Europe a la Carte Blog

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Update 21 November 2008  - There are still a few £9 rooms available, I just booked 2 nights at the end of April.

Travelodge are selling rooms for £9 for stays from 30 January to 4 May 2009 from 21:00 this evening, Thursday 6 November 2008. £9 is a fantastic price for a ensuite room, with family rooms sleeping up to 2 adults and 2 kids. The £9 rooms will be available at selected hotels on selected nights. Expect the Travelodge site to be very busy, last time they had a £9 room promotion, I had to make several attempts to get onto the site and get through the booking process but I did manage to book a clutch of £9 rooms.

Falkirk Travelodge

I’ve stayed at Travelodges, mainly in Scotland, many times over the last few years and on the whole the accommodation is comfortable and spacious. Not all Travelodges are at service stations off motorways, Travelodge has opened more hotels near city centres recently.

Easyjet is offering free carriage of skis on flights if you book by 14 October 2008 and enter the discount code SKIEASY0809 when you are in the 2nd stage of online booking at the sports equipment section.

Sounds like a pretty good offer if you find a cheap flight from and to your preferred airports with Easjet. At present some airlines like British Airways don’t charge extra for ski carriage but that could change soon as BA is looking at following the low cost airlines lead and making additional charges for carriage of sports equipment.

The Hungarian National Tourist Office is running a Winter promotion where some Budapest hotels offer the third night free you if you pay for 2 nights or the fourth night free if you pay for three nights. More than 60 hotels are taking part in the promotion. Unfortunately I couldn’t ascertain which hotels had which offer until I searched at each hotel individually. The offer is available for stays from 1 November 2008 to 31 March 2008.

Romantic Budapest

Although the three nights for the price of two offer sounds good it’s always worth checking hotel prices with a hotel price comparison site such as HotelsCombined.com. I had quick look and there appear to be quite a few hotels for around £25 a night for a double room.

The Budapest Christmas Market runs from 29 November until 24 December 2008, so you could justify the trip as a Christmas shopping foray.

Budapest is another destination which is on my “would like to visit” list.

Ryanair are offering £1 flights from the UK to destinations all over Europe. I’ve checked and there is some availability of the £1 flights. I found flights from Edinburgh to Pisa and Newcastle to Girona during the second half of November for £1 total charge if:

1 You pay by Visa Electron there is no card handling fee, there’s a £4 charge for other debit and credit cards

2 You only take hand luggage and check in online

3 You travel Monday - Thursday

4 You book 14 days in advance

Leaning Tower of Pisa

The £1 flights are on sale until Sunday 5 October 2008 for flights from 15 October - 16 December 2008 with blackout during the October school holidays.

Update 12 September 2008 - The £9 sale appears to have ended, I did manage to book several nights at the £9 rate although it was difficult to get on to the site,   However there is good availability of rooms for £19 a night for stays from the 1 October 2008 to 31 December if you book at least 21 days in advance

£9 rooms are available on the Travelodge UK site for stays between 1 December 2008 to 22 February 2009 in their Winter Sale. You can purchase online from 06:00 on Thursday 4 September 2008. You need to book at least 70 days in advance and pay in advance.

This is a great offer as you pay per room at the Travelodge, rather than per person, so a family room sleeping up to 2 adults and 2 kids for £9 is amazing.

I’d advise that you to get on the Travelodge site and book as soon as possible as rooms are bound to sell out fast at this low rate.

Iceland Express will offer 3,000 tickets from London Stansted to the Icelandic capitall Reykjavik for only £60 including taxes for one day only, Monday 1 September 2008. Tickets will be available on selected flights and dates. You must book online on 1 September and complete your travel between 15 September 2008 and 31 March 2009.

Sunset in Iceland

There’s no mention of £60 flights for your return flight but evidently prices start from £90 so looks like the cheapest possible return flight would cost £150.

One thing I liked about Iceland Express is that they offer a 50% reduction for children under 12 years of age travelling with an adult. The site also has an interesting blog.

