle airport (Roissy). Aegean offer 2 flights each day, Air France have 3, and Olympic Air 2. Aegean and Olympic will sell through tickets to Rhodes connecting onto their domestic networks, with through-checked baggage. Air France passengers will need to check in again in Athens onto any domestic flights. EasyJet have also entered this market with a daily flight from Paris Orly airport to Athens. You would need to check in again in Athens onto a domestic flight to get to Rhodes, but this is always the case with EasyJet who don’t recognise connections even between two of their own flights.
Orly is also the departure point of the only direct flight to Rhodes, by Transavia, on Thursdays and Sundays from mid April to the end of September. The Sunday flights continue into October.

Nice Airport has a daily flight to Athens in summer – twice weekly in winter, with Fly Baboo. Some of these flights are not non-stop, so check flight duration before booking.
FlyBaboo provide light drinks and snacks, and allow 20kg hold baggage and 8 kg handbaggage in the fare.
The only other French airports that seem to have useful flights are the two joint Franco-Swiss ones, Geneva, where one door in arrivals leads into France and the other Switzerland, and Basel-Mulhouse, physically 10km inside France but considered a joint airport.

From Geneva Fly Baboo operate once daily to Athens, as does Swiss. On Tuesdays in summer Eidelweiss Air operate a direct flight to Rhodes on behalf of Swiss and using a Swiss flight number.
Swiss allow 20kg hold baggage and 8kg hand baggage in the fare, and free drinks and snacks are served. It isn’t clear if this also applies to the Rhodes flight.
The airport website suggests that both Air Berlin and TuiFly separately fly to Rhodes on Thursdays in summer, but I can’t find any trace of these in the two airlines’ timetables.

From Basel-Mulhouse there are direct flights to Rhodes by Air Berlin on Thursdays from 13 May to 14 October, and by XLGermany on Thursdays from 6 May to 21 October, also by TuiFly on Saturdays from 1 May to 30 October.

Moving on to Spain, there are no direct flights to Rhodes. You can though travel via Athens from both Barcelona and Madrid.
Barcelona passengers have a choice of a flight a day with either Aegean or Vueling (also sold as an Iberia flight), and Madrid passengers have 2 flights a day with Iberia plus one a day from Aegean.
Iberia have a hold baggage allowance of 23kg, and 10kg hand baggage, with more in business class in both cases. Snacks and drinks are included in the fare for business class passengers, economy (tourist) class can buy items on board.
Vueling is a partly-owned Low-cost associate of Iberia. If you book directly with them you will pay 10 euros for up to 23kg hold baggage, and 8khg handbaggage goes free. If you books the same flight using the Iberia flight number, Iberia’s conditions will apply, but you may pay more for the flight.
Finally in this section we come to Portugal, just for the sake of completeness, as there are no flights to either Athens or Rhodes and passengers will need to connect elsewhere in Europe to make the journey.

Here we have a more confused picture. In particular there seem to be charter flights which can’t currently be bought seat-only. Now this may be that they are sold in some special way rather than through the airline websites, if so perhaps a Dutch reader can share this with us. Alternatively the airlines are very slow in updating!

The scheduled flights are straightforward: From Amsterdam Schipol KLM fly twice each day to Athens, and Olympic Air fly once each day. KLM have the earliest departure from Amsterdam so there is the best chance of completing the journey to Symi in a day, ferries permitting, but you will have to book connecting flights to Rhodes separately and check in again in Athens. Olympic offer through tickets and a single checkin using their domestic flights Athens-Rhodes. As Olympic are moving towards alliance with AirFrance-KLM these flights may be marketed jointly in future years. Both airlines have a 20kg checked baggage allowance (more in business class) plus handbaggage, and offer snacks and drinks included in the fare.

From Amsterdam direct to Rhodes Transavia, the low-cost division of KLM, fly on Thursdays and Sundays from the beginning of April to the end of October, with additional flights on Tuesdays from the beginning of May to the end of October.
Arkefly, the Dutch division of the TUI group, fly on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays from 29 April to the end of October.
All these flights can be booked with the airlines or through on-line agencies.

There are also charter flights as follows:
From Groningen to Rhodes, operated by Transavia, on Tuesdays from May 4 to 5 October.
The source is the airport website, there is nothing that I can see on Transavia’s own publicity..
Last summer there were flights from Rotterdam to Rhodes on Sundays, operated by Transavia. No information yet about 2010 operations.
From Eindhoven Transavia are due to operate on Thursdays and Sundays to Rhodes from the beginning of May to late October. These flights can be booked on some websites, but not on Transavia’s own!
Last summer there were flights from Maastricht to Rhodes on Thursdays, operated by Transavia. No information yet about 2010 operations

I’ll update this page with more information as it becomes available, including baggage allowances and meal charges.

The UK section for Newcastle has been updated with additional flights, gleaned from the airport website.