You're listening to Life Kit, from NPR.

Hey everybody, it's

everybody, it's Mariel.

We are coming up on the Super Bowl of travel in the US, the moment when millions of people

dragged themselves to the airport so they can eat soggy airport sandwiches and pack, like sardinesines into metal tubes that shuttle them

through the sky to their destination, all in the name of seeing friends and

family. Scott Kies says he understands why people travel at Thanksgiving in the December holidays.

But from a travel perspective, it's one of the worst times to travel from disruptions to crowds to the price of the flights. My secret best advice for travel over the

holidays is if at all possible just don't do it. Scott by the way is the

founder and chief flight expert at going.com,

formerly known as Scott's cheap flights.

He says, if you can wait and travel in January,

you will probably have a much better travel experience.

My favorite date of the entire year is around January 8th.

I circle that date on the calendar because,

whereas flight prices really get inflated over the Christmas

New Year period around January 8th they just fall off a cliff from the most

expensive time of the entire year to the absolute cheapest.

And we're not talking, you know, 20 or 30 percent drop in fares.

It drops like 75, 80 percent.

But this episode of Life Kit is for the rest of you poor souls, who will be traveling during

the holidays. Because lots of crowds, plus winter weather, can lead to delays and cancellations and just chaos.

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