Seizing the Day: Will the Crowds and Expensive Airfares Continue?

"Après moi, le déluge"?

I have feelings about these things, but if you had asked the same question in January 2020 you'd have gotten far different answers than you will now.

I expect the crowds and high prices will remain, for the time being, until the next shoe drops. Economy could require people t draw back, or another pandemic might spur the opposite.

Regardless, to the extent possible, I am all-in on avoiding the most-popular and most-busy locations in their peak seasons and instead visiting more far-out, less-well-known locations and going as far from summer as practical.

American baby boomers are almost all retired, and millennials are right on their heels. There’s plenty of supply of people to create a demand.

Then there are more and more folks from “developing” (now developed?) countries. More and more upper middle class, and large populations that haven’t yet been to those once-in-a-lifetime destinations. The “back doors” are wide open, and lots of people will continue to beat a path to them..

There are many people who have miles/points especially older middle-class people.

Every flight that my family and friends have been on is almost full-even almost a full year after re-opening. I doubt travel will ever die down. Yes, we can have a recession but enough people still have money and, Gen Z are traveling instead of saving.

So high prices are here to stay.

Blockquote American baby boomers are almost all retired, and millennials are right on their heels. There’s plenty of supply of people to create a demand.

Everyone always forgets Gen X. I guess we are all home taking care of our kids and parents and working till we die.

I didn’t forget you, Celeste! 😄 I thought the same thing.

Also, those of us at the tail end of the boom, born in the ‘60s, are still several years away from full Social Security retirement age (67 for us).

There are simply more people overall than ever before. That is not a trend, but a fact. And Europe is the safe haven of travel. And promoted by so many per websites and instagram. The crowds will not get any worse, but they will expand to other sites as people look for that not tourist experience, yet will make the new sites touristy anyway.
So, all will continue and probably get worse.

As a Gen X-I'm glad we get overlooked. Slipping right past everyone!:)

When you get here, you will find out that it is not just Americans traveling to Europe. Everyone is here. On our tours, though we have a good number of Americans, we get a lot of tourists from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India, S. Korea, Singapore, various countries in S. America, and lots of countries in Europe. The big bus tours we are seeing are from Vietnam, Spain, France, USA and India as well as Germans touring their country.

People waited a long time to go on vacations and though last year saw an uptick in tourism, this year is simply booming. People wanted to be sure before spending all that money to come over here.

Among our 5 closest friends, two couples have been to Europe twice this year, one couple has been once, and a widower has been once. Only myself and another couple did not go to Europe this year. My husband went 3 times from Feb-June, but it was for business.

Will expensive airfares continue

Will prices decrease even though inflation is still globally high? Will the availability of fuel magically increase despite war in Eastern Europe and rising global tensions? Will the airlines that have been penny pinching and cost-cutting left and right suddenly prostrate themselves for the sake of the consumer? No, outside of the odd discount fare, prices are here to stay

the crowds and recent high demand for it

High demand for travel predates the pandemic. It is only in May of this year that travel stats exceeded 2019 levels. There has been a consistent ramping up of demand over time, and the 2020-2022 COVID years were just a temporary dent.

If I may, I would like to toss in another thought. My wife and I are both in our mid-70's and have been using the re-positioning cruises to Europe for 3 years. While these are more expensive than airfare they are more reasonable than mid-season cruises. You arrive in Europe feeling refreshed, with no jetlag, and often with a number of interesting ports of call along the way. Once, with some extra research we were even able to find a return cruise to the U.S. at a surprising price. I realize this will not work for people who have a limited time for the trip.

We have used one-way transatlantic and transpacific cruise four times and love doing that. We have done 3 transatlantics and 1 transpacific.

You save on airfare and these one-way cruises are cheaper per day than other cruises.

On airfare, yes, prices have gone up quite a lot. Well, the price of fuel has significantly increased. Also, inflation in general has affected air fare prices.

Now, since COVID shutdowns, demand is likely a big factor. Not sure when that will start to slow down.

I don’t think we are all doomed (for lack of a better word) to travel with massive crowds & being charged exorbitantly.

A few days ago, I came back from nine days in Germany and stayed in a small city in North Rhine Westphalia at a beautiful family owned hotel for €95/night which included breakfast. I did day trips to Münster, Aachen, & Köln. There were no masses of tourists. There were very few English-speaking tourists let alone Americans. I bought regional day tickets on the DB which gave me freedom to take whichever regional train I wanted. I also spent two nights at an airport hotel by Frankfurt Airport for €125/night also including breakfast. I did this as I wanted to take a day trip. I enjoyed a day trip to Heidelberg. I did encounter some American tourists —all from the south — but that was it. Heidelberg was not mobbed with tourists. I chose to go in the second half of September as I wanted daylight but not visit during peak tourism season. The sunset at 7:30 PM! It was great!

I found a points redemption deal on Delta in March which made travel quite possible — 56,000 miles for Delta Comfort which basically means the first few rows in economy with 3 inches more legroom.

My point is that it is not a given that returning to Europe after the worst of the pandemic means massive crowds and high prices. Not at all in my travels in Germany.

I don't like the high air fares flying from SFO to FRA or CDG.

Since I prefer going in the summer, it's a given that I can readily expect such air fares and the crowds. Regarding the crowds I see that factor as relative depending on where you go. Obviously, if you go to Paris in the summer, which I do anyway, you can expect to confront the crowds . Likewise with London and Vienna.

I went to several smaller cities /towns in France on this 9 week trip , only in 4 did I see Americans in any recognizable numbers: Rouen, Troyes, Versailles and Fontainebleau. Absolutely not so when visiting and exploring the others: Soissons, Arras, Amiens, Metz, Maubeuge, Thionville, Albert/Somme, Bar-le-Duc , Chateau-Thierry, St Quentin, Orleans, visitors , if any, were only French.

Likewise in Germany...only in Munich and Berlin did I see it was crowded with Americans and international tourists. Münster/Westf. is never crowded with visitors, who are going to be locals. The last time I saw Münster was in 2007.

The other cities/towns visited this time: Ingolstadt, Hildesheim, Karlsruhe, Bad Ems, Koblenz , Ellingen/Bay. were in no way swamped with crowds....no Americans and international tourists, obviously, only locals, if any.