Summer Airfare

[needmesomesun]

Is anyone else finding airline tickets for this summer way more expensive than normal? We are traveling with a group for the first time and we gave them an idea of what to expect for airfare a while back. It is turning out to be way more than we told them. In our ten or so trips I have never seen anything like this, and we have travelled before during higher gas prices. What gives?

To add to that, now baggage costs an extra $50 pp per bag rt..... I feel bad about it.

[piscesgirl0314]

We haven't paid less than $700.00 pp since 2003...its the biggest expense when we go to STJ. That being said, we are carry on people...so, THANKFULLY, we save money there...

[liamsaunt]

The plane fare was definitely more money this summer than other trips. We watched for a couple of months and finally booked at $650/per person out of Boston with a connection in Miami. We ended up having to change our planned travel dates to come in one day earlier (oh darn! ). Coming in on the day we had originally planned was $900/pp. The $650 fare was the cheapest we could find--it has been tracking around $800 for our dates.

[surfnh]

Are you traveling on a weekend? If so you're screwed, the weekends have gotten progressively more expensive the past five years, its really ridiculous now, you often can't even use your miles on weekends.

As liam noted....change your dates if you can, get away from the weekends. This past week we booked US Air with miles for next March, out of Boston for us and our kids out of Rochester. Weekends were crazy expensive and miles weren't available, so we switched the trip to a 10 day Friday to Monday (bummer ehh? ), and its alot cheaper. I recall the round trip fare from Boston was like $450, but we used miles from Boston and for 65k miles got coach down and first class back, not so bad. Kids got the same out of Rochester.

I was also concerned that the villa and cars wouldn't be available with these strange dates, but no problem at all.....Bougainvillea and Caribbean Villas were fine with the Friday to Monday. They understand, the weekend airfares are getting too high.

[needmesomesun]

We are only looking at midweek flights, both going and coming. It is crazy expensive. Right now the flights we want are over $600. The most we have ever paid in off season is $320 before taxes. A few years back we got round trip direct flights in December for $200 using flexible dates.

I am wondering if we should hold out a few more weeks... But there is a flight I really want that gets in around noon, so we will still have a few hours of beach time after all the travel. I don't want to have those poor children traveling all day long and then drive by the beach and not let them get in that water!

[surfnh]

Ok, so you're already shooting for mid-week this summer, oh well, you'd think they'd be cheaper out of season? But, I guess they just cut back on the number of flights out of season and keep the planes full, that way they can charge higher fares maybe?

Bummer.....sounds like you're trying all the right moves. Flexible dates is also a good move, but sounds like you've already played that card.....

[surfnh]

Where are you flying out of? Have you tried different airports?

[Lovermont]

Try the Airfare Search utility on www.itasoftware.com with some alternate airports. The results will show all airlines.

[lazylane]

We booked our December tickets about a month ago and got them for $525, we have paid as much as $750 and as little as $400 over the years.

[Heather-in-MA]

This probably doesn't help, but we booked our airfare 11 months (!) in advance and got Rt from BOS to STT for $320. Flexibility in vacationing has become insane.

[2muchsnow]

Agree, been watching them as well for months for our november trip. Just booked today, interestingly the same flight 2-3 months ago was 1000.00, then 740.00, then finally 580. Thought that was as good as it will get. Little trickier coming from the west, as you can get a flight for $400, but it will take you 2 days and you get to stop 4 times.

Figure SLC to ATL then ATL to STT with a couple hours between is fair.
second on – http://matrix.itasoftware.com/
use it for finding the airfare, then book through the airline direct or orbitz.

[jmq]

At prices like these to STT, as much as we feel the need to get back to STJ and Virgin Gorda, it makes you think - screw it, maybe a few hundred more for airfare and lets knock Hawaii off the bucket list.

[2muchsnow]

feel your pain jmq, My parents planned a family reunion trip in Maui in January, (right after we booked the STJ villa) and I stumbled upon a deal 2 weeks ago that made it cheaper to hawaii ($480) than the STJ.

got to get off this schedule of 2 tropical trips within a 6 month period. (although it's nice to have the problem) Dropping $2000 in airfare in a month is BRUTAL.

[PeggyKristine]

Last summer we flew to St John (or St Thomas, rather)in mid-August from NYC for $330 RT. Layover in ATL on the way and direct flight home (I believe it was Delta).

We absolutely fell in love with STJ and decided we had to go again this Summer. I monitored prices for months and we finally pulled the trigger at $404 RT on American- we were hoping to get a better deal like last year. But it didn't look like it was going to get much cheaper. However, we are flying direct both ways. Can't beat a short 4 hr plane ride to paradise!

[cmw5682]

These insane prices are why I booked with Spirit even though I hate everything about them! We booked with Spirit 10 months out and were able to get tickets for $300 a piece. Since then, I've seen the prices more than double for the same flight!