Like Scuba, check the polar bear cooler as a piece of luggage (we do add ice packs, but we spend the night in a hotel the night before our flight), so it's about 30 hours from packing to unpacking. Everything still frozen solid. Like Scuba, we usually spring for first class tickets, so no extra expense. Now, if we were going for 2 x weeks, no. But for 8 weeks, definitely worth it. JMO.