00:00We are weeks away from Thanksgiving and many of us will be flying or driving to visit family and
00:06friends. Whether you're taking the airways or the highways, here with some insight for travelers
00:11is Eric Rosen. He is a content director of the Point Sky, the travel website. Thanks for joining
00:18us today, Eric. And boy, busiest travel time of the year. So if you're looking for flights and
00:24you're flexible, what are some strategies to plan a trip this Thanksgiving? Absolutely. According
00:32to a recent study that we conducted with Harris Polls, over half of Americans are going to travel
00:36for Thanksgiving this year. So the roads and the airports are going to be clogged with people.
00:41The busiest travel days tend to be the Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving and then
00:45the Sunday after Thanksgiving. So if you can avoid traveling on those specific days, maybe
00:50wait to drive till Thursday morning for Thanksgiving itself and then head back on
00:54Friday or Saturday. Or if you can work remotely, wait until the following week to book your flights
00:59back or to take to the roads. You're going to have a better chance at not having your travel plans go
01:04awry or having to brave tons of crowds in the airports or on the roads with you. And with some
01:11new rules that have been implemented at some airlines, what advice do you have for travelers
01:16if bad weather disrupts their travel plans? Absolutely. You have to be your own best advocate
01:22in these circumstances, right? If you don't have your airline app, make sure to download it so that
01:26you can get status updates on your flights. Chances are this will be the first way that an airline
01:32will contact you if your plans are going to go off the rails and also an easier way to rebook through
01:38those apps. The other thing is you can arm yourself with a little more information aside from the
01:41airline apps through a site or an app like FlightAware, which oftentimes has updates a
01:46little earlier even sometimes than airlines tend to update their app when weather strikes. You can
01:51also purchase things like travel insurance. Some credit cards come with trip insurance,
01:56trip interruption, trip cancellation insurance in case something happens. So you just want to make
02:01sure that you're covered one way or another. I would also suggest booking flights early in the
02:05day, which are less likely to be canceled or delayed. Once those cancellations or delays
02:09start piling up, it just cascades. And then you could be looking at days of being stranded in a
02:14city or an airport that you're not familiar with. All right. Some of us will be driving
02:19for the holiday. What are the tips to beat the worst of the travel delays?
02:26Absolutely. As I mentioned, the Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving are the busiest
02:29days for people to hit the road. If you're going to leave one of those days, do it early in the
02:34morning, as early in the day as you can to beat that rush hour traffic, especially later in the
02:38afternoon. If you can drive Thanksgiving Day itself, the roads are less likely to be crowded
02:43with other travelers heading home for Thanksgiving. And then the Sunday after Thanksgiving is that
02:48busiest day as well. It'll be in the roads as well as in the airport. So if you can leave on
02:53Saturday instead or prolong your trip into the following week, if that's something you have
02:57flexibility to do, you're going to encounter fewer traffic jams.
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