Ticket Prices

As many of you have noticed, tickets to Europe in August cost a small fortune, around 1500 dollars, at the moment. This is far higher than anything I've ever paid, and I've traveled in August twice before, so I've been hoping this is temporary. When we planned our wedding last August, all we had to rely on were current tickets (then around 1000 dollars, even for pretty much last minute flights), and the following chart of historic ticket prices, which showed that summer peak prices drop in mid-July, and August is about the same as the rest of the non-winter months (here,  http://www.hotwire.com/tripstarter/details.jsp?inputId=tripstarter-index&originAirportCode=&destinationAirportCode=&contextDomId=&origCity=Salt+Lake+City%2C+UT+-+%28SLC%29&destCity=Paris%2C+France+-+%28CDG%29 , they didn't have slc-warsaw so I did slc-paris as a proxy).

Unfortunately today I ran across a saddening article indicating that things might have changed for the worst since I last took a summer flight: here , or http://www.smartertravel.com/travel-advice/europe-airfares-next-spring-and-summer-buy-or-wait.html?id=6194716. This was written in 2010, but predicted based on general trends / the Olympics that 2012 prices would be roughly where they are now.

Unfortunately the wedding date is fixed, and I couldn't do it any later anyways without running into visa problems, and any earlier I couldn't really take the time off (plus Rilee, Alex, and Brynna couldn't make it!), so fate has deemed it be August.

So what does this all mean? Well, the one positive takeaway from the first article is that these first published prices are the maximum; there might be sales sometime before May. I think for those of nerves of steel you have until 21 days out to watch for sales before tickets are guaranteed to get higher, and for those that want to have settled plans further ahead, June seems like a very reasonable time to make a final decision.

But most of all, I'd like to repeat that this wedding is totally optional. We would welcome with open arms anyone that wants to come visit during a cheaper time, or anyone who wants to celebrate with us next time we are both in the states.

Love,
Travis