Booking a Rick Steves Tour

The best thing to do now is to sign up for fare alerts for the flights you are looking at. Keep watching the prices so that you can see what a "typical" price is. Then when a good deal comes along, jump on it immediately. Plan to arrive in your starting city at least the day before your tour starts so that a travel delay won't cause you a problem.

www.kayak.com/explore/ is a good tool to keep an eye on prices. Just like at the department stores, airline tickets go on sale frequently, competitors price match, planes get booked up and the sale disappears suddenly.
I would think that from Texas, if you got tickets for a May trip for 3 figures, you would not feel totally ripped off. Make searching out the options part of the fun of trip planning and don't get too bent out of shape about getting the single best deal. I guarantee someone on the plane got a better deal than you did.

Nicole, A few suggestions, based on my own experience.... 1.) Plan to arrive at least two days prior to your tour, not only so you have time to get over jet lag, but this also provides a "cushion" in case of flight difficulties. Try to book the same Hotel used by the tour for the extra nights. If you call the Tour department, they should be able to tell you the first and last Hotel. You may or may not have to change rooms when the tour starts, but that's not a big deal. 2.) If you have the time and money, you may also want to stay a day or two longer after the tour ends, just to explore a bit on your own. By that point, you'll be comfortable touring on your own (the Guide will make sure of that). 3.) For travel in May, I'd start monitoring flights towards the end of the year. The $1200 price you quoted for open-jaw flights into Paris and out of Rome sounds quite reasonable (I generally have to pay considerably more than that from the west coast). Use a variety of travel sites when searching, such as Expedia, Travelocity, Hipmunk, PriceLine, etc. but also the airline websites. 4.) As this is your first trip to Europe, you may find it very helpful to have a look at Europe Through The Back Door. It provides a lot of good information on "how" to travel well in Europe. Your local Library should have a copy. As neither of you have been to Europe, I can't think of a better way to experience it for the first time than with a Rick Steves tour. You're in for a treat!!! Happy travels!

Adding to what Ken said, the other reason to arrive early and leave later is that generally, (but not absolutely), flights are cheaper Tue, Wed, and Thur than the other 4 days of the week. So if the tour starts Sat afternoon, leave Thursday to arrive Friday. Extra day of rest and what you spend for the extra day's hotel, you save on the airline ticket.

Ken, I have read Europe Through the Backdoor cover to cover!!!! A great Read!!!!!!!! Thank you all for your help!
Nicole

How exciting , the tour will be so much fun.. I took the 14 day Family Tour, its the same itinerary as the regular tour basically but more family orientated, and I really enjoyed it. Best run tour! As others said, and I really want to bat this home, arrive at least 1-2 days early for tour. A family on our tour missed the first day of the tour because their flight was delayed..Also if airline loses a piece of your luggage it has time to "catch up" to you, plus of course you need time to recover from jet lag and plain old travel fatique. Rome and Paris are both worth a few more days anyways. You may not feel confident touring around your arrival city on your own, first trip to Europe and all, but you can always jump on a HOHO( hop on and off bus tour) , they will take you around to all major sites, taped commentary and you can just hop on and off all day with one ticket,, no fear about getting lost etc. Also after tour I guarantee you will feel alot more confident to tour around on your own for a few days, the RS tour guides actually teach you how to travel, how to use buses and metros, what majoy sites to visit etc etc DO pack light, it means the difference between a fun carefree holiday and a stressed out sore shoulder one, one trick I did with my dd was when you arrive in Venice you have to leave the bus and take boat to island, well dd and combined the clothes we would need for the 2 day visit into one of our bags. Venice has those cute little arched bridges right, well guess what, many of them are actually stairs!! not ramps. Wear and bring only the most comfy worn in shoes you own. My mate really p*ssed me off this past visit to Paris. I told him to wear comfy worn in shoes, well, he thought that shoes he purchased a month ago and maybe wore 5 or 6 times were worn in enough,, ha, guess who had sore feet!! I am so jealous, you will really enjoy the tour!
Enjoy

I suggest you looks for the best price on the best flight, not just the cheapest deal. That three figure sum Sam mentioned may be unrealistic for a decent flight from Texas. Often the cheap fares are offered for undesirable routes with long layovers on the way. Don't be fooled by price into doing that. The best way to avoid flight fatigue is to book a direct non-stop flight. If you can find those from Texas to Paris and Rome it is worth paying more, in my opinion.