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Greetings folks; I'm a DUT student who will be returning home to California this July.
Unfortunately, prices seem to have jumped on me since I came here last year. The cheapest flights I can find from Beijing or Shanghai to San Francisco are over $900. I have found a flight from Hong Kong that is only $760, but the cost to travel down there would mostly offset that advantage.
Are these prices that I'm seeing from the major online airfare consolidators just about as good as it gets? In doing some forum searching I found the recently bankrupt Oasis Air, which seems to be exactly the kind of thing that I am looking for. Are there some other specialty, rock bottom services like this?
One additional question that is probably better directed at the concerned airline: The aforementioned flight from Hong Kong actually transfers in Beijing...Do you know if you buy a transfer whether it is possible to actually jump on half-way? I know that the answer is almost certainly negative, but I can't help asking.
Thank you for your help, and while I regret not being an active member of the Xpat community, I have certainly enjoyed my stay in Dalian for the past year.

They won't let you get off when transfer. but if you have an acceptable reason and insist to do it,if they don't want to make people wait and see that you fight with them,then they might let you go. but most of chinese airlines don't care. but it happened to a chinese,so not impossible.

I don't know if you want to try a train to Hongkong.

there is a train from Shanghai -Hongkong（T99B）, about 20 hours,17：09-13：05，around 500rmb,clean and fun.

the cheapest air-ticket from Dalian to shanghai costs 299+150,1.5 hours. there is only one train from dalian-shanghai,13:10-12:30,about 24 hours.ticket costs 420-480rmb.
so,it's about 1000 rmb from dalian-hongkong.

there is train from beijing-hongkong (T97)too,25hours,12:00-13:13,around 600rmb. the trains from dalian-beijing take 9-11 hours.

Have a fun trip

Rigelation wrote:

QUOTE:
I found the recently bankrupt Oasis Air, which seems to be exactly the kind of thing that I am looking for. Are there some other specialty, rock bottom(*) services like this?

Yes, you can try:
TWA, SABENA, Swiss Air, Ansett Australia, EOS, Skybus, ATA, Aloha, and another odd 1500 at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_defunct_airlines

Rigelation wrote:

QUOTE:
(...)The aforementioned flight from Hong Kong actually transfers in Beijing(...)

You could try to call them 2 days before departure & let them know that for some reasons, you needed to be in Beijing early & will need to board there... Could work but no guarantees - It will NOT work if you don't call them with some kind of a reason.

Now that you know which airline, you can try to buy only the PEKSFO leg at a discount from the HKGPEK-PEKSFO... it would "logically" make sense, but about NOTHING makes sense in the IATA pricing!.

Next time, think about purchasing your tickets 3 to 4 months in advance if you can.
(*)I can't believe you said ROCK BOTTOM?

I suppose I meant 'rock bottom' services that are preferably still in operation, but I can appreciate that there is a certain conflict of terminology there.
I'm looking at direct online quotes from major airlines right now (Air China is particularly attractive at what would seem to be $680 from Shanghai to San Francisco), which brings me to another question: I understand that online consolidators/travel agencies are valuable in part because they have access to occasional discount tickets which are below the price one could normally get directly from the airline itself. Having only bought a ticket once, though, I'm not very familiar with the process--can you occasionally save a fair bit of money by meticulously searching different websites? Also, what are the major Chinese online airfare consolidators? I've looked at several so far, such as airkx.com and el777.com, but they all seem just a bit hokey and come down to giving the folks a direct phone call, which I'll do tomorrow.
You'll have to forgive me; I am not a frequent forum user and thus still use a form that is likely more suited to letters, making me feel obliged to say, 'thanks for everyone's help'.

I use www.kooxoo.com to buy my air-tickets. they have all the airlines,show you the prices. you can see the prices changing online. but it is all in chinese,you better have a chinese people with you when you buy it,and usually you have to pay it online in 40 mins,that means you should have a paypal,and already signed papers for E-bank .
BTW,all the chinese websites don't sell international tickets online.you have to call. here is the ctrip's #, 800-820-6666,but you should be the member of ctrip.

Good luck.

Thanks for this post Clare!

One last thing, where to find their office here in Dalian?

Thanks again....