Holidays in December

The first two weeks of December are the bargain nobody takes

Same markets, same winter sun, and roughly half what the same trip costs after the 18th.

Christmas and New Year is the single most expensive fortnight of the year in almost every destination we sell — Goa, the Canaries, the Caribbean, the Alps and Lapland all peak together. Before about the 18th, prices are ordinary and the Christmas markets are in full swing. If your dates have any flexibility at all, the first fortnight of December is the biggest saving in the calendar, and the markets close on 23 or 24 December anyway.

December, split in two

• Travel before the 18th if you can. Roughly half the price of Christmas week for the same markets and the same winter sun. The biggest saving in the calendar.
• Markets close on 23 or 24 December. Many pack up on Christmas Eve. A trip between Christmas and New Year often finds the huts already gone — Prague and Kraków are the exceptions, running into January.
• Christmas week books a year ahead. Lapland, the Alps and Goa all sell out by the previous spring. If you want late December, we should be talking in April.
• December snow is not guaranteed. Alpine cover is still building. January and March are more reliable and considerably cheaper.
• Goa at New Year is the priciest fortnight of its year. By a distance. Late November or February gives you the same beach for a fraction.