cheap flight to europe
 

good news and bad -- mother just won a European River Cruise (Peter Deilmann (sp)?) for any time this year or next, but she has to pay air fare. Anyone with a suggestion for low fare to Europe from PHL or Newark? The prices are so high now -- do you think she should just wait until next year?

"Europe" is a pretty generic destination. Where is the river cruise departure point? Is the cruise available in the early fall as well (when airfares will likely be lower?) Is it available in, say, May? Summer is the highest fare period and summer without the opportunity to do much shopping for fares can be even higher.

They can go on any of the European cruises summer or fall. I'm going to take a look at the brochure this weekend to see where they would embark.

I'd go for September or early October. Better prices. Also, less tourists as the kids are back in school. In May it rains a lot.

Sometimes you can find a cheap direct flight to the city of your choice from the US, but, one thing that saved me money in the past was flying into London, and then taking one of the cheap European discount airlines (Ryanair, EasyJet, etc. etc.) to my final destination. If you want to do this, definitely make sure you are flying IN an OUT of the same airport (Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, City...) and that you know what airport you are flying into (As it turns out, Frankfurt Hahn is waaaaaaay far away from Frankfurt Main. Learned that one the hard way). In addition to the discount airlines' websites, you can do more openjawed searches with openjet.com and opodo.com.

All that said, sometimes the convenience of flying ONE airline and not having to switch your luggage, etc., makes the more expensive ticket well worth the extra cash. And having so many stops can be exhausting!

If you are going to opt for this, it may pay to sign up for one of those fare watchers like travelocity offers. It will email you when fares go down...

Good luck! I hope she has a great time; those trips are supposed to be fantastic.