Virgin America Air

Have you flown on Virgin America Air yet?  Not only are they the only airline with “mood lighting“, but they have some of the cheapest flights from Seattle.  I think in an industry that has forgotten all about customer service, Virgin America Air is long overdue!   Every seat has it’s own little tv screen, where you can order pay per view movies, a 110v outlet, and you can listen to over 3000 different mp3’s.  You can place a “food order” from your seat, instead of the typical cafeteria truck that comes down the aisle.   Flights from Seattle on Virgin America Air are often on sale for less than $200 round trip, including taxes and fees!  Virgin America Air is still a fairly new airline, so the destinations from Seattle are limited to San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Las Vegas, Washington D.C. and New York.

Source: Air_Virgin Airlines: More Entertainment, More Comfort, More Options, More Fun!

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How to find Cheap Last Minute Vacations Fast

Are you a bit spontaneous?     Would you like to get away for the weekend, to somewhere you may have never been before?    Are your travel dates flexible?

When I’m looking to get away for the weekend, many times I don’t care exactly when and where I go.  I just want to go somewhere DIFFERENT, and well let’s face it, DIRT CHEAP.  (When I say “cheap”, I mean that I want to stay in a semi-luxury hotel for a rock-bottom sale price, and not at the dump by the train station).

I know exactly where to search for the cheapest vacations, fast.  In my opinion, Travelocity has the EASIEST search engine.  Why?  Because Travelocity allows you to search for all last minute vacations departing from Seattle, without requiring you to enter in travel dates and destination cities.  That way, when Travelocity pulls up it’s list of deals from Seattle, I can scroll down the list until something looks interesting (and affordable).   It takes less than 5 minutes.  

Here’s how to do it:

1. From Travelocity’s home page, click on “Last Minute Packages” tab.
2. In the search box select your departure city.  In this case “Seattle“.  As long as you are a little flexible, leave all other boxes alone.
3. Hit “Search Packages“.
4. The cheapest packages are on top of the list.  Usually the top of the list is ignorable.  Do you really want a Spokane vacation?  I didn’t think so.  Move on to step 4.
5. Select “Flight + Luxury Hotel” tab.   This way you will pull up hotels with higher star ratings.  Today they have a vacation to New Orleans from Seattle, staying at the “Marriott New Orleans Metairie at Lakeway” for $241.97 per person.  This even includes taxes!
6. Copy the title of the hotel that you are interested in and go to TripAdvisor.com. 
7. Paste the title of the hotel into TripAdvisor’s searchbox and read the user reviews.  These reviews are priceless.  Be aware that even the best hotels sometimes get bad reviews, so use common sense.   Whatever you do, don’t skip this step, or you may be in for a bad experience!  I am pleasantly surprised to see that the Marriott New Orleans has the #1 rating on TripAdvisor.com with stellar reviews.  Definatley a good pick.
8. Take note of the going rate of the hotel on TripAdvisor as well. The average price for the Marriott New Orleans is $173 per night.  Sounds like a I found another cheap vacation on Travelocity!

Sources: Travelocity.com, TripAdvisor.com