Dreaming up an exotic vacation getaway is the easy part. Making the plans and scheduling the flights, the accommodations, and the day trips is much less appealing. These days, private aviation companies are stepping into the breach to offer turnkey vacation options. You want someone to plan for you the perfect six-city tour of a continent, complete with surfing lessons, hiking excursions, and a chauffeur-driven day of boutiquing? No problem. You want to celebrate your wife’s 50th birthday by having a specific type of birthday cake served during a stop on the journey? Just ask. Do you want the services of a concierge who’s conscientious enough to text you in Paris to tell you to go back and get the jacket you left in that café? They’re available. Private aviation companies, brokers, and flight clubs alike have lots of suggestions for great vacation plans. When asked to generate a memorable vacation experience, these four companies had plenty to offer.
JETWORKS FLIGHT SERVICES
[La Costa, California]
Destination: A custom tour of Europe. Can’t decide between France, Greece, or Portugal? See them all (or any other combination of countries or cities) in a two-week excursion designed by Jetworks. This company specializes in a turnkey vacation experience. You fantasize out loud about the cities you want to visit, the hotels you’d like to stay in, the restaurants you’d like to enjoy, and the cultural experiences you fancy, and Jetworks organizes all of it, down to the specialty foods served on board the aircraft and the ground transportation that takes you everywhere. During your trip, Jetworks’ concierges are in constant contact via text message to offer assistance should you need it.
Recommended Aircraft: A Gulfstream IV. With its range of 4,376 nautical miles and a roomy interior that can seat 14 passengers, this jet represents a great way to fly from the United States to Europe without a fuel stop. In addition, the aircraft features ample baggage space and a full galley kitchen, and it is operated by a crew of three pilots and a flight attendant.
Price: $80,000 to $120,000 for the aircraft. Additional travel services are priced separately.
Why Fly Privately: No tour of Europe should be ordinary.
V1 PRIVATE JETS
[New York]
Destination: Burning Man or bust. You’re stranded in Paris with a bunch of friends, and you want to attend the preeminent hippie festival, which starts this weekend in the Nevada desert. This was the conundrum that a client put to V1 Private Jets. The company responded by planning the ultimate luxury flight so that the client could be on hand to celebrate radical self-expression (the event is clothing-optional) and temporary communal living. He and his friends departed Paris in a Gulfstream G550 and flew nonstop to Scottsdale, Ariz., where they changed planes, boarding a King Air that traveled deep into Nevada’s Black Rock Desert. Upon landing, they boarded a fully stocked Winnebago, which whisked them off to the festival. The entire trip took less than 14 hours.
Recommended Aircraft: A Gulfstream G550 and a King Air 350.
Price: $330,000 to $340,000 for the flights. The Winnebago stocked with a weekend’s worth of meals, snacks, and cocktails costs extra.
Why Fly Privately: This trip would take more than three days by any other means.
AVANTAIR
[Clearwater, Florida]
Destination: Cabo San Lucas to stay at the Casa Dorada resort for a weekend of marlin fishing aboard a private yacht. Not every vacation needs to stretch around the globe. One last-minute phone call followed by one short flight from Los Angeles, and you can be boarding a yacht on Mexico’s Pacific coast or enjoying a meal in an exclusive Mexican resort. Members of the Avantair Axis Club buy 25-hour blocks of flight time. They spend hours by booking flights on the company’s fleet of 54 Avanti P-180 turboprops. Most members use the company for every type of travel, including flying to visit friends and family, or bringing friends and family to visit them. They also favor Avanti for short-hop vacations, and a favorite destination for Los Angeles clients is Cabo.
Recommended Aircraft: The Piaggio Avanti P-180. While it doesn’t have the range of larger jets, this turboprop is quiet and extremely fuel-efficient, making it welcome at many resorts with strict noise abatement restrictions and short runways.
Price: A trip from Los Angeles to Cabo takes two hours and 20 minutes, which means that members pay less than $10,000 round-trip.
Why Fly Privately: Because a weekend getaway is better when it’s spontaneous.
EPIC JET
[Lennox, Massachusetts]
Destination: Cuzco, Peru, en route to Machu Picchu. For most people, a trip to visit the Lost City of the Incas means flying to Lima, Peru, then taking a bus and then a train that threads its way ever upward to the sacred site. But for those traveling with Epic Jet, the trip involves a short layover in Lima followed by a dramatic landing at an airport near the top of the Andes, nearly 11,000 feet above sea level. In a Gulfstream jet, the flight from New York to Lima takes just eight hours. During the layover in Lima, a local aviation expert will board the plane and brief the pilot and crew on the safest way to approach the airport in Cuzco. Every day the weather in these high altitudes is slightly different, sometimes rainy or foggy, and each afternoon a fierce wind kicks up, causing most afternoon flights to be canceled. But the breathtaking scenery and architecture of this beautiful destination and the invigorating hike to Machu Picchu are worth any such delays.
Recommended Aircraft: A Gulfstream IV. Although the second leg of this flight, from Lima to Cuzco, is just 50 minutes, you might as well travel in style.
Price: Starts at $120,000 for the flight and varies depending on the point of departure.
Why Fly Privately: High afternoon winds, frequent fog, and mountain peaks make a flight from Lima to Cuzco an adventure. Thus many of the regional airline flights to this resort are cancelled or overbooked. The surest method of travel is your private jet.