I’m hoping they drop it too as I have a daughter coming back from England on June 25 and we have another trip planned for June 29. If she is delayed, she’ll miss the other event (and I’ll be mad because I paid a fortune for those tickets and she’ll just use the credit to visit her boyfriend which I DON’T want to pay for!).
With her luck, she’ll do the test wrong or like someone’s husband above, not get the results back in time. She’s somewhat of a space cadet so I can totally see her getting to the airport and saying “Test? What test? I’m not sick. I didn’t need a test to get here.”
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We don’t have international travel plans again until maybe next summer, to Scotland. For now, the big issue is pricing just to fly to Portland or Seattle from Chicago. We want to visit family before D22 goes to school in August, and tickets are over $1k each. It’s really frustrating. I feel like it’s partially the airlines’ way of making up for lost revenue over the past 2 years.
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They are definitely trying to make up that lost revenue. Ditto hotels in popular places that were shut down for a while. Our youngster friends wanted to go to Hawaii this summer and can’t - whatever was available is out of their price range. Instead, they are doing a road trip to SF/Napa and will be camping.
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I haven’t looked at Hawaii recently, but I thought lodging prices hadn’t gone up as much as airfares. It seems that airlines don’t need to compete with each other these days and hotels still do (perhaps not in Hawaii).
Maine establishments are having a terrible time finding seasonal employees due to the housing shortage. Some places are renting hotel rooms for kids, but that gets expensive. A lot of houses that were available for summer rentals in the past are now Air BnBs. Acadia National Park has a serious staffing issue - when they run out of housing for new hirees and subsequent applicants are told the park can’t help with housing, nobody accepts a job! Yikes.
I found the opposite, when I was looking a few months back when Southwest had fares to Hawaii for $99 each way, lower then before the pandemic. I remember booking them at $112 each way. But the hotel prices went up significantly.
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What’s true a few months ago is probably not true now. If you recheck how much your flights cost today, you may be surprised.
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True, the closer you book to your travel dates, the more expensive everything is, I usually look ahead.
Flights to Hawaii are still cheap… some as cheap as flying from SEA to SFO on the same dates… but lack of affordable hotel or VRBO options in Hawaii will quickly make one rethink their Hawaii travel plans. My kid and her buddies toyed with the idea of a bachelorette trip to Honolulu because economy airfares were so affordable, but lodging was way out of their price range.
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It is frustrating. But that is a route that many carriers fly, so you might try looking at their flexible fare calendars. I see tickets for less than $700 in July. It’s hard if you need specific dates or flights, though. There are so many carriers that fly direct from Chicago to Seattle. Delta, Alaska, SW, United, AA, and that’s just the big guys. Probably some regional carriers flying those routes too. Of course, you never know when they’re going to cancel or go on strike. But I think you could get some better prices if you’re really flexible and search on those calendars for the cheaper flights.
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@busdriver11 i read in our local paper that some surveys indicate that Seattle is one of the most popular destinations this summer. I guess that can explain high airfare prices. Good god what was I thinking when I booked our 7-ish am flight to Hawaii this summer… will have to be at the airport at least at 5 am!
I have a 5 am flight to … Baltimore! not even a fun place like Hawaii. But now because of all the delays that are happening I’m glad as if there are delays, I’ll still get there sometime that day. I hope.
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I have a conference in the fall that starts on a Wednesday mid-afternoon (weird, I know). Usually I would fly in Wednesday morning - I’m tempted to pay the extra night in the hotel to arrive Tuesday just so I know I get there. Flight changes and delays might create a disaster day of.
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Tell the truth, even during normal times I’d fly in the day prior ( if it something I wanted or needed to do). But now more than ever, I’d surely fly in early. Unless I was hoping to get out of it.
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My daughter just landed in Switzerland, I hope when she flies back the test requirement is removed. Otherwise she will miss work.
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Will she miss work only if she tests positive? If negative, would she miss work?
We’re leaving on a 7 AM flight to Canada, so have to leave the house at 4:15. But, we need to arrive in time to move in for ShawWife’s residency and arrange meal plans etc. Will be lovely, but the eating is in a big dining hall (huge ceilings 50’?) so that the dining room has big view of the Rockies. There is some outside seating, but in the mountains, the weather is not always hospitable.
We’re planning another trip to Italy. But, my client work has not required much travel at all. I was going to have to fly back from Western Canada to NY for a four hour engagement. Postpone. We are on the short list of two for a German client and the RfP said we’d need to be in Germany for the bake-off. When I pressed them on timing, they said it was fine to do it virtually, which is great as the other two of my team members on this project are on the West Coast. Similarly, a Brazilian client used to have us visit a lot. New engagement will likely be mostly over Zoom, although we need an initial few day trip down there.
Probably, if she tests positive, she won’t fly period. I’m not sure if she brought her work lap top either. Whatever it’s a good excuse for her to miss work, that’s how I see it. Why worry.
But a negative test wouldn’t prevent her from getting to work on time. Correct?
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On another note, we were trying to rent a car a month ago at Calgary airport. There were no cars. Anywhere. Tried Autoslash. Tried Hertz, Avis, Costo Travel directly. None. So, we rented a U-Haul pickup truck. Not as good but OK. The day before the rental, they called to switch the pickup to a cargo van. I tried Autoslash again (a few weeks later) and found some cars, so we switched from truck to car. Just called to cancel the van.
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