Air Fare Shock!

I flew in August and paid $1400.00. Remember you are travelling in June at the top of tourist season so the prices will be higher because the airlines know the consumer will pay the price if they want to go.

Yep, traveling at during the high season is the only option when traveling with teenagers.
Also, I am flying from SFO, so that adds $$$$.
It is just so depressing that fares are so high....

I think it would be safe to wait till mid January but airfare are up substantially. We are flying to Spain from Denver over New Years and the best we could do with decent connections was $1150. Also, flights to Rome tend to be more expensive.

Try flying into Frankfurt and then on to Rome. There are more flights landing there and you might get a cheaper price. I saw flights to Rome from FF for about 145 euro roundtrip. Ryan Air also flies to Rome with great deals, but they fly out of Hahn airport which is about a one and half hour bus trip from Frankfurt. Play around with the dates too if you can. Not flying on weekends will save you money quite often.

leslee,

I don't think there's an easy answer to the pricing situation. You might want to wait until early in the New Year to buy your tickets, as more flight options and better pricing might be available then?

It's possible that changing your beginning and ending cities might help also, as there are a greater variety of flights available to some airports in Europe, and therefore better prices to those. The major "hub" airports such as Frankfurt and Paris CDG often have flights and specials at really attractive prices.

For one example of that, I checked Air Transat pricing for the time frame you're considering, and they have flights to Paris CDG and returning from Frankfurt for Cdn$1025 (including taxes and fees). If the exchange rates stay the same as now, that's about US$825. Of course, that wouldn't get you to Rome.

Another option you could check into would be to fly return Paris CDG and use a budget (Air Berlin or Vueling) from Paris to Rome. However, that would make for a LONG travel day after the long flight from the US.

Good luck!

Do you have to leave from Paris? If not, be sure to try flying into Paris and out of Rome. Doesn't seem like it would make a big difference but it does in some cases.

Some poeple say flying into one city and out of another is not more expensive, but my reasearch did not show me that for this past summer, when I wanted to fly into Rome and out of Paris. I ended up getting a flight into Paris, then flying on a low cost Europeon airline ( Vueling) from Paris to Rome, then fly out of Paris to return home.

On another note, I found the receipt from my flight to Paris ,, from 1985. It cost me $ 1,095. dollars , return, leaving in July and returning in October( which made ticket cheaper as October was considered shoulder season back then ) . So airline prices haven't really gone up so much . There were just some really cheap flights for awhile and we got used to that.

I think you're a little too early. You can also fly into Ireland or London (although they have high taxes) and get Ryanair(very restrictive baggage allowance so travel light). Having travelled with teens' schedules if you can get out before June 15th it sometimes helps. I was booking with award travel a few years ago and couldn't get Paris so we flew out of Brussels visiting Bruges and it turned out to be a wonderful surprise. Lastly the good news is that when your teens go to college put the tuition/dorm on a mileage credit card and you'll earn lots of miles for free tickets!

We are also flying from the San Francisco Bay area to Italy in late June. We just kept looking and found that $1400 was the base fare we had to work with. Just kept on looking and found a $905 airfare roundtrip from San Francisco to Milan through Chicago. My best advise is don't give up, make notes of the best fare you've seen and check as often as you can. Fares pop up when you least expect them. Just be ready to jump on it when you see it.

Dan

I just bought my ticket for April of 2009 . I was not taking any chances and I booked thru American Express,payed with American Express and got travel insurance...1000.oo to fly from FLL to Rome and then from Milan to Dublin and then back home to FLL.
I did not want to wait. The fares are so expencive and some Airlines should be ashamed of themselves. One Airline quoted nearlt 4000.00 and that was NOT business!!!!
PAT

It is a difficult time for airfare. I got lucky about 6 weeks ago and got a flight RT from Charlotte to MIlan in mid July 2009 on United and Air One for 900$ (taxes included). The airfare is now around 1400$. It's all about timing. If you really want to go to Europe next summer, it might help to keep a watch on the fares through a website like Kayak (www.kayak.com) to see what the airfares are with many diffent airline. When I am airfare shopping, I will usually search for airfares every 2-3 days. Sometimes changing the day of departure can help (mis week departures are usually cheaper). It is about luck, but also persistence. Airfares change often. Good luck with your search - maybe now that oil has gone down the airfares will follow suit?

I'm going to agree with Karen who posted earlier.

My group is going in April 2009 and I've been watching the airfare since July 2008 when we first started to think about this trip. When I first started to watch the airfare from Los Angeles or San Diego to Rome, they were all in the $1400 range. I was really waiting for October/November when the "specials" are advertised. For the longest time, the last date for the specials was for travel begining March 31st - c'mon I only needed two more days! So, when I checked last week, I found airfare had dropped to the $900s (depending on the route) and ended up finding and booking a "webdeal" for $760 per person out of San Diego. The rest of our group is out of Los Angeles, and when I checked again today, there were "webdeals" in the $800 range - much different from the $1400 we originally saw in the summer!

