How do Americans do holidays?

[Champagneforeveryone]

We've just flown to Venice for a few days, and I was reading the guide book which says that flights arrived only from a couple of US states.

Which got me thinking how very little I know about this and it seems I have a huge amount of preconceptions 🙄

I imagined that you could fly from every state to anywhere in the world - obviously not! So I'm guessing there's a large number of internal flights? Are they expensive? Are they as time consuming as taking a flight abroad, or are they similar to taking a bus.

Also, does this limit how you holiday? I had always imagined that the US was similar to us and people holidayed abroad frequently (ours would be mostly Europe with the occasional long haul "big" holiday) Do you fly to different states or do you leave the US?

TIA for filling the gaps in my knowledge while DH showers 😉

I’ve no knowledge but I was talking to a woman in disneyworld and her internal flight had taken as long as our international one.
I imagine it makes travelling difficult, especially as they often don’t get great holidays.
she was shocked we were there for 2 weeks, they were there for 3 days because of holiday/cost.

They also get a lot less annual leave than we do. Friends in the US will take reasonably long flights on a Friday night to spend a couple of days somewhere and then fly back again on Sunday.

Oh god, here we go again. First, it's the less annual leave, next will be health care, then the thread will decent into politics.

To answer your question, there are probably few direct flights from, say, South Dakota to London or Paris. Someone living there would fly to New York or Chicago and fly on from there.

You do realize that England is about the same size as New York State I hope. And by the way, I get five weeks of annual leave and 11 bank holidays.

I read that only 37% of Americans have a passport, my American friend had never left the States until she was 50!
Like Teatime55 said the annual leave in the States is abysmal.

The short answer is that yes, travel for Americans is expensive and they have a lot less time for it. Places like Hawaii are super expensive (compared to similarly beautiful islands which have a more European clientele) partly because their largely American clientele make good money at their jobs but have very little time for travel. They are therefore are willing to spend enormous sums of money on their one big holiday of the year, and resorts charge accordingly. As for airfare, my parents live in the States, and it is sometimes almost twice the price for them to originate in the US for a RT ticket to where we live than it is for us to do the same RT journey originating in Europe. They know that Americans are over a barrel for options and will pay. The big airlines there have a monopoly—there isn’t much competition amongst low cost carriers like Ryanair and Easyjet. The closest might be something like Southwest, but their cheapest fares don’t hold a candle to Ryanair for price.

Rude much? OP just asked some curious questions.

Why the attitude? Amount of annual leave is very relevant to a discussion about holidays.

I'm surprised there aren't international flights from most if not all States, and @MissConductUS, the sheer size of the country is why. If states are size equivalent to countries in Europe, I'd expect states to have the same transport links as European countries - generally multiple international airports.

But I guess its down to population distribution within US being less even than in Europe.

There are massive "hubs". I've been to the US twice, and had to change planes to get to my final destination. Once in New York, the other was Atlanta I think.

Also driving... some of their interstates make our motorways look like backriads, simply due to the volume of traffic that need to use them.

This is a conversation I had with a couple of semi-retired Americans in a pub just outside Oxford a few years ago. They were on holiday for three weeks.

Zuffe: "So what is your itinerary for your holiday here."

American man: "Well today we are doing Oxford. Tomorrow, Saturday we are driving to Stonehenge then onto Land's End. On Sunday we are driving back to London then on Tuesday we are going back to Edinburgh for two nights."

Zuffe: "Wow, you are really packing it in. Would it not be better to spend a longer time in each location?"

American woman: "We figured the UK is really small so we could get around and see things really quickly."

Zuffe: "Well what are you going to with the rest of your time? Are you just going to go round again."

American man: "Hell no. From Edinburgh we are flying to Copenhagen for a night, then we are going to Bad Ems one night, then onto Zurich one night, Rome two nights.

Its a dream if you love plane and car interiors.

I should add that there is a huge geographical variety in the States, and you have every type of climate zone to choose from without ever having to leave the country—desert, plains, wine country, tropics, coastal climates of all varieties, mountains, and even the arctic. For this reason, and for the aforementioned financial and logistical challenges of getting out of the country, the vast majority of non-rich Americans holiday domestically with perhaps a big trip to the Caribbean, Hawaii, or Europe once every few years.

Don't Americans go to closer places like Mexico, the Caribbean etc? I imagine it's expensive to get to Europe.

I'm a Brit who lived in the States for ten years. Most people particularly in low paid jobs only get two weeks vacation, but that is changing and in many cases vacation is better than the UK. My husband use to get 5 weeks leave plus 11 bank holidays. Wages are significantly higher too, especially in white collar jobs. When we lived there, other than visiting the UK, we use to drive to the beach every year in Florida. We could have a luxury beach vacation on some of the nicest beaches in the world for less than a trip to the Costa Del Sol from the UK. It's hard as a Brit to comprehend the vastness of the US. Honestly, there is so much to see and do, and there is so much culture to explore (each State has it's in own culture and identity) that I totally get why so many American's don't have a passport.

Yes, that’s right. It is expensive to even get to Europe—usually around $800 RT for a plane ticket each if you’re flying from a non-hub (unless you are a student or can find a deal) and then hotels, transport, etc. Americans have few holiday days, so they tend to want to ‘make it count’ and will blow loads of money on nice hotels, eating out etc. They will also pack out the itinerary to get the most bang for their buck if they visit somewhere like Europe. Very few Americans would fly all the way to Europe just to sit at a beach resort for a week.

