Holiday prices fit for a president
With all due respect to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, travelers don't see much to celebrate on Presidents Day this year.
Airfares and lodging rates are soaring around the third Monday in February, when Presidents Day is observed. Now, some travelers are changing their plans to avoid the holiday -- even if they have to take extra vacation days to do so.
Presidents Day isn't thought of as a major holiday, but it has become big business for the travel industry, with the largest crowds at ski resorts and Caribbean destinations. In 2007, the long weekend around Presidents Day drew more bookings than Labor Day weekend for online travel agency Orbitz.com, making it the fifth-busiest holiday weekend of the year.
Many schools close for the holiday or the whole week, prompting families to travel, and Valentine's Day this year falls on the Thursday before the holiday, encouraging people to take a long weekend. This year, other factors are driving prices higher, too. Because of tight capacity, firm demand and rising fuel costs, airfares for February and March are 7 percent to 12 percent higher than they were a year earlier, says Rick Seaney, chief executive of FareCompare.com, which tracks ticket-price changes. "It's the trifecta," he says. "The environment is ripe for an increase."
Fuel costs have been especially significant this month, as airlines have been alternately raising and rolling back fuel surcharges. "Our fuel prices today are roughly 50 percent to 60 percent higher than a year ago this time," says Tim Smith, a spokesman for AMR Corp.'s American Airlines, which last week doubled its fuel surcharge to $40 round-trip, only to return it to $20 in order to remain competitive.
The cost of travel is driving some people to adjust their plans. Christine DeLoach of New York wanted to visit friends in Dallas that weekend, but she says she couldn't find anything under $600. (The fares have since dropped.) "I was like, 'I don't think so.'" She rescheduled for the following weekend and obtained a $299 fare -- but to get it, she had to return Monday afternoon, using a vacation day at work.
Eric Madrid of Menifee, Calif., is more fortunate. His children, whose elementary school has a year-round schedule, are off for the entire month of February. The family of five is taking a 10-day road trip that includes the Grand Canyon and a visit to family in Waco, Texas, during the early part of February -- avoiding holiday crowds and traffic. "We have enough traffic here in Southern California," Mr. Madrid says.
Anyone flying at peak times around the Presidents Day weekend -- Friday to Sunday or Monday -- is likely to pay high fares. Though some airlines are running sales, the lowest fares are often scarce or unavailable on the holiday weekend. JetBlue Airways Corp. Tuesday announced a four-day sale for flights in four major regions, including the Caribbean, but it cautioned in the fine print that the fares might not be available for trips between Feb. 12 and 28.
Still, "there are good deals out there," Mr. Seaney says, "if you're willing to travel on days you don't want to." For instance, JetBlue's fare sale includes a flight from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport to Aruba. On Tuesday, you could book that flight on JetBlue's site for $265 round-trip, taxes included, if you traveled from Feb. 5 to Feb. 12. The price of a Feb. 14-21 trip: $865. Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays are typically the cheapest days to fly.
A flexible schedule is also critical for travelers trying to score a hotel deal. Rates at the Four Seasons Nevis start at $795 a day the week of Feb. 16-22, then return to $695 afterward. At the Ritz-Carlton Grand Cayman, rooms for Presidents Day weekend start at $899. If you can get away the previous weekend, that same room type -- garden-view with a balcony -- is $549.
Value-minded skiers may face the same issues. A one-bedroom unit at Timberline Condominiums in Snowmass Village, Colo., over Presidents Day weekend Tuesday was $490 per night, with a required five-night stay; the rate for the previous weekend, Feb. 9-12, was $355, with only three nights required.
John Tiernan of Bedford, N.Y., knows to avoid the Presidents Day crush. "A few years back, I went to France that week thinking it would be a different story, and it was the same thing," he says. He plans on going downhill skiing in the Western Adirondacks the week before Presidents Day weekend and the week after. Just not that weekend.