Airfares in April...
 

Hi,

I'm planning to go to Paris & London on April 22 for about 10 days. I thought the peak season doesn't start until May, but the lowest fares I found is $617! (flight out of NY to CDG, leave from LHR to NY). I also searched on a RT from NY-LHR, it's still around $560. Do you think the price will come down later on or should I book it now?

If you have looked at both consolidator and aggregator sites and that is the best fare you have found then unless there is a sale AND you know when that sale is AND the sale fits your travel dates I would buy the ticket now.

I'm wondering the same thing. I'm looking at Good Friday long weekend.

Non-stop flights are actually about $800.

Also leaving from NYC.

I called 800 Fly Europe and their fares are not really any better.

Seems quite high to me, I must admit. But it's unclear if the fares will come down.

Out of curiosity, I looked up my price for JFK/LHR on AA May 20-30 last year.

I paid about $463.

Don't understand what's going on this year.

$600-ish is a shoulder season fare, peak season would be about $300 more, probably.

What apparently has happened is that airlines have cut back on the number of seats in order to maximize efficiency so flights are more likely to be full, and there are fewer flights.

Also, the favorable exchange rate for those using the Euro vs. the US dollar may be increasing the amount of traffic flying westbound which, of course, has to fly back.

But you'd think that Memorial Day weekend should be even more expensive (I flew back on Memorial Day last year). It looks to me that this year's airfares are at least $100 more than last year's.

I thought that my Jan. airfare to Paris was not unreasonable (about $435), but it turned out to be about $50 more than last year's (about 10% increase) -- both were for MLK weekend, and were basically the same airline and flights.

I know one can't draw too many conclusions from limited data, but I'm wondering about the same questions.

April is a high travel month for families (Spring Break.) I'm also headed to London in April, and I went ahead and booked the flight I wanted (nonstop) for around $725. Seats were filling up on this particular flight, and this was a month ago!