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European Continental Flights to Cape VerdeGermany, Netherlands, Belgium, UKit is possible to fly from airports without direct flights via UK or Continental airports. Often it will require an overnight stay on the outbound trip because of departure times and the fact that the airline will not refund the ticket if you arrive late. Early bookers pay just £329 return for direct flights
See next month`s return faresYou can check on capeverdejetaway. C from Birmingham thought Italy might be a cheap and easy way to go and booked with a travel shop in Birmingham. How wrong can you be? "I had to phone London from a callbox as my tickets were not at Milan airport, 10 minutes before departure time. So I had to fly to Sal via Lisbon rather than direct. I had a 200m dash to the gate. The flight left late and I missed the connection at Lisbon. I had to stay in Lisbon and depart 24 hours late. My luggage arrived 9 days later"She had more problems on the return flight."I arrived at Lisbon too late for the flight connection to Milan. The next available flight was going to be too late to connect with a flight to the UK that day and I did not fancy another overnight stay abroad. So they found a Heathrow flight at no extra charge so long as I did not expect any further help from them.Her erstwhile friends also had a problem on the return as they had arrived a day late and failed to reconfirm the return, so all flight sectors were cancelled "They had no record of our booking. The plane was an hour late and we missed the connection from Lisbon to Milan. We were offerred a flight in three days time. The alternative was Business Class at £900. We went to the Alitalia desk, which had the last two seats to Milan that afternoon for £450"But Baggage arrived three days later.Amazingly enough C tried this route again, this time with heavy baggage. "I was charged excess baggage on a 30kg box by Alitalia from Heathrow to Milan. Arriving at Milan in the evening I had to take a shuttlebus between terminals. I had to lift the heavy baggage onto the bus as they do not take trolleys. By 10pm there was no-one there and only a few vending machines for refreshment. The Shuttle has an hourly schedule but it often fails to arrive at night. Check in was at 0430am and the departure screen was so confusing that we all queued at the wrong desk."D from Dublin flew via Frankfurt."I wasn`t really listening to the announcements and they had not told me that the plane would stop at Dakar. So I got out with other passengers. Only after the plane had left did I realise where I was. It took me three days to get back to Sal via Santiago. Some locals said that they would take care of me for the night but when four men jumped into the car, I jumped out, "Santiago AirportYou can now fly from Lisbon direct to the new airport on Santiago. It also takes the flights from Boston twice weekly and flights from Las Palmas and Amsterdam. Beware touts and taxi driversDo not permit someone shouting taxi to grab your bag on arrival at Praia. You will be charged several euros for a tout pushing a trolley a few metres. Worse still you will likely be delivered to a taxi driver who will con you. for n oversharge. The official fare in 500 escudos in day time but they may demand 1,000 or 2,000.There can be problems with TACV as W from Yorks found out the hard way. "I will have serious concerns should TACV fly direct into the UK for the security of not only air travel, but English soil. TACV - 1 drink and meal in 8 hours on the plane. Staff rude and spend most of their time chatting in their quarters. Flight out from Amsterdam only one third full. Had to stop at Paris on the way back to make the numbers up. We were not told this. 21 hours door to door is not good."Transfer TimesSome airports which are so large and busy that they are notorious for missed flight connections. Most people would include Heathrow, (4 terminals) Amsterdam, Frankfurt (two airports), Milan (three airports) Paris(two airports) Rome(two airports) amongst the danger spots. At Lisbon and other small airports transfers generally work better. But there is little to be done if your flight arrives late. The only sure answer is to leave a lot more time for connections.C from Birmingham learrned from bad experience "The travel shop in Birmingham that I booked through did not know that I would have to change planes at Milan, one of the stops en route and I didn`t bother checking. If I had I might have realised that I wouldn`t have enough time at Lisbon."TACV flights - long haulH from Shropshire had problems with TACV"We had a delay going out, our flight was delayed from 8.50pm until 01.30. We had arrived at Lisbon for about 5.00pm so it made it quite a long night. The flight was with Cape Verde Airlines, I didn't think they were as efficient as TAP but then again from what I saw no one rushes in Cape Verde so may be that was why."B flew from Holland "Just spent 2 weeks in the Cape Verdes. Of six internal flights, only ONE was anywhere near on time - ranged from 5 hours early (we missed it!) to 3 hours late. Schedules! Trouble is, there is not much choice. The international one from Amsterdam Schipol is also not very good - business class was hardly more than a slightly bigger seat than economy. Wouldn't recommend."M from Lisbon flew on a wet lease Airbus "Lisbon to Sal in economy. Plane was a former Canary Islands charter that had yet to be re-painted, but in good condition and comfortable. Crew friendly, check-in slow, food OK. I was expecting a fairly poor experience, but found the flight to be far better managed than my return on TAP. I'd use them again.R from Frankfurt flew up front "Lisbon to Praia in business. Flight on time and food okay. But confirm other comments that the business class is just an upgraded economy. No space with just the middle seat left empty. Not worth the money in business class."J from Amsterdam found the flights late "All domestic flights (5 in total) were on time, the flights from Amsterdam to Praia and return however both had a delay of 1.5 hours. The aircraft on the international flights was rather tired looking B757-200. Service is adequate, but they could have come around more frequently with drinks. After meal service, the service stops."M from London found it better than expected "Lisbon to Praia. It was, quite surprisingly, not really late leaving (despite reputation). But business class was, in fact, economy-class seat but with the middle seat left vacant. And better (really quite nice) food! All in all, not a very good business-class experience, though there isn't much choice in getting to Cape Verde"
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