Mdemmons

Hi Scott! I love (and pay for) your service and I've saved at least a couple thousand dollars last year alone! So thanks! My question is about hubs.

Why don't we see many deals from airlines at their own hubs? For example, it's rare to get a deal on Delta from Atlanta. But United often "attacks" Delta's routes in Atlanta. Why doesn't Delta lower their fares here to compete with those instead of just reciprocating in United hubs? I'm a Delta Platinum in ATL and this annoys me! :-)

Thanks for your answer, Scott. My best deal from "Atlanta" was when the price to Indonesia was $520 from Philly! I got a 12.5k RT Delta flight to PHI and went to Indonesia from there - normally $1300-1400!!

This is NOT a dumb question. You'd be surprised at how many people, including me, have been nervous about this.

Congrats on taking the jump and getting out of your comfort zone. I've been in your shoes. My first "adult alone" trip was from the US to Thailand in 2010! Back then, you arrived at an airport and HOPED to get a taxi that wouldn't rip you off to get you to your hotel.

Now, it's even easier than it was then. Now, you can just Uber it at a fixed price. So just find a hotel you're comfortable with and stay there for the first couple of nights. If you want to be even more adventurous, go into the backpacker districts of wherever you are and find out where other people stay. That's what we did. When we went to Bangkok, we stayed at Le Meridien for the first two nights on points. Then, we went down to the district and met up with several people who had great recommendations on local hotels where we could meet even more travelers

Turned out to be an amazing experience for both of us!