My dbro lived in USA all of his adult life.
No statutory entitlement to leave. The most he had was 10 days.
The vast majority of Americans never leave the USA/Canada
Most holiday there, tbf you probably have all that you need, skiing, sun, beach, mountains, national parks.
Yep planes are like buses

We have done quite a few road trips in America, (my DH was a Class 1 HGV driver for 40 years, so nothing phases him driving wise!)
We did Texas last year, I was looking forward to visiting Dallas. We could see the fantastic skyline, but the freeways were like the seven circles of hell, we just couldn't get near!
Fortunately we we were staying with friends in Fort Worth, and they kindly took us into the city, but I have to say the traffic was unbelievable. And I say this as someone who flys into Atlanta every year, and the freeways there are supposed to be horrendous, but not compared to Dallas!

Whenever we've been to the Caribbean around Easter for usually one or two weeks, the Americans always baffled us by turning up for only the weekend. Not even a long weekend but literally Friday to Sunday. My cousin went to work over there but came back moaning of the awful holiday allowance. Yes she did know about it beforehand but excited and thought it wouldn't matter but of course everyone wanted to visit and she had hardly any time off.
Planes are like buses we did a few domestic flights on various holidays.

Most of my US friends still living in the US holiday there. One goes annually with her sisters to Disney CA and to the beach. Another goes to Southern California and visits family. Then another does Mexico for a week every couple of years.
We used to go up to Lake Tahoe and do all the tourist stuff there (2 Hour drive), we'd stay at a ski resort, or in a friends cabin go out on the lake, visit the casinos, go to Carson city and other stuff. We also would go to San Francisco for a day, or stay one night only.
I've only had one family travel to UK to visit, Ds friend came for a week, so he traveled with her to see more of UK and Ireland and her mother came to see me for a week and we visited castles and national trust gardens with her.
Most will never visit Europe until a short trip once retired if it's on the list of things they've been waiting to do.

You ok hun?

DH was headhunted for a job there. It only offered 2 weeks holiday and I remember the guy telling me how I could use it as an opportunity to see the US. Whereas I knew 2 weeks would mean 2 weeks travelling back to my MILs every year. I made him say no.

I’ve been to the Caribbean. You notice the Americans are quite intense in their behaviour to get the most out of it, whilst the brits are lolling about.

Actually now you mention it, all the Americans here are noticeably well off (and mostly older) or students. There's no families that I've seen.

I hadn't really given much thought that travel was so difficult, hence my post. Our flights with BA were under £100 return each which makes a long weekend affordable. It also seems obvious, but the things I travel abroad for are all available in the US so less reason to travel out of it.

Holiday allowance varies. DH worked here in the UK for a US company and his US based colleagues only had 10 days but they make the most out of long weekends with their various bank holidays and do short trips.

My company has a NY office and the staff there has 4-5 weeks per year plus bank holidays (depening on length of employment, you start at 4 and work your way up). Several of them fly to Europe on holiday, doing city break tours, but they also do Caribbean, Mexico. One said for her the Caribbean is the same as for us European the southern Europe islands, 3-4 hour flight and AI.

But a lot are also stay in the US as they don't have and don't want a passport.

Same as in the UK. Not all airports allow you to fly all places. You can't fly to Dubai or Bangkok from Bristol. You would drive or fly to, say, London first.

But Venice is long-haul from the US. It's a bit like going to Vegas or Mexico from the UK. That's quite a big holiday. Most Americans would holiday in the US (it's huge) or places like the Carribean/Mexico/Central America/etc. I grew up in the US and I didn't know anyone who had ever been to Europe. We went on holiday at Disney or the Bahamas or our local beaches.

MissConduct you’re spending too much time in mumsnet, anyone would think you’re a grumpy Brit 😉.

@Champagneforeveryone “I imagined that you could fly from every state to anywhere in the world - obviously not!”

Thats not practical given the size of the country, same way you don’t have airports and flights from every city in the UK. If you live in Coventry you have to get yourself to London or Birmingham don’t you? And Heathrow will have significantly more destinations than Birmingham airport right?

Airlines in the US use a hub system so United have their main hub in Chicago, Delta in Atlanta and I believe NY, and America in Dallas. There are many other airlines but let’s focus on the big 3.

this means when you fly from smaller cities to international destinations you will most likely have to stop over at one of those hubs if you don’t live in a big city. I live in Chicago so use United for direct flights, but if say I lived in Wisconsin I may have to either fly to Chicago then changeover or just drive to Chicago and catch a flight to an international destination.

Having said that there are lots of local flights that connect the country.

About how they vacation, the US is so big that there are a lot of vacation options within the country so they is drive to go abroad like the UK. For the Uk it’s easier due to providing and also people just prefer abroad due to better weather etc to the extent some will look down on your if you don’t go abroad but in the US there is a lot within.

Mostnof my vacation since moving to the US has been within and we have had amazing times, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, road trips even around just the Midwest have been great experiences.

We have a road too planned around Lake Michigan this summer ending up in Mackinac Island which is a beautiful historic island where no cars are allowed. www.michigan.org/article/trip-idea/perfect-mackinac-island-travel-guide-first-time-visitor

I’ve just not had the great desire to do much outside as there is still so much we want to explore within and we’ve done all the Europe trips before we moved here.

As I said even driving around the Midwest near Chicago we have other lovely cities around eg Minneapolis etc for short weekend trios, mangy small charming towns, sand dunes, caves etc all within driving distance. Michigan across the lake has so much activities and stuff to do. And I’m not even including the west coast, east coast or south.

I tend to dislike US posts here as it descends into stereotypes and bashing and thus need to explain and categorize Americans into perfect little boxes of no vacation and they don’t travel like us. I may not have had an international trip aside visiting family back in the UK since I moved to the US but don’t worry I’m having a great amazing time.

Also Americans didn’t need passports to many countries and I soaked a nearby and even don’t on some cruises which they tend to do a lot more of than Brits.

Also cultural differences eg it’s normal for a British PMs to vacation abroad while American presidents tend to vacation at home eg Obama to Hawaii etc.