Heads up: Crazy business class sale to Europe

The view of the Bosporous where east meets west in Istanbul from my Turkish Airlines flight this week (Photo: Chris McGinnis)

I’m fresh off the plane home from Greece and Turkey and have found business class fares for fall trips that look more like economy class. Seriously! We are talking about $1,500 round trip between the US and several cities in Europe for trips that start as early as August 21 and appear to go deep into September. If you are curious, just click over to Google Flights and see if you can find what we’ve just seen. It’s crazy.

Fall is by far the best time of year to head over the pond because the weather is soo much better, and the locals are sooo much happier to see you. And this year, there’s the extra added attraction of a very strong US dollar, so why not?

My eyes are spinning at these deals. So let’s take a look at what we found using September 6-September 13 as a sample. Fares will vary based on your exact dates and departure city. But my goodness this is good! And it won’t last.

Stay in a villa like this in the Greek Isles with the money you’ll save on your flight to Athens! (Photo: Chris McGinnis)

The cheapest flights are to Istanbul...which does not surprise me too much given weak demand for travel to Turkey due to recent bombings in Turkey. But the deals go well beyond Turkey. Athens is super cheap, too, and September is the best time to be there, according to what I heard on the ground there last week.

First let’s look at roundtrip business class flights from various cities with none or one stop en route (we don’t have all listed, so check around!)

San Francisco with 0-1 stops.

Istanbul $1,080 on Air France

Athens $1,622 on Air France

Munich $1,610 on Delta

Stockholm $1,545 on Delta

Lisbon $1,586 on Delta

Zurich $1,570 on Delta

From Los Angeles

Munich for $1,610 on Delta

Delhi for just $2,525 on Lufthansa

From New York:

Istanbul $1,160 on Delta

Athens $1,529 on Delta

Berlin, Frankfurt or Munich for $1,540

From Houston:

Munich $1,560 on Delta

Istanbul $1,283 on Delta

From Seattle:

Berlin, Munich $1,600 on Delta

From Chicago:

Athens $1,722 on Air Berlin

Munich $1,610 on Delta

Check for yourself on Google Flights— and our apologies if these crazy fares evaporate faster than we can post them! Use this helpful page if you are not familiar with how to find deals and view calendars on Google Flights.

Here’s a look at the Google Flights map showing all sale fares from SFO to Europe for Sept 6-13 (Updated June 2):