I’m not much of a planner. And these days, without parents around to plan for me, nor the endless vacations of the academic life that make planning less imperative, I lose out. Every year, those precious two weeks of freedom inevitably arrive with not so much as a sojourn on Virginia Beach planned. Thus, I while away my “vacation” watching HBO at my parents’ house, eating their food (they get the good stuff from Whole Foods) and doing laundry.
And my planning problem is not just a time crunch: It takes some serious dough to get a good old-fashioned vacation penciled into the date book. That’s where www.Site59.com comes into this tale of “What I have-nots.”
A couple of weeks ago, I was talking with my sister’s friend, who lives in New York. She had gone to visit my sister, who lives in Aspen, Colorado, last fall. Courtesy of Site59, my sister’s friend flew round-trip from New York to Aspen, with a rental car included, for $150. Even more incredibly, she had purchased the ticket a week before off Site59. (For those not in the know, Aspen is legendary for the pricey costs of flights in and out of its posh little airstrip.)
I went home and immediately checked out the Site59 goods. Sure enough, last-minute deals abound—well above and beyond the usual Travelocity or Expedia fare. Roundtrip flights to Portland, Oregon, with two nights in a hotel, for $380; a weekend in Las Vegas, including hotel, for $170; an L.A. excursion, with a rental car included, for $200.
I’ll be honest: I haven’t yet used the site to book a flight out of town, but the holidays are coming up, and I’ll be damned if I don’t pick my ass up off this couch and go somewhere worthwhile. Somewhere, that is, that’s not my parents’ house.
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