Hi - I'm just starting to plan a 10-night West Coast trip (we live in CT) for next April. I will have many questions I'm sure as I plan this trip, but for now I want to get the best possible air fare and I need some help narrowing down the options before I can even begin to research fares. We are totally flexible as to travel days and can fly to & from several locations. We will be going to San Francisco, San Jose, Torrance, and Las Vegas; we want to hit Vegas on weekdays but otherwise we can do them in any order. So here are the options:

Leaving From - Hartford CT, NYC, or Boston

Flying to - LA, San Francisco, or Las Vegas

Doing 10 nights the options for leaving/returning are:

Sunday/Wednesday; Monday/Thursday; Tuesday/Friday; Wednesday/Saturday; Thursday/Sunday; Friday/Monday; Saturday/Tuesday

This is just too many options to research. Can anyone suggest which departure and arrival locations are most likely to have the best fares or which travel days are most likely to have the best fares?

Finally, any advice on the best time to book for next April? Should I book what I find now or wait a few months?

Thanks in advance for any help!

You can search travelocity (and I think orbitz) with the option of "choose any date" and narrow it down by month. There is also an option of chosing airports within 70 miles of the one you enter. This means you still have to play with the starting/ending cities but at least it cuts down on having to enter billions of start/end dates.

I would wait a few months before booking (look for the spring deals) but start your research now--you never know if there is a great deal lurking.

Also if you do fly into San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose (assuming you have a rental car) are close by and can have way cheaper prices then SFO.

A couple of years ago we were flying from San Francisco to Hartford and were quoted around $300. We switched it from San Jose to Rhode Island and flew for $118!

OH thanks a bunch LOL .. I will add Oakland, San Jose and Rhode Island to the list! Seriously, thanks for the search info, I don't normally have date flexibility when I book flights so I didn't realize I could search that way.

It's still pretty early for tickets. I would probably concentrate on Hartford if that airport is conveninent to you. Besides having Southwest fly out of it, the other major airlines often have fares that are lower than flying our of NY or Boston.

Southwest often has $99 ew Coast to Coast fares. I'm pretty sure American has decent deals every so often out of Hartford.

Expedia used to have a really useful flight calendar that showed the lowest fare between two cities for each day. But they seemed to have removed it. But as mentioned above, Travelocity and Orbitz have similar features. Another useful tool is the Fare Alert from Travelocity. Sign up for a number of different cities and they will email you when the price drops.

Jet Blue has flights from JFK to Oakland airport at reasonable prices.

mcqueeney449,

I'm curious. Other than flight options, why are you going to San Jose and Torrance?

Curious

Curious, I was wondering the same thing. Oh well....

Speaking of JetBlue, for southern CA travel, there are non-stops between JFK and Long Beach (which is also served by American, America West and Alaska).

Curious - We have friends in San Jose and family in Torrance that we want to visit. San Francisco & Vegas are just for fun

Glo - Thanks for the Jet Blue suggestion! Since they seem to price everything one way I may fly us into Oakland and out of Las Vegas. I'll keep an eye on the prices for a couple months.

Jet Blue also services Las Vegas.

The few times I have checked it is often cheaper to fly into Oakland than San Fran so do keep it in mind.

The date flexibility is really helpful - I really enjoyed playing with and getting the best deal.

One other thing in favor of Oakland over San Francisco airport. My boss flies up regularly and says that SF is much more likely to be fogged in than Oakland and they are both about equidistant from the city center of SF.

Torres,

" San Jose, Las Vegas, and SF are all fun cities with plenty to do."

You are right about Vegas and San Francisco, but San Jose as a "fun city"???

mcqueeney449,

You will be much happier basing out of San Francisco, believe me.

Curious

Thanks again for all the great info. I will keep an eye onprices and probably wait a few months to book but it looks like JetBlue from JFK to Oakland and then from Vegas back to JFK will be the best bet for us. Being able to fly home from Vegas rather than driving back to San Francisco/Oakland area is really going to save us some time to do other things!

I think our rough itinerary will be ...

Fly into Oakland

Spend 3 nights in San Francisco

Spend 1 night in San Jose (at friends house / meeting their new baby)

Drive down coast stopping for 1 night somewhere

Finish coast drive to Torrance & spend 2 nights w/ family

Drive to Vegas and stay 3 nights

Fly home from Vegas

I would of course appreciate any comments anyone has on this but it is just a rough draft at this point. I plan to do a lot more research and then post something more specific for all you great fodorites to comment on. Thanks again for the help so far!