jfitzjr

my wife, 13 year old twins (boy and girl) and I are planning to travel to Rome/Tuscany in late June '06, returning around July 2 or 3. In shopping airfares from Newark, Philly or JFK (they all work for us), nonstop R/T fares are now in the $1050 - 1450 range per person. Am I wise to wait a month or two and see if fares will drop appreciably, or will this still be the going rate in late winter or early spring? I don't want to be penny -wise and pound foolish -- I know italy in June is a popular destination, and don't want to be disappointed, because our available travel dates are otherwise limited. Do we book fares now?

Also, we are considering renting a car at Fiumicino, and heading north toward Florence, perhaps with a couple of nights in Montalcino or Siena en route. We understand we should keep the car out of the cities, so we'd return the care to the airport in rome and rely on train/cabs for our last few days in Rome.
Any thoughts? thanks.

wliwl

That seems pretty high. We bought our tickets in 2005 on Feb 15 (to Paris from JFK)for $842 ea and they only went up after that. Maybe you should watch for a couple weeks. It's a crap-shoot, isn'tit???

Midnightsun

jfitzjr I'd agree with the idea of not driving in Rome. Our hotel (Alimandi) included an airport pick-up and return at no charge, and we used the return to pick up a rental car and drive north to Tuscany (did this both in 2001 and 2005). I'd agree with the previous poster that fares might come down. One offer you might look into if you want to add another destination is SAS. Their early bird fares out of Newark are about $940 to Stockhol and/or Copenhagen. Add on $99 and they'll give you a round trip to Milan (but alas, not Rome), and you could see acouple of days in a Scandinavian capital and then head south through Tuscany to Rome. Incidentally, the Tuscan hill towns make great bases for exploring Florence, Siena, Pisa, etc.

rkkwan

I don't think you'll get much lower fares for those dates. Flying to Italy is always more expensive than places like London or Paris, and late June is getting close to the peak season.

Having said that, I think you can wait a little. I doubt the fares will go higher between now and say early March either.

And don't worry about your trip being ruined. Worse case is that you pay the same and fly a one-stop.

francophile03

Those fares sound pretty high for your part of the US. From the west coast it's actually about the same.

molly_k

Actually, we just booked our airfare to Rome and out of Venice from Washington D.C., and we paid about $1100 pp. I had been watching the airfare religiously since last fall, and I was starting to notice some subtle climbs in the rates. (I was keeping an eye mainly on expedia and orbitz.) In fact, one flight I was going to book ended up going up by one hundred dollars a ticket, so I decided to book a different one last weekend. I am not saying you need to book immediately, but I do not think that they are going to go down at this point. Good luck!

rbnwdln

Well, I DO think they may go down somewhat, but the $1010 flight on Northwest Airlines I've been watching was listed at almost $5,000 RT on Kayak this morning!!!!!!!!! Uh, I think I'll wait!

Henry

jfitzjr,
Try your trip the other way around. Land in Rome and go directly to Florence, an hour and a half by train, after Florence rent the car for tuscany. This avoids a long drive when jet-lagged. You can return the car in Orvieto and train to Rome, about and hour and fifteen minutes. e-mail me for suggested day trips in southern Tuscany.

nmilller1950

Have you thought about flying into London or Paris (much cheaper than Italy) and then taking a smaller European airline to Rome or Venice? Try www.easyjet.com.

MarcoB

The fare is ok, i don't think you could find any better.
About Montepulciano or Montalcino please visit www.myowntuscany.com, maybe you could find something interesting.In Montepulciano we have a wine farm holiday featuring cottages for 2 or 4 people starting from 35 Euro night p.p. including
wine and olive oil tasting.

Ciao

Marco