If you don’t have to, why would you spend more money on flying to your travel destination rather than shopping, taking an excursion or treating yourself to a nice dinner?
We are noticing an increasing number of travellers driving across the Canada-US border to fly out of Bellingham International Airport (BLI), and we think they are on to something.
A drive to the airport from Vancouver is about an hour to an hour and 20 minutes.
If you prefer to leave the car at home, you could also take the Amtrack train (starting at $34 one way) or a Flexbus or Greyhound (as low as $22.99 one way).
What might make the trip tiring by bus or train is that it is a significantly longer journey than driving yourself. By train, it’s about five and a half hours, and by bus, it’s about two and a half hours.
So, taking into account that getting to BLI will still cost you time and money, here are the destinations we think are still worth travelling south to catch a flight.
Mumbai
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Flying out of Bellingham into Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport at times could save you about $500 for flights (especially near the end of the year).
Even for last-minute flights, you could save hundreds to fly out this week or next month into India.
London
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There are certainly cheaper flights available in Bellingham if you’re heading into London, UK. However, you will find the most significant savings if you are flexible. Otherwise, trekking past the border might not be worth the trouble if you’re just going to be saving a few bucks (we’re talking under $100).
If you are flexible, you are looking at saving around $100 to more than $200.
Las Vegas
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The US is a prime example of why comparing airports is a good idea.
If you want to fly to Vegas this summer, flights out of Bellingham can cost as low as $164 some days, but other dates could be as much as $508.
Finding a flight out of Vancouver for around $164 is not really possible at the last minute, but if you plan a trip ahead, we found flights out of Vancouver for $125 in the fall.
Some flights from Vancouver to Vegas will cost about $200 to $400.
So, if you are hoping to fly to destinations around the US, Vancouver and Bellingham offer good deals – it’s just a matter of being flexible enough to take advantage of the savings.
Where it’s cheaper to fly from YVR
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It can be more expensive to fly from Bellingham, depending on where you’re flying to.
The most obvious routes that cost more were trips within Canada. We noticed that if you are flying within Canada to cities like Edmonton, Toronto, and Montreal, for example, it is significantly cheaper to fly out of Vancouver International Airport.
Additionally, trips to major cities in Mexico, China, Australia, Hong Kong, Vietnam, and France, for example, generally cost more to fly out if you are in Bellingham.
However, we still advise comparing your dates out of Bellingham because while there are limited examples, sometimes flights on particular days cost less. So double-check, and you can save a few hundred dollars on flights to spend at your destination instead.
You can compare flights by visiting sites like Google Flights or Skyscanner, entering the same destination but searching for flights out of YVR and BLI in separate tabs. From there, you can compare dates and find the best combo for you.
Happy flying!