All the travel deals!
Friends and family are constantly asking me where I find all the travel deals. I will start out by saying that the best deals can be had by people who have flexibility in their travel. I’m fortunate enough to have a super flexible job AND being a DINK means I don’t have to plan around kids sports or school or whatever else you parents have to plan around. 🙂 My other disclaimer is that I actually LOVE planning and searching for deals and am happy spending hours of my free time researching. I realize that is not for everyone. 🙂 So…let me share with you a few of my favorites that don’t require too much effort.
Over the years my go to places have changed but there are few that are my old standbys. First of all, where you look for deals really depends on what type of trip you are looking for. One of my long time favorite deals sites is Travelzoo (www.travelzoo.com). I’m a big fan of the top 20 email that gets sent out weekly along with their newsflashes and local deals. They cover a wide range of deals…from airfare, to hotels, to local things to do to international trips. I would say that personally I mostly find great local deals through Travelzoo OR something I see on that site will actually just lead me down the path to something different.
Another favorite of mine is www.kayak.com/explore. On this site you can see prices of flights that have been booked recently. You can filter by the city you want to fly from, the price you want to pay, the time of year you want to go and more. Then you can just scan the globe to see if there are any deals. This is where I found roundtrip airfare from Madison, WI to Zurich last August for just over $400. Madison is a small airport and is super close to my house and I absolutely love flying from there (vs. driving 2.5 hrs to Chicago). It is one of the best airfare deals I have ever gotten.
I’m not big into Twitter but in the last year I started following Escape Flights – ORD which focuses on flights from Chicago Ohare. They have seperate feeds for other larger airport hubs (ATL, LAX and NYC to name a few). Since I’m not constantly looking at Twitter I simply set up notifications for the handles I’m most interested in so i don’t miss anything. On a side note, the other thing Twitter is good for is communicating with airlines. I find that most of the domestic airlines at least are very quick to respond to messages on Twitter.
My newest most favorite site right now is Scott’s Cheap Flights (www.scottscheapflights.com). Scott’s focus is on international airfare. You can sign up for their free emails which contain LOTS of great deals or you can upgrade to their premium subscription for $39/year. Up until this week I only got their free emails and was very happy. However, this week one of my friends who pays for their subscription shared with me an AMAZING deal that I did not receive. We ended up booking round trip airfare from Chicago to Tahiti for $485! Whaaaat?! The French Polynesia is one of my bucket list trips and now I get to go for a fraction of what I thought I would have to pay. The money I’m saving on that trip will pay for my subscription many times over! If you are interested in international travel deals JUST DO IT! You will not be disappointed. Plus there is a 30 day risk free trial if you are!
Well I think that wraps up my current favorites. Watch for a future blog where I focus on lodging after getting all of these amazing airfare deals. Happy deal hunting!
-Erin