We are entering the era of “shoulder season” travel, or vacations booked between high and low seasons, when travel is cheaper, less crowded, and the weather is more favorable.
What was once “one of travel’s greatest secrets”… 1706484788 It’s our busiest time of the year,” said James Thornton, CEO of Intrepid Travel.
Travelers are typically adults without school-age children, but “parents are becoming more and more willing to take their kids out of school to travel,” he told CNBC Travel.
In some places, the changes are so pronounced that Long-established seasonal travel patterns are changing, according to Zicasso’s 2024 Luxury Travel Report. A survey of nearly 200 travel professionals found:
- 41% said high season will be longer and they will travel more during “what was once considered shoulder season”
- 43% say they are increasingly moving to year-round destinations with “no clear off-season”
“we [have] Tourism Authority of Thailand Governor Tapani Khiafaiburu told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on January 18 that there is no longer a low season. Similar annual travel patterns occur in parts of the Caribbean and Mexico.
According to Hopper’s 2024 Travel Outlook, January is the cheapest month for flights in the U.S. through the fall “shoulder season” of September and October.
Jeff Greenberg Universal Images Group | Getty Images
As the line between busy and off-season disappears, so do savings, Thornton said.
“Travel demand is strong, even during the off-season, and that’s why prices are going up,” he told CNBC Travel.
To find out where deals still exist, CNBC Travel analyzed hotel prices in five popular destinations, comparing peak and off-season prices for entry-level rooms for two travelers to most Comparisons were made including tax. Prices are current as of January 25, 2024.
Peak periods depend primarily on the weather, but also on festivals and natural phenomena such as the Northern Lights and natural phenomena in Africa. Great movedrive even in high season.
There are three cherry blossom seasons in Kyoto, and many tourists visit the city from late March to early April to see the cherry blossoms in bloom.
But it’s not just hotels that are seeing price hikes, said Chisato Nishiyori, general manager of 360 Private Travel Japan. “Everything” from guides to trains to museum tickets has gone up in price, she said.
Restaurant prices remain stable, she said, but reservations at high-end establishments are extremely difficult, even through hotel concierges.
With a year-round warm climate, the Maldives’ seasons are determined by rainfall rather than temperature.
According to , the “dry season” (or northeast monsoon) lasts from January to March, and the “wet season” (or southwest monsoon) lasts from mid-May to November. Maldives Meteorological Department.
Add in the year-end holidays, and the peak season in the Maldives runs from December to April, with November and April considered the “shoulder” months.
According to a CNBC analysis, traveling to the Maldives just before the start of the rainy season can save you hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars on hotel costs alone.
Summer in Italy is so popular with tourists that the country’s peak season extends from May to September.
As such, the “sweet spot” in Italy’s shoulders has become shorter and harder to pinpoint, according to the website. description of italy.
The magazine said, “Spring is Italy’s last shoulder season in a true sense, but it only lasts for two months, March and April,” adding that price breaks can also be seen in late October and November. added.
Rome’s River Palace Hotel has bucked this trend by lowering its rates for its “classic rooms” in June compared to March thanks to a 60-day booking promotion. Without this discount, the nightly rate would have jumped to $281.
Due to the scorching summer temperatures, international arrivals to Dubai are at their lowest between June and August.
Like many places in the northern hemisphere, its shoulder season marks the end of the summer season and lasts for four months: April, May, September, and October.
Prices in Dubai didn’t change much between peak and off-season. But in the summer it became noticeably cheaper, and the rates in May were cheaper than in his April.
Accor Queen Elizabeth 2 in DubaiThe only floating hotelHowever, room rates followed a seasonal pattern, declining in March, bottoming out over the summer, and rising again in October.
New York City has two peak seasons: summer from June to August and Thanksgiving to New Year’s.
In CNBC’s analysis, New York City was the only destination where shoulder season prices exceeded peak season prices.
But that was only during the summer.
Year-end prices for travelers arriving in the Big Apple Ice skating at Rockefeller Center Shopping on Fifth Avenue was much more expensive than at other times of the year.