Regarding airline tickets by the way - I priced tickets on Orbitz.com, Expedia.com and Travelocity.com and the best price I could come up with from my home to Kishinev was around $1,500 (round trip of course) the departure dates for those prices would have been midweek (Wednesday or Thursday) and had three stopovers.
Not happy with my results I did a quick search and found that Air Moldova had special agent in the US with a Pennsylvania travel agency. The woman refered to quoted me a price of $1,110 with two stops instead of three and leaving on a Saturday and returning on a Sunday. The entire flight is actually NorthWest to Amsterdam - Air Moldova then to Kishinev.
I was very impressed at the savings (for a better flight anyway). Guess the online services are not always the best bet.
The lowest I found was about $1,100. Round trip to St Petersburg. Miami- Atlanta- St Pete. Im thinking about throwing in a bid to Priceline, but you get no miles through them.
Ah, gotcha. Yeah I priced to Lithuania and to Ukraine the other day-having a hard time deciding between several ladies :-), I am in cow-lumbus ohio. They ranged from 980 to Lith (pretty good actually) to about 1300 to Kharkov Ukraine.
Remember - there are no direct flights to Kishinev (Chisinau - same city). No American based airline flies there at all. In fact, according to the US State Department web page - the FAA does not certify or even rate the landing facilities in Moldova! Information given on the web site by the US State Department is only that made available by the US Department of Defense.
OUCH! (re: faa). And I was starting to like several ladies from there. Oh well, I like to fly by the seat of my pants with women anyway, might as well be a wild plane ride as well :0
Now does everyone see why a chat room would be a good idea ? ;o)))
Jet: Dont worry about landing quality mate :o)) Russian, Moldovan, Ukraine pilots could fly their planes upside down and backwards if they had to !!
Ive flown on some of the most delapidated Antanov 24`s you could imagine, and every one arrived on time, or early, with a good smooth flight and I never once fel uneasy with these guys :o)) t
After all, their lives are at risk to if the screw up !!
But there is a lot to be said for old fashioned hands on flying !! All these computerised sterile western jets are boring !!!
Tim: I'm not concerned at all - i was just pointing it out, especially in reference to why my flight might have cost a little more than some others to the FSU. There simply are no directly flights Or anything close). And Moldova is a little more...benind than say Russia or Ukraine.
As far as flying/landing Tim - I fly 50 year old Cessna 150s and 180s myself (with a few upsdates). I'm a student pilot. So the phrase "A wing and a prayer" means something to me especially in heavy cross winds.
RThere is a pilots saying: "A GOOD landing is one you can walk away from. But a GREAT landing is one where they can use the plane again."
Don't worry about me Tim. The plane and the landing are the least of my concerns on this trip.
Ok a question for Olga, if she is listening (and of course , you guys can chime in-couldnt stop you anyway!!)
I have filled in the questionaire for a private tour twice and have never gotten a reply for details..
Have you blokes ever did that? Or, do you like Tim, just do all travel arrangements on your own?
Also, flying out (will be my first time) to a strange city, with little to no knowledge of culture, much less language, kind of freaks me out. Maybe it shouldnt because I have gone other places like chicago and las vegas by myself plenty of times (God knows vegas can be dangerous if you step into the wrong street-but at least I will understand the guy as he is sticking the knife in!)
Jeff: The single time I have been to the FSU (Odessa) I went with an organized tour the European Connection. They took care of everything - including those (wonderful) socials where its just 15 guys and a different 200 to 300 women every night for three nights. (And the women want to meet you real really bad. Closest thing us single guys get to heaven on this earth).
THIS time i feel condfident enough to go on my own (sort of - it is Moldova after all). I will be spending my time with the same women on my last trip.
But if I had never had the European Connections experience - just taking off and doing it on my own... got to admit I am not quite that brave.