traveling
Alright, I know that many of you check this page or respond to it more than your actual email, so I thought I would pose a question to all on this page. As most of you know John and I will be travelling to the Netherlands in March for about a week. I have been checking plane ticket prices for a few months and notice that the prices have been increasing greatly. I want to know if prices will continue to rise, or if maybe they will go down after the holiday season. When I first checked around Sept. two tickets would have been about $600. Now thay are up to $1,100. I cannot afford them at this time, but if they will keep going up, I suppose I should find a way to pay for them now. If any of you have any useful info on this subject, I would love your input.
And don't forget to vote on Tuesday :o)
0 TrackBacks
Listed below are links to blogs that reference this entry: traveling.
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.monicajane.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/1495
Dear Monica,
Right now the prices are getting higher for several reasons; the price of oil is more than fifty-five dollars a barrel, OPEC is controlling the oil supply, the Euro is up against the US dollar, the airlines are in financial trouble and we are moving into the holiday season.
Normally, prices drop in January as the travel season is very low at that time. One option is to drive to New York and fly from there rather than flying from Detroit. The other thing you should do is stay longer in Europe and check out the sights. You'll get a better airfare for staying longer. It's a waste of your money and time to only go to Amsterdam for a week. Stay in the youth hostels and see more while you are there. Amsterdam is great for about two days and then it gets boring unless you're there for a convention or seminar. Definitely visit the Rijks Museum to see all the Rembrandts and the VanGogh museum while in Amsterdam. The Anne Frank house is there too, but it closes at five o'clock in the off season.
You can ride the trains and be in Paris in about 14 hours from Amsterdam or go to Germany as well. Be adventurous and take advantage of being in Europe. Don't pass up the opportunities to go to the fashion museums in Paris or all the other big museums that inspire millions to go there every year. Paris has great night life too. We can give you recommendations of where to stay and eat while in Paris. We've found our favorite cheap places that are just fantastic, so we go back everytime.
Try doing some research at www.ricksteves.com this guy wrote the book on traveling inexpensively throughout Europe and we use his books everytime.
Nancy
The airlines are in trouble; they've stopped honoring each others' tickets and some might go bankrupt again. The price of oil is probably the biggest factor. Ticket prices probably will only go up with time, so I would buy now. The holidays are really only a factor if you are actually buying a ticket to fly at the time of the holidays. Probably in January, you would still have enough time that the proximity increase (buying too close to the fly date) wouldn't kick in, if you wanted to wait though. You know if you are paying that much though you should stay for more than a week, more like three, and you should go see France, Belgium or Germany, it's only a couple of hours away. The one other idea I would offer is you could try to see if flying into another big city is much cheaper, like Frankfurt, Munich, or Paris, then possibly taking the train over to where you want to be in Amsterdam. Unlikely though since Amsterdam is such a hub.
I don't konw how long you're staying, but that can also be a factor. When you have a Saturday night stayover, the price usually comes down.
At least that applies for domestic flights, maybe it doesn't apply internationally. But I guess no one really flies all the way over there to only stay a couple days anyway, b/c you would just be traveling the entire time.