Take to the Skies - Copyright Andrew Hayes

Sometimes, I tend to over-analyse things. This is usually the case when I am searching for cheap airfare! I previously reported my thoughts on Dutch website cheaptickets.nl but I do have another trick up my sleeve. Kayak is a slick and easy-to-use website that allows endless amounts of manipulation to your search results to help you find endless possibilities of flight combinations. I have yet to figure out why they called it Kayak, though. Maybe because it glides easily through the airline reservation systems? Or because it is a tool that is simple, easy, and does exactly what you expect?

Good

- Multilingual service (English, German, French, Spanish, Italian)

- Easy to use controls allow you to select flights within certain timeframes or airline alliances

- Has ‘weekend’ getaway search option

- Flight Buzz section with up-to-the-minute deals

Bad

- Depending on which flight you choose, you might have to register at a new site to actually book (Kayak does not do any of the bookings, they are merely a screening tool.)

Rating out of 10: 9.5

You start but simply defining your search criteria, and then you will quickly be presented with a large amount of results. Then you can use the Filters on the left side of the screen to easily narrow down your choices by Number of Stops, Airline Alliance, Flight Times, Aircraft Type, Trip Duration, or Price Band. It may sound like a lot of choice but really it is easy! Each result has all the necessary details on-screen but by clicking the ‘details’ link, additional information is displayed. You can even click on a flight that you definitely want and it will reconfigure to show all the flights that will pair up with the one you chose. When you are done, click the airfare link and you will be taken to the corresponding website for booking.

Before you buy, be sure to check out our other air travel tips on Europe A La Carte.

I happened upon the website http://www.adayin.com which claims to sell ‘free vacation guides’. Upon further investigation, I have to say I am very impressed! At first I thought they only have guides for Northern Europe and the Mediterranean, but this is simply a bug with the display map as a number of central European destinations can be found in the location list.

Each city is broken down into smaller guides (Factual and Background, What’s to See, Shopping, History and Economy, Art & Culture, Recreation & Sport, Getting Around, Eating Out) but you can download a single PDF containing all sections.

Pros:

• ·Consolidates all types of information into a single document.

• It is Free!

Cons:

• You are required to give some self-identifying information before downloading (Gender, Age Range)

• There is no rating or recommendation on listings.

I think these types of guides are perfect for long weekends or city ‘minibreaks’ where you might not find it justified to buy a full blown travel guide (or if you are like me and lacking bookshelf space). Indeed you might need to do some further research, but A Day In offers a great starting point. However, be sure always to check in with us here at Europe A La Carte to find the cheapest airfare and exclusive tips for authentic travel.

My Crowded Bookshelf - Copyright by Andrew Hayes

Visit Bristol have a “Summer Specials” section in their website with details of hotel offers and discounted attractions tickets. There is also information about festivals and events such as the Bristol Harbour Festival and the Festival of the Tree. I liked the suggestion of a canoe safari to see the wildlife at close quarters at the Slimbridge Wetland Centre. located between Bristol and Gloucester.

Bristol Harbour

I stayed in Bristol in a family room at the Youth Hostel a converted warehouse for a few days with one of our sons a few years ago. The Youth Hostel was in a very central location close to the harbour.

Clifton Suspension Bridge, Bristol

I really liked Bristol, we enjoyed walking around the parks, the harbour and Clifton Bridge. However don’t take your car to Bristol, there’s a congested one way system and it’s expensive to park. Have you visited Bristol, what did you most enjoy about your visit?

SAS have flights from London to Stockholm from £56 and if you arrive during August you qualify for a free 5 day Island Hopper tickets which allows unlimited travel on the ferries of the Stockholm Archipelago. The Hopper Ticket usually costs 340 SEK around £28.

I did a search for availability of the offer price flights departing London on 20 August 2008 and returning on Monday 25 August. The price was £125 for the return flight. However I looked on the Ryanair site for flights on these dates and found a Ryanair flight to Stockholm for around £50 but you have to consider the airports used and the time and expense getting too and from the airport.

It just highlights that you shouldn’t be too impressed when you see a special offer, it’s always worth spending some time looking at alternatives but do weigh up factors such as convenience too.