Flights to New Orleans - Outrageous!

[BSBRose21]

So I screwed up and still have not booked my airline tickets from Wisconsin to New Orleans for my cruise that leaves on the 26th. Right now prices are $400 a person for a 2 1/2 flight..uggh!!

 

My Dad was having some scheduling issues so wasn't sure if he was going to be able to leave on the 25th until this weekend.

[TruckerDave]

So I screwed up and still have not booked my airline tickets from Wisconsin to New Orleans for my cruise that leaves on the 26th. Right now prices are $400 a person for a 2 1/2 flight..uggh!!

 

My Dad was having some scheduling issues so wasn't sure if he was going to be able to leave on the 25th until this weekend.

 

 

$400 from Wi to New Orleans this late? BOOK THEM NOW.

I don't know where you are leaving from but I just did a quick check from Minny/St Paul on delta about $527 (if you are close to there). and United from Chicago starts at $400 and goes up. (used Feb 25-Mar 3 as test dates)

[KristyM79]

I'm flying in from Detroit and flights were over $500 per person, which is ridiculous. It was about the same to Miami and Ft. Lauderdale for March. I regularly fly to Florida and those prices are crazy. I'm not sure why they're so much. I have lots of airline miles to use, so I just used them for the NOLA flight.

[erinmarie424]

I would be ecstatic if I found airfare to NO for $400 pp. Right now we're looking at about $500 out of CVG. We could fly out of Dayton if we wanted to leave NO at 6:30 am or land at midnight for about $100 less.

 

We typically research the airfare cost before we pick our port - but we just really wanted to go to NO for a couple days pre-cruise so will have to accept the higher cost to get there this time.

[ebbinns]

Back in the late summer I booked flights from Chicago Midway on Southwest to NOLA for spring break. $340 for direct flights, but they've now gone up to around $700. I'd say the $400 is as good as you're going to get and it will only go up from there.

[kycalgal]

It's crazy expensive to fly, but unless you're up for the drive, it's worth booking. We live in Louisville, KY and it's high from here. I thought I'd be smart, take a book, and go Greyhound last Sept. I'm a seasoned traveler, but hadn't taken a bus in the good 'old USA in a while. Ouch. A 19 hr trip took 40 hours, and it was not pleasant. Seats were not comfortable, even the 2nd hour. Buses were hours late, and did not make connections. Re-routing was 10 hours later once. Some stations were clean, others were NOT. Transfers were difficult because loudspeakers were muffled or garbled. It was not better than the developing country travel I've done. :-(

I flew home on an expensive 1 way ticket! And we're driving our own car this time to NOLA!

[Lynda59]

Flying everywhere is getting ridiculous. Keep in mind that prices now include taxes and fees as of last week.

[scullymom]

You just made me feel better about my flight in April. I found $287 on Airtrain from Detroit. We took the layovers but I thought it was worth it.

[cruise_control]

$305 with tax from KC. We considered driving, but dreaded driving home after a nice vacation.

[KristyM79]

You just made me feel better about my flight in April. I found $287 on Airtrain from Detroit. We took the layovers but I thought it was worth it.

 

$287 is pretty good. I'm guessing timing has a lot to do with it too. We decided pretty last minute to do a cruise and wanted to go in winter. We couldn't go in Jan-Feb, so March was our best bet. We didn't want to wait till April either. The prices to Fort Lauderdale/Miami were about the same, so we chose New Orleans to explore a new city. I used to live in Florida, so sailing out of there really isn't a big novelty for me.

[erinmarie424]

our preferred flights are down to $449 total. Since it's Delta we get a free bag each, which means $399 for purpose of comparison to prices on other airlines. We may just book at this price and be happy knowing we have the schedule we want.

 

Glad to hear there are others getting decent prices!

[RoyalDiamond]

We considered Amtrak from Chicago to New Orleans...$115 each way for the overnight, 19-hour trip with no change of trains. However, we have decided to fly since we fly free as airline employees. We are very lucky to have this perk, as it saves us quite a bit. We are "standby" naturally, so if the flights are full, we'll use the train. But so far, everything looks good...keep in mind fares are probably higher during Feb/Mardi Gras.