Leisure tips

TAP Air Portugal is celebrating the new year with a new flight sale offering trips to Europe and beyond starting as low as $379 round-trip.

It’s going to be a great year for airfare with domestic prices predicted to start even cheaper than 2023 and remain low for the next six months.

If you’re seeking a special place for a vacation, honeymoon or business conference, you may just want to consider Maui in 2024. Always a spectacular destination, there is a reason for the saying “Maui No Ka Oi,” which means “Maui is the best.”

JetBlue is welcoming 2024 with a winter sale that has one-way flights to Europe starting at just $299 and flights across the United States starting at under $40. 

It just got easier to visit Greece from the United States. Norse Atlantic Airways, a low-cost airline based in Oslo, Norway, announced a new route between New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport (JFK) and Athens International Airport in Greece on Wednesday. The flight will operate five times per week from May 30, 2024 through Oct. 26, 2024, the airline shared withTravel + Leisure. The new flight has a duration of 9 hours and 35 minutes. Currently, the airline operates service between New York and Athens with a stopover in London’s Gatwick airport for a total duration of 18 hours.  “This launch underscores our commitment to meeting the evolving travel needs of our passengers," Norse Atlantic Airways’ CEO and Founder Bjorn Tore Larsen said in a statement shared with T+L. «We believe this route will not only cater to the demand for travel to Greece but will also create opportunities for cultural exchange and business collaborations between these two vibrant destinations,” 

Sunseeker joins Allegiant’s vast portfolio of ancillary products including rental cars, professional sports packages and more. The airline has been selling hotel rooms to customers on behalf of third parties for more than 18 years.

If traveling more and paying less for flights is on your New Year’s resolution list — you’re in luck.  A new analysis from discount flight booking site Going.com, shared withTravel + Leisure, revealed that airfare has dipped below pre-pandemic prices and also dropped 24 percent from the May 2022 peak of airfares. The company provided evidence of the  international fares dropping such as flights to Paris for $387 and to New Zealand for $686 round-trip.  “2023 has been a return to normalcy when it comes to flight prices, while 2024 is expected to just be normal. The peak of flight prices in May of 2022 have disappeared,” Going.com’s Katy Nastro shared in a statement to T+L.“Looking forward, we don't anticipate any major swings in demand outside of typical peak seasons like the summer or the winter holidays like we saw in the last 18 months where post-pandemic pent up travel demand drove prices upwards.” Naylor analyzed the average price of airfare and tracked a downward trend for 13 of the last 18 months, and that prices are currently down 12 percent from the same time last year.  Economists cite less people traveling for leisure, and a lack of business travel as reasons for the lower airfares.  “It’s a combination of less business travel, as we haven’t seen the rebound to pre-pandemic levels, lower fuel prices, and more capacity as more planes have come online,” KPMG’s Chief Economist Diane Swonk told T+L in an interview.   Southwest Airlines recently described the current level of business travelers flying as “below historical levels” during their October 2023 earnings call.  In addition to airfares trending down, car rental prices dropped 10.1 percent over the last year, according to the recent Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index Report.  

Low-cost Icelandic airline Play is going all out for the end of the year by offering a whopping 50 percent off its already low airfare to Europe.

In a surprise move, the Norwegian Competition Authority has approved the acquisition of Norway’s regional carrier Widerøe by Norwegian for 1.1 billion kroner ($107 million).

Delta has all eyes on Austin next spring with a record flight schedule to the Texas capital.

Popular time-saving service Clear, which advertises to travelers the opportunity to “get to your gate faster" has recently become a topic of conversation online due to longer wait times in comparison to regular security lines. 

Virgin Atlantic will make it easier to fly between the United States and the United Kingdom next summer with added frequencies to both New York City and Boston.

A historic year of strikes has been roiling across hotels in one of the biggest travel markets in the US. Starting in July, thousands of Los Angeles-based hotel employees, including cooks, housekeepers, dishwashers, servers, bellhops, and front desk agents, walked off the job to protest their current working conditions, according to Unite Here Local 11, the union that represents most hospitality workers in Los Angeles.

Weather is the largest disruptor of air travel, according to the Federal Aviation Agency. In fact, 75 percent of all delays are caused by weather, with congestion and mechanical problems being the second and third largest causes of delays.  Now, a new report is here to spotlight which airports are more punctual than others.

Get into the holiday spirit with Spirit Airlines’ flight sale that has trips across the country starting at just $42.

Naturally on a flight to paradise I wouldn't want anything less than a seamless and relaxing travel experience — and thankfully, that's exactly what JSX is offering on its new flight to the Bahamas.

Did Hilton return to Las Vegas, or did it never go away?

Soon fans of Harry Potter and Super Nintendo may have a new Universal theme park across the pond.

A volcano eruption in Iceland Monday night sent lava spewing into the dark sky, forcing the country’s famous Blue Lagoon to once again shut its doors.

Where are travelers planning to go in 2024? I asked some of the sharpest minds in travel to look into their crystal balls and advance bookings to give me a sense of where people are eager to go.

 Broadly speaking, the concept of experiential travel refers to immersive experiences — the kind that aims to forge a deeper connection with a destination than can usually be had from traditional leisure holidays. These often involve an element of adventure, whether physical, cultural or spiritual. According to trend-spotting agency Mabrian, these kinds of trips are now almost as high on the average traveller’s wish list as more conventional holidays — defined as involving activities such as sunbathing, family gatherings or shopping.