Dh and I will be going to Paris April 2010 to take a France rivercruise. Although I have been to Europe several times I have never flown into CDG. Our departure is from Evansville,Indiana (EVV) or Nashville TN (BNA). The airfare now is $962.00 including all taxes and charges. Can I expect the fare to go a lot lower or is this a decent fare?We plan on going a few days early and I have already reserved a room at the Hotel Valadon for a few extra days pretrip.Therefore my dates are really fixed departing 4/15 and returning 4/28.That's midweek so should help a little. The airfare thru Avalon is of course higher than what I can do on my own.

Thanks for the advice. I really don't know what a good fare is to Paris.

ttt

You mentioned going a few days early before the cruise and I thought, good that gives some flexibility, and then you say your dates are fixed because of hotel reservations.

But you don't have to consider your outbound date, at least, to be fixed. Hotel reservations can be changed and canceled.

Even if you pre-paid for the hotel, you could depart a day earlier, or two days earlier. Or arrive a day late, giving up a night at the hotel. You could even call the hotel and ask them to please cancel/change your 6-month pre-paid res. That is, if you did pre-pay.

Thank you for the advice but the cruise date is set and we are only able to get away 2 days early because we have horses and rely on others to take care of them while we are gone. In addition DH is still working.We do not have the flexibility that others do who do not work or have a farm full of dogs and horses..I know what the fares are now I just am trying to figure out if this is a decent price or not. I do understand what my options are. Also I have just found 1800flyeurope.Have others been happy booking thru them? Rates were a little better thru them than at Orbitz,travelocity expedia or the direct airline sites..I have checked all the other booking companies.Last year,just luck I got a $700.00 fare,open jaw to Rome return from Venice. That was after checking several different sites everyday for several months.I booked that fare early AM and by night time the fare went up to $1200.00. Talk about dumb luck!!!I really do not need help booking,I just would like to know what is a good fare please.I have traveled to Europe every year for the last 8 years and always book my own flights so I am not a newbie at this.Because we depart from Evansville Indiana some of the fare watch site are not available to us.

Ok, then I guess you will figure it out since you are an experienced traveler and ticket buyer. Good luck.

OK, Thank you for your response.I do appreciate your input.

I sure hope someone answers my question althogh now I guess after checking checking on Tripadvisor it looks like anything around $700.00 or under would be OK.Guess I ended up answering my own question.

I just did a random search on Swiss for ORD-ZRH and fares are right around $700. Good luck at finding a fare you can live with.

I actually spent an hour after my post searching fares.

I read "... I have already reserved a room ... Therefore my dates are really fixed ...". Just wanted to find out for sure if you meant that literally. A reply of 'those dates are fixed but not because of the room res' would be sufficient.

What I saw were fares as you described ($960) as well as a fare of $840 with two stops in each direction (Detroit and Amsterdam). I don't think those fares are too bad, considering your tight schedule. I might wait a few weeks, checking daily.

People may have got a $700 fare last April but might not get it for next April. And then the question is when might it be available.

The place I didn't check was itasoftware.com

Also, I would probably drop BNA from the search in favor of (or adding) Cincinnati since there are nonstops from there. I realize it is a 40-minute longer drive, but getting a nonstop would be worth it vs a connection via BNA. But you may have other reasons for trying BNA.

I too think 2010 will not be as low as 2009. I would say 800 or under should be what you are looking for

I've had terrific luck with www.1800flyeurope.com for many years. Timing is everything, though. They're a consolidator, so you never know whether the next block of tickets will cost more or less. In the overall, I've found the best fares by booking are far as possible in advance. Fares for peak months (April to October) are more likely to go up than down as your dates approach.

With fixed dates (or little flexibility), there's usually no point in hoping for sale fares, and they will not likely be available for your specific dates.

These days, the airlines are more likely to continue to cut back schedules than offer cheaper fares. Waiting, when connections are involved, could result in very inconvenient flight times and connections. It's far better, for example, to have a more reasonable departure time from CDG of 10:30 AM, than 7:30 AM, only to spend an extra three hours in a connecting airport.

I agree with considering a major hub - the extra drive is far less stressful and inconvenient than many connections and flight times.

I do not think you can or should expect the fare to go a lot lower. It may go a little lower, but I, personally, doubt you will see it go under $800 for your cities, and if you wait for that, it could go a lot higher.

Thank you so much to all of you. I have a room at Hotel Valadon that is not refundable for the first night so stuck there. I just discovered 1800flyeurope and the fare I found 2 days ago has already gone up about $30.00. ARGHHHHHH.

I don't see that $840.00 fare.Where is it? I would prefer to connect in Amsterdam rather than Heathrow for obvious reasons. I forgot to mention I need open jaw into CDG and home from NCE. I don't know why I omitted that.Getting old I guess.

Here's another recommendation to check diligently for a few weeks. Be thinking about whether it's worth saving a hundred dollars or so with early morning departures and inconvenient connections. For me, having to head for home before daybreak with too short/too long connections is no way to end a vacation.

Keep checking the airline websites directly for those with schedules/connections you like, as you can mix/match better than with the sites that search multiple airlines.

Honestly with your conditions and wanting a flight out of Nice..... I would book sooner rather then later. You aren't flexible on dates, you aren't flexible on destinations etc....

But expecting someone on here to "predict" airfares is probably not realistic.... None of us have managed to finish that Harry Potter class on predicting the future.

(And it's really not nice to "lecture" those who do try to help ).

Thanks everyone for the great advice.You all helped me a lot and I did go ahead and book today with 1800flyeurope. The flight that I wanted last week had actually gone up about $25.00.. They said it was an additional fuel charge imposed by the airline over the weekend.I got cold feet when I saw the airfare was on the way up. I got really good connections except for the early morning flight out of Nice but there were just not a lot of options there.I really didn't expect a prediction but just wondered what others had paid. Sorry if somone thought I was lecturing,it was not my intention. To many years writing bank letters I guess.LOL!