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Costa Rica

Eaglelion
Explorer C

Live in WA state, I want to go to Costa Rica.  Why does website/app not allow this but I can book to Houston and then Houston to Costa Rica?  Can't the app do that work for me?  Sees rather limited.  If I put Costa Rica as my destination from WA state it says "unavailable".  Am I doing anything wrong.  If no, does any know what is best (cheapest route) launch off to Costa from US? Is it HOU or Chicago or ?

4 REPLIES 4

Re: Costa Rica

parpitt1
Frequent Flyer A

Thinking this is probably due to timing of flights from Washington State and departure times of flights from Houston to Costa Rica, if they can't make a "connection" they won't sell an itinerary as a single ticket.

Re: Costa Rica

TheMiddleSeat
Aviator A

Using the route map on southwest.com you can see that San Jose has flights to Houston and Baltimore.  Liberia has flights to those 2 and Denver.  Flights appear to leave pretty early so you would need to overnight in a connecting city if you wanted to fly Southwest, that's why you can't buy it as one trip on southwest.com

 

--TheMiddleSeat

Re: Costa Rica

5280Av8r
Frequent Flyer C

It's definitely because of timing of flights. Southwest serves two airports in Costa Rica, San Jose and Liberia. San Jose is served year round from both Houston and Baltimore but I'm pretty sure Baltimore is Saturday only. Liberia is served year round from Houston, Denver (Saturday only) and seasonally from Baltimore (Saturday only). 

 

Considering Southwest currently doesn't have nonstop flight from Seattle or Spokane to either Houston or Baltimore, you're going to have to have a stop or connection to either of those Costa Rica gateways. With Denver, the flight still leaves early enough that you can't get there in time for the departure to Liberia.

 

I would say if you want to fly into San Jose then Houston is your best bet because you can just fly in on a late arrival to Houston and take the flight out the next day (you would have to book separate tickets requiring baggage claim and needing to check-in 24 hours before for both tickets going to Costa Rica.

If you want to fly into Liberia, Houston is probably still the best option because I believe it is daily operations. Denver is viable, but it is Saturday only. You'd still need to book two separate tickets going there (one to Houston/Denver and one to Liberia). Again this would require baggage claim and check-in online for both to ensure good boarding positions. 

 

The return for both San Jose and Liberia to Seattle/Spokane can be bough separately as one ticket. It is pain to do all the separate bookings, but that's what you have to do until hopefully more nonstops are added from Seattle. 

 

-Andrew E.

DEN based | Aviation Enthusiast


DEN (CLT) Based | Aviation Enthusiast | Full of Passion for Southwest

Re: Costa Rica

dfwskier
Aviator A

Your problem is one of two things:

 

A) There are no valid connecting flights on the days you want to travel  .or.

B) The connections involve more than one plane  change. Southwest does not allow 2 or more plane changes on a given routing.

 

I'd suggest

 

1) Use the reservation system  to find out the time the flight out of Houston is supposed to depart   .then.

 

2) Do the same to find out the time your flight to Houston is supposed to arrive  in Houston

 

If your arrival in Houston is  too close to the departure from Houston, then the problem is A above

 

If your flight to Houston requires  a plane change, then your problem is B above