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Teresa Plowright
Teresa's Family Vacations Blog

By Teresa Plowright, About.com Guide to Family Vacations

Cheaper Thanksgiving Travel Flights

Sunday November 1, 2009
Travelocity, the giant travel-booking site, has been crunching numbers about airfares for Thanksgiving travel, and has this advice: if you can be flexible with dates, you can save big bucks.

The costliest flight itineraries ($459 on average) are for departure on Nov. 22 and return Nov. 29, or for departure on Nov. 25 and return on Nov. 29. If you can shift your dates to depart Nov. 26 and return Dec. 1, that figure for average fare drops to $280.

At Travelocity.com, when you're searching for airfares, use the online "Flexible Dates" tool to help the system find cheaper alternative dates.

Of course, families are generally limited in their dates by schooldays and work constraints. Still it's good to be aware of how dramatically a fare can change if the date shifts a day or two.

Other farefinders offer some kind of flexible date function too: be sure that whatever site you're using has this feature!

Also be aware that not every airlines shows up in searches at farefinder sites. For Southwest Airlines, for instance, go to Southwest.com for their fares. Check out some other tips for finding airfares.

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Comments
November 2, 2009 at 12:54 am
(1) Mark says:

its informative how the rates can change and one can plan accordingly specially when low on cash

November 2, 2009 at 12:51 pm
(2) Gene says:

be sure to check out all the other travel sites as well because sometimes they offer different deals on the same travel arrangements.

November 2, 2009 at 2:57 pm
(3) Kathleen says:

We combine the cheaper air fares (from travelocity, etc.) with renting an inexpensive timeshare (we use http://www.redweek.com). We like to take a real vacation during Thanksgiving week, but we’ve also rented a timeshare when we were visiting relatives. With all of our kids, I know Grandma and Grandpa were secretly glad not to have everyone underfoot in their house.

November 3, 2009 at 3:08 pm
(4) erictheolson says:

Do these sites figure in bage fare at all?

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