If I had any money I would definitely be looking at that Australia trip.. dang car just cost me $500.

That's getting better. Early 90s, you could get from San Jose to John Wayne for $29 one way. Made for some cheap group offsites to Disneyland.

Maybe if they weren't so fucking greedy to begin with, they wouldn't be in this mess. I cant wait for United, Delta, and all the worthless airlines to get a clue and realize that charging for what used to be basic items is conterproductive to them keeping afloat. I've been on Aeroflot flights with better gate personnel than these bozo's have.

Great, now I just need a company that gives you more than 10 days off a year.

@Radi0logy: Yeah, that Australia trip has me wondering just how pregnant I have to be before they won't let me on the airplane!

@TemplaEuryclea:

Seperating those items allows them to charge cheaper for the actual ticket, and allow people to spend less if they cant afford the ticket with all those things rolled in.

@Saboth: Come join mine, we get 3 weeks, even for brand-new employees, and most of our sites also shut down for a week @ Christmas. Its considered holiday so you get full pay, so its like an extra week of vacation time.

@TemplaEuryclea:

PREACH TO THE CHOIR !

That evil human emotion, GREED is driving humanity towards a downward spiral.

No one wants to see the bigger picture, this has definitely been the century of the Self. Not enough humans have a communal sense of mind and motivation.

It reflects in our political system, or business and society. So death to us ALL. Bleak but partially true.

I LOVE that picture.

And I'll be restricting all my current travel to work or by car TYVM. The airlines need to reassess their situation, and stop trying to bend the Consumer over a barrel.

"You could buy shrimp for [i]your whole unemployed[/i] block, [i]y'know, if you still had a job[/i]."

There, fixed.

Actually, I still have a job, but you get my drift.

@Radi0logy:
Headed there next week. Late last year Virgin announced new service between LAX and Sydney, and tickets were insanely cheap. Like $100 each way. With taxes and fees, came out to $500 round trip. And now hotels are cheap and the exchange rate is good.

Might be the last time I can afford such a trip though, at least for a while.

We stopped flying last year, partly because we had a then 1 year old, partly because there are so many great destinations in driving distance but mostly because of the cost and hassle of flying.

We have had several great vacations over the past year and a half all without flying. We have one, maybe two more vacations planned this year and we will not be flying then either.

@WatchOutNow: Amen brother (or sister), I'm so tired of the "I'm going to get mine, f everybody else" attitude that seems to be the societal norm for the last several decades, isn't it time to move beyond that, especially seeing the financial damage it has been doing lately.

You couldn't pay me to deal with a TSA laptop-snatching luggage-stealing two-hours-in-line-for-your-protection security-theatering powertripping twenty-something just to be miserable stuffed in a flying sardine can with wailing babies and recycled air and potentially be stuck on a grounded plane for 8 hours without food or bathroom access.

I'm planning a week-long trip to Tokyo this August, and it's $200 cheaper per person compared to last year, when I went at the same time. I won't be surprised if it drops further.

I got a good deal from Continental a couple weeks ago. My g/f and I are flying from Newark to Bristol, UK then from Shannon, Ireland back to Newark. When we originally planned the trip, we were looking at about $750 each. Then it dropped to $650. Then it dropped to $620, then to $610. It stayed at $610 for a few weeks and we decided to buy our tickets. When we bought them, the price suddenly fell to $480

We just got back from Cozumel, MX. We went because it was such a great deal. We got a great deal on Orbitz--8 days, 7 nights at an all-inclusive oceanfront resort plus airfare from Detroit for only $725 per person.

When we initially found the deal, it was even cheaper--only $575 per person, but unfortunately that deal only stuck around for a few hours--by the time we decided to book it was gone.

If I could afford to travel, I would, but I definitely can't right now. In the fall, my job was "re-evaluated" and I went from full-time to part-time (I lost 20 hours a week, vacation time, sick days and all my benefits). My fiancé started a new job in January, so he doesn't have any vacation time either, but at least he's got a job.

Definitely. Planned an Alaska cruise this year, great low price on the cruise. Too bad excursions are still expensive. Thankfully, I was able to redeem miles for most of my flights.

JetBlue has a New England fare sale going on- LAX to Providence, RI for $90 O/W. I nearly shat myself, since I paid over $250 O/W for that flight last year. The promotion ends before I need to fly, but hopefully I'll still get a bargain for the Sept. flight I need to take.

You couldn't pay me to go to Providence, RI

I'm not sure what moron thought the Virgin America pricing was a sale. As much as I love them, I know I've done $49 one way trips from LAX to SFO and back before sale or not, and I see it's still $49. Even from Orange County.

Now the Australia flights? Time to consider vacation planning...:)

I'm going from San Diego to San Francisco next month. $140 on Virgin for the whole trip, taxes and fees included. Add in savings from crashing on friends couches, and this vacation's a steal.

