<p>To help those buying tickets and/or thinking about sending their kid there:
What are you paying?</p>
<p>Just paid $669 and feel like a winner. Small town to big city far far away. Picked Friday return to save almost $200. We'll miss her, but she can do some homework while the dorm is empty.</p>
<p>Believe it or not, I feel like we got a good deal based on earlier tickets
Walla, walla to DFW
$669</p>
<p>ALaska online but with help to use airfare from a previous ticket.</p>
<p>I used frequent flyer points + cash & got a ticket for $113 all inclusive on NWA. That's with a November 30th return! Nashville to Detroit, nonstop.</p>
<p>I got the Christmas ticket in August. $10 ... frequent flyer on AA. This one has a connection at O'Hare. I bought travel insurance for $13, just in case the snow decides to make an appearance.</p>
<p>My credit cards come in handy! I use them like cash & get ff points.</p>
<p>Winner!
where were you going to and from?</p>
<p>I updated with the info. I did get lucky!</p>
<p>kelsmom, I wonder if you would mind elaborating on just how you do that, and with which credit card? I've never quite gotten the hang of frequent flyer miles, my eyes start to glaze over reading the fine print. However, D is doing 3 round trips this fall and I'm getting tired of paying the full fare.</p>
<p>Bought the tickets in July.</p>
<p>Oakland to Long Beach on JetBlue, leaving Tuesday and coming home Sunday, $209 round trip.</p>
<p>Of course, I also have to pay $58 for the shuttle to and from the airport.</p>
<p>We use 2 frequent flyer cards, currently American & Northwest. For each, we got 25,000 bonus miles at sign up, enough for one ticket. The fee was waived for the first year on the AA card, and we pay an annual fee now ($59, I think). The NWA card was fee free, I think. We charge everything we can, paying the bill in full every month. At one time, we could even do our kids' private school tuition on the credit card, so we banked the miles for college flights. AA offers a free ticket at 25k miles, but they can be hard to get. Last Thanksgiving, I had to use 50k to get D's roundtrip. We have moved to NWA for the most part now, because the Perksaver deal allows more flexibility. We can pay for the ticket with a mix of miles and money (you can check sample fares by going to the nwa website & searching for perksaver worldperks fares). </p>
<p>I am considering canceling the AA card and going to a Southwest card. They have a really good program, and you can get enough points for a free ticket right away. Another good program is the Starwood Points credit card - it's the hotel chain. You can convert their points into airline frequent flyer miles. Another option is Amex Gold Rewards, but I think you have to be invited with a mailing (50k points that you can put into any airline program). Maybe someone has experience with these cards?</p>
<p>For some airlines, you can check availability & points necessary for award flights even if you aren't eligible for an award flight. Go to the airline websites for the airlines you'd be using, then try to search for award flights. You'll get an idea of how easy/hard it is to use points to book a flight (it varies by route - I am lucky to be in a hub city). You can look into credit cards based on the airlines you'd be likely to use. Another good resource is flyertalk.com - go to the Forums section & look at the airline programs threads.</p>
<p>Less than $200 from Columbus, OH to Chicago. </p>
<p>Some people are saving money by going through Cheap</a> Tickets for College Students and Faculty: Airfare, Rail and Hostel Deals. We booked directly with the airline online and got a cheaper rate, but others I know are saving money going through that site.</p>
<p>DD bought her own ticket to visit old friends in Canada, not Tgiving there, so not as popular a destination- cheaper to do that than come home!</p>
<p>I haven't personally found the studentuniverse airfare tickets to be such a great deal. And sometiimes they route through several cities. I bought Thanksgiving tickets a while ago (August) and got Weds afternoon- Sunday (NOLA-Atl) for $294. Haven't gotten xmas tix yet as dont know DS's exam schedule.
I've net had luck using FF miles for the holidays-- they are usuallly blacked out. So you guys who could use them are lucky!</p>
<p>Thanksgiving...$140 round trip from San Jose to San Diego. Christmas $400 round trip, San Jose to Hartford. Free ticket using FF miles from Greensboro to Hartford. Flights were all booked in July.</p>
<p>If you're a platinum FF miles holder with USAir, there are no blackout dates.</p>
<p>I like our Captital One card because it is so flexible. We also use this card for everything like Kelsmom and pay it off in full each month. No annual charge. No blackout dates and you can choose to either buy the airline ticket (with your Capital one card) on any airline and have it reimbursed or call their 800 number and have them book it. You can also use your points for any travel expenses like hotels or rental cars. Another bonus is that the points never expire so if you don't use your charge card often, you can still build the points up over a longer period of time without worrying about losing them.</p>
<p>I use Capital One, also. S's school allows us to charge tuition/fees R/B, everything. I like the fact that points don't expire. (I think we have enough for 10 tickets. . .)</p>
<p>S doesn't come home for Thanksgiving--this year we had our "Thanksgiving Dinner" in August before he left. (The holiday isn't very big in our family--we don't live near any relatives, and with Xmas break only a few weeks away, it's not worth traveling long distance for a short break).</p>
<p>S isn't coming home for Thanksgiving, but we had to pay $400 for his one-way ticket home Dec. 21 on Southwest Airlines. It's a black-out date on Southwest, and he cannot come home sooner than that because he has a final exam on Saturday the 20th. Fortunately we are using half of a "Rapid Rewards" free ticket to get him back to school in late January.</p>
<p>Since summer, we've been using our SWA credit card for everything, including tuition and room & board. We already have a few free airline tickets in our account, one of which we're using for DH to fly to Maryland for parent's weekend next week.</p>
<p>My daughter is is going from NY to ATL for under $300. I told her I would pay half.
She is going to her friend's house - not home.</p>
<p>My NC daughter - out in rural NC with no big airport never comes home for Thanksgiving. We just can't justify the expense for 4 days especially when Christmas is around the corner.</p>
<p>Check out airfare watchdog. many of the fares are last minute but some are regularly scheduled. Airfare</a> ? Cheap Airfares ? Cheap Airfare Deals
You can sign up for particular airport alerts and they do occasionally have real bargains, unlike studentuniverse.</p>
<p>Bought thanksgiving tickets in August while gas prices were going up. Cleveland to Kansas City round trip for $400. Same flights running $420+ now.</p>
<p>Would like S to buy winter break ticket, but he hasn't done so yet.</p>
<p>My s loves this site Cheap</a> Flights, Airfare, Airline Tickets, Cheap Travel It predicts whether fares will go up or down from the current price based on history and a whole bunch of other variables. IT lets you determind of the current fare is worth buying, or if a better deal is likely to come along soon. Its cool</p>
<p>dragonmom, I also have college kids in Walla Walla. Use Alaska Airlines credit card. The trick is to make the reservations far, far in advance - whether using miles or paying. Alaska takes reservations starting 11 months in advance. I've found it saves money and aggravation to just make the reservations and cancel them if my kids change their minds. Also, in cases where kids wanted to handle it, sometimes they end up getting a ride to Portland or Seattle where the fares are much cheaper. P.S. I love Walla Walla - such a great place to visit!</p>
<p>I saved about $30 using studentuniverse for my daughter's flight from Austin to Chicago next weekend.</p>