On our family's trip last summer, we wanted to start in Paris, but Air France RT route was $1800 per person (5 people). We ended up flying round trip on SAS from Seattle to Copenhagen, then purchased one way tickets from Copenhagen to Paris, and from Zurich (where we ended our trip) back to Copenhagen. I believe the SAS flight was about $1200pp, and the one ways were about $100 each. Flying on SAS was an excellent experience, full of friendly Scandinavian efficiency.

We have enjoyed using Virgin Express and Tuifly from "cheap" airfare cities (Brussels, Munich) to Italy. My first step is to check airfares from my town to about 20 cities in Europe, then try to work with the most inexpensive one. One year this was Nice, France!

I watched airline tickets for my trip in May/June (Phoenix to London and Rome to Phoenix) 2009 for over a year. Try changing the days you fly. For Example: Fly out Monday instead of Sunday. I kept saying that if it dropped to $1200 I would purchase. It hit $1158 and I bought them. ($750, plus $408 fuel surchase and taxes). The tickets now are $1510. I have heard that if you sign up on websites (travelocity???) that I will send you emails letting you know when prices drop. I am not sure of website but I am sure someone out there might. Keep checking websites mentioned in other posts everyday or two then check with the airlines directly (usually saves a few $$). I was told that I should wait until Oct or Nov to purchase my tickets, because that is when BA has their sales. Glad I didn't listen to that advise. Trick is to have any idea what you are looking to spend per tickets and purchase when the price seem right, but once you see it, jump on it. I could be gone the next time you check. I heard the airlines will run specials for like 15 minutes. Good Luck. What days are you flying in and out?

BA has tickets for San Fran. to Rome June 15th and Paris to San Fran. on June 30th for $1571. Little cheaper.

On Airfare.com... flights are available through London for $1,302. On kayak.com it's $1,490 through Munich. On orbitz, it's #1,366 but with two stops each way (Finn Air);

One option would be to take the Chunnel to London from Paris and fly from there. CDG and FCO are two of the most expensive airports to travel through in Europe. Cheaper to connect and go through FRA, AMS, MXP, and LGW.

I second the idea of holding off until after the first of the new year....the airlines still haven't recongnized the decline in jet fuel prices yet...look to see all fuel surcharges go away and look for some bargin rates in February-March time frame as the airlines struggle to fill planes. As for departure days, I like to leave on Saturday and arrive in Europe on Sunday (usually late afternoon with connecting flights)...avoids most business travelers as they like to leave on Sunday or Monday and arrive the following day..I will not be surprised by open jaw flights from SFO to Rome (connecting in Frankfurt if flying United) returning from CDG at $1100 pp in a couple of months. Your star Alliance partners in this trip could be Air Canada, Lufthansa, and United.

Ok, so I'm taking a group of HS students in January, so obviously low season. But, I got airfare for $750 RT on Delta from SFO to ROM. We are flying out on a Monday and returning on Sunday. When I was planning the airfare, the prices dropped $600 per ticket by switching from a Saturday or Sunday leave to a Monday leave. I don't know if that is the same for June, but it's worth a shot.

Have you tried www.kayak.com? I usually find pretty good prices on that site.

Just booked Boston to Milan. KLM through Amsterdam for 654,99 Flying out of Boston first week of march.

I have been watching airfares steadily increase since September. You might want to fly into another city in a nearby country. Air Berlin has inexpensive flights. I just checked last night for one way flights from Germany to Italy and they averaged about $45 Euros taxes included....complete.

Keep checking...seems like everyone is dropping their prices at the same time.

http://www.ricksteves.com/graffiti/helpline/index.cfm/rurl/topic/25495/airfare-saleplease-read-quickly.html

We were going to fly in June as well and noticed that prices were super high like you mentioned, so we changed our vacation to September instead (prices are still kind of high then as well)--but we lucked out and found an amazing deal with US Airways via sidestep.com. Only $618 per person to fly from Seattle to Paris (round trip)!

Out of curiosity, I was using sidestep.com the other day to look at prices for June and found some good deals. You should check it out!

Leslee-

Most times you can get a reasonable flight within Europe. Since we are always very constrained by school and camp schedules we look for the cheapest city (usually Amsterdam) and then get a flight from there to our destination. No matter your regret at spending so much on airfare, stick with a reliable carrier or discounter and not a ticket liquidator as that can be a good way to get stuck and have to foot additional costs. Best of luck!

Another tip is to look at different days of the week, and also get pricing over the span of a few weeks to a month. You would be surprised at how much the airfare can change depending on the day of the week, or if certain events/holidays/etc. are taking place. A year or so ago when I was looking to book a flight to Europe, Air France had a nice calendar on their site that gave prices on a daily basis over some time span (weeks if I remember correctly). Usually, the other air lines will follow the same general pricing scheme, so if you can find a calendar like that online, it can really help a lot.

As much as I wish I had a crystal ball and could predict whether fares will decline/increase, none of us do . . . . . another website to help you track fares is
http://www.airfarewatchdog.com

Also, for getting to Italy, check other cities (i.e. Milan/Venice/Pisa/Naples/Bologna). USUALLY, flying to/from Rome or Milan are going to be your cheapest options, however sometimes you may snag a deal into one of the smaller airports.