Travel Zoo

I have seen these offers and have wondered about them myself. They sound fantastic but I have no personal experience. I am hoping someone responds and can provide some insight.

Travelzoo searches other websites. So if you see an offer for $899 it is usually through another site such as GAte 1 travel or EuropeDestinations, So you would want to chack into the quality of those travel brokers. I tend to find the rates are based on taking off from New york and get higher from other cities. I have found I can do better on my own, if you choose to invest a little bit of time, It can be enjoyable.

Note also that in addition to those rates being typically from NYC, they are often also quoting off-season rates. I have nothing at all against traveling in the low or shoulder seasons, and in fact usually do all my traveling in March-April-May and September-October, but you TRULY have to read the fine print and do your homework. Sometimes, also, you do not get to choose which flights you can go on, so whatever the air schedule/route, you have to go with it. If hotel is included, it is going to be one or two specific hotels, which may or may not be the exact kind of hotel you would choose for yourself if you were doing the picking. I took a trip to Rome this year (mid-March) in exactly the same type of scenario: the offer was 4 nights in Rome at a 4-star hotel, including airfare from NYC for...wait for it....$750pp! We jumped on it and overall were satisfied with the cost-to-value ratio, but would not do it again unless we just REALLY need a cheap getaway. Why not? Because we could ONLY leave on Thursdays, and all travel had to be completed before 31 March, so that basically gave us 4 dates to choose from and no flexibility. Because we had to add on air from our gateway here in Atlanta to New York and if we had to pay for it, that would have easily been $500 or more (we used SkyMiles). Because our route ended up being Atlanta-New York-Madrid-Rome....that's just TOO many stops for us....airports are grueling and put me in a bad moodbut the routing was not divulged until AFTER full payment had been made and seats could be confirmed. Because despite the fact the hotel we stayed in was truly a 4-star property it was an ugly modern structure designed for large tour groups and we prefer smaller, locally characteristic properties (have to say, though, that the breakfast was awesome, the location was acceptable, and the staff were friendly).

I've taken advantage of a couple of trips from TravelZoo. You have to book quickly - but the price was a good one. I usually fly out of LAX and found that doesn't add too much to the TravelZoo price. I think they are good deals......

I knew there would be some red tape. Booking quickly is an issue for me too because my husband is more of a planner, and he doesn't like to be rushed. I am thinking these deals are probably not the best option for us; the price seems so good though that I am always tempted.