Matthew and I have a trip to San Diego planned next month for a friends wedding. Originally we were going to just drive since it’s just a bit over 7 hours but honestly I am not in the mood to do that long drive and would rather fly. I’ve slowly been searching but knew that with our trip being just a little over a month away I needed to book them before they got to expensive. I put a questionnaire on my Instagram to see what everyone’s favorite go to site was for good deals and after some suggestions I tried them out! Now I spent over 2 hours checking sites looking for the beat deal and finally got one that wasn’t terribly priced with Southwest. Southwest is one of my favorite airlines for a few different reasons, mostly for the affordability and ease when flying. But I did check around before booking and learned a few different things!
For starters, I checked out the typical “save some bucks” sites such as Expedia, Kayak, and Priceline. Before I continue, let me just say Priceline had the cheapest flights out of the 6 different sites I looked at. What I liked about these were you could get cheap flights through different airlines one way without a hassle since there were so many options. The problem I had was the times did not work out with our schedule as we have to be able to drop our son off for school and then our daughter off before heading to the airport. I found tickets for almost half the price I paid but I’m just not a morning person and getting to the airport at 6am didn’t sound to appealing. However, if you are flexible I can not recommend checking out these sites enough. Not only do they have many airline options but some are half off what they are on the direct airline site. They also offer bundles for hotel and rentals which is another huge plus!
Moving on, I then went to a few direct airlines. We knew what airport we wanted to fly out of and of course knew we needed to land in San Diego. American Airlines was our top choice but again way to expensive due to us traveling on a weekend. After looking at a few other ones, Southwest won. Although not as cheap as Priceline, still the cheaper option plus free bags! I recommend making an account so every time you fly you get points which can go towards other flights in the future. What’s better than a free flight!
My #1 tip is to get your trip dates and available times decides then head on over to one of the deal sites then comparing to the direct sites. It takes longer and may seem annoying but can save you hundreds in the end. We are not picky but some people do have preferences for airlines which is another reason I recommend looking at sites like Expedia and Priceline. With so many options, you can compare the prices. I was really surprised some were double compared to others. In the end, Southwest did win! For our hotel, I booked through Hotels.com but will share more on how I find cheap hotels in another blog.
Our trip is booked and we look forward to it!
What is your favorite frugal travel site?
Xoxo
Christian Mulkey
Memories With The Mulkeys 