Travel plan idea blog

How to make US dollars go further in Europe

Here's a good WFAA article (the Google news feed said it was subscription but I was able to follow the link without trouble - I hope you can also read this article - if you can't it is an AP article but I couldn't find it published anywhere else).

The article notes that while London is most popular with US tourists, it's also very expensive thanks in part to a weak dollar. They recommend getting deals in Croatia, Prague, or Germany (but I really want to visit Germany in winter). Then again, it does seem cheaper to fly to London than any other European city. You might try to get the best of both worlds by flying to London and then traveling around Europe a bit.

We have the London and Amsterdam travel plan, but Amsterdam was mentioned as one of the more expensive destinations. They don't mention the cost of visiting other British cities, but Oxford, York, and Scotland might be a nice addition and a little less expensive than London.

The article I linked to at the beginning lists some new flights but notes that prices are going up despite the greater number of seats:

Delta Air Lines Inc. is continuing to add new routes to second-tier international destinations, including flights from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport to Pisa, Italy, and Bucharest, Romania, as well as from Atlanta to Vienna, Austria, and Prague, Czech Republic. Northwest Airlines Corp. has several new routes and extra flights, including a new Hartford, Conn.-to-Amsterdam route starting July 1 and a second daily nonstop from Detroit to Frankfurt, Germany, operating from May 7 through Oct. 27. Austrian Airlines has a new Chicago-to-Vienna route set to start in May, and Air France will offer a daily Seattle-to-Paris nonstop starting June 11.

They do mention that airlines often have sales in March so perhaps in a week or two we could see better deals.

The article also mentions cruising as a possibility. Cruises typically charge US dollars so you won't get killed on the exchange rate. There are also a few hotels with special US dollar prices to attract American tourists.

Posted by James Trotta at March 10, 2007 11:17 AM | TrackBack