Keep watching the fares.

One year when I lived in Oregon and flew back to see my relatives at Christmas, I kept seeing fares of $550 all through October. Going into November, I decided that I had to bite the bullet, so I went into my travel agent and gave her the dates I wanted to fly.

She typed in my information and said, "That will be $198." Then she did a double take and said, "I just booked some people for $550 yesterday."

Her comment at the end of the session was, "I sometimes think they set fares with a dartboard."