We're planning a two-for-one trip for two separate family gatherings in May. We just bought tickets from San Francisco to Narita, Japan, to Inchon, Korea, and then back on United. Total ticket price was a little over $1k apiece, with about 35% of that being taxes, duties, fees, etc.

It's cheaper than we expected, but not what I think of as super crazy fire-sale cheap. But then again, this is the first time I've bought tickets going to two separate countries across the pacific, so what do I know?

We recently booked a trip to Cape Town, South Africa. Normally, flights are around $2K+; we got ours after fees for $1200. Given the strength of the dollar against the SA Rand (their currency), and the fact that Cape Town in general is affordable (once you're there), it's shaping up to be an awesome vacation. I'm just dreading the ~30-hour plane flight...

@TideGuy: Fortunately, it's just short drive from Providence to Worcester, the Arm Pit of New England.

@Applekid: So you'll be walking? :)

$250 round trip from Orlando to Las Vegas booked on Southwest. I paid $380 for the same trip booked 5 months in advance last year.

I'm in the 'too broke to travel' category. Which is a damn shame because they are giving away tickets with these prices. I could go to London soooo cheap and I'm dying too.

@legwork: 2~3 years ago on a good day you could fly $39 one-way from SNA to SJC on southwest

I make regular flights from Oklahoma to Pennsylvania and am paying about $200 less for the flight now that I was last year. I couldn't be more pleased, although I am nervous about taking my concert instrument through security.

@bonzombiekitty: I noticed the Continental promo, too. If you're near one of their hubs and were thinking of going to Europe, worth checking out. I don't know if they're having 'sales' on non-Europe destinations, but fares to Asia seem to be a bit lower than this time of year last year.

The problem many of us run into is that if you live in a small town with access to only a regional airport you almost always have to switch airlines between flights.

@Jubilance22: May I ask where you work?

Just bought 3 tickets from Phoenix to Detroit for $99 each way on Southwest - nonstop. Paid $225 ea. for the same trip just this past October on Northwest.

I have been able to find flights from Denver to various places in Europe (Spain, Russia, and Ireland) for less than $500 including taxes. Flights to Germany are in the $500-$600 range and there's even a flight to Singapore for $800. Not that I'm going to any of these places anytime soon, but there are good deals to be had!

According to Kayak.com, I can get a $470 flight to Tokyo with 500 WORTH OF TAXES AND FEES. WTF!?

This got me worried that maybe the price on the trans-atlantic flight I booked a few weeks ago has gone down, and maybe I actually should have considered that slightly-annoying orbitz price drop thing (instead of booking directly through the airline)...... nope. Price went up $700 since I bought my ticket. Looks like price schedules from previous years are still operating in some markets.

@oranges w cheese - maybe that's the airline version of artificially discounting the product price by elevating the shipping charges?

Is that sand... or cookie dough?! God, I'm hungry.

Could the low rates be a precursor move to cutting less used routes again? I'd like to think the price fluctuation tide is finally eroding the steep airfare cliffs, but who knows. It's likely they won't learn and ticket prices (sans specials) will stay high.

Booked NY to Cairo (Egypt) for $1200 back in december, and they moved our flight by about 12 hours. We waited to see if it would move again before we made any changes, lo and behold, the price dropped from 1200 to 600 last week, so we cancelled full refund since they changed it so much, and re-booked for half the price!

@Oranges w/ Cheese: I work for a defense contractor.

@Jubilance22: Such bragging should only be allowed if you are a hiring manager of some sort, with a roster full of openings :p

@SuryaGlabrio: Too broke to travel is when I ALWAYS go. Somehow I leave with no money and no job and come back and everything works out.
No clue why...
I'm a frugal pragmatic person but for some reason when it comes to travel, the more ridiculous the arrangement, the more likely I am to say F it and go.

$1575 - MIA to Istanbul, return Bangkok - MIA 6 weeks later. Can I grab someone's credit card number now? Also maybe for the trans-Siberian train?

@TideGuy:

One less losah for us, ha ha!

Last week I flew from Orlando to Baltimore/Washington and back for about $150. Both flights were non-stop.

Outgoing was at 8:15pm on a Saturday, and the Return was at 6:15am the following Wednesday. Neither are ideal times for flying, but hey, cheap is cheap.

Oh, and it was Southwest. Love them.

Looks like the days of "It's cheaper to drive," have been usurped, even if only temporarily.

@kev313: I'm not a hiring manager, but I know we have a TON of openings, especially in CE,CS, and EE. We have some limited openings in finance, business development, and HR. Oh and these are openings all across the US.

@Jubilance22: Oh, and systems engineering too. We need a lot of those.

A couple of weeks ago I decided to go for a little weekend getaway the next weekend. Seattle, LA, SF, Austin, Boston were all more expensive than I wanted to pay. And Paris was crazy cheap compared to them. So I went for the weekend, my first trip there. Had a fantastic time. I'd do it again in a heartbeat.