There’s two sides to the question of how North American visitors will view travel to Europe this year.
On the negative side, there have been economic protests from several countries such as France over raising the retirement age and general economic issues. Not only that, but air travel has been repeatedly disrupted by everything from Iceland’s volcanoes to strikes to horrible Christmas-time snowstorms.
Also negative, but to be expected: air travel by US citizens to Europe was down about 1 percent for the first six months of 2010, according to the latest available statistics from the Commerce Department.
“But Europe’s weak economy could result in travel bargains, especially in such countries as Portugal, Spain and Greece,” writes the AP.
“I think smart consumers this coming year going to say,’Hey, this is a great deal,’ said John Clifford, a luxury travel consultant.
Almost everyone predicts that whatever happens there are likely to be good travel deals.
"By no means does that mean there isn’t an opportunity for deals, but in order to take advantage of that opportunity, you have to be flexible," said Scott Berman of PricewaterhouseCoopers.
By David Wilkening
