This year marked the first time many Americans traveled since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. People tended to start small with short road trips, visits to relatives they hadn’t seen in a long time, or other domestic travel for events like rescheduled weddings.
But now that many of us have made up for lost time and adjusted to leaving our homes, some are starting to dream big again. Looking ahead to 2022, there’s even more hope for exciting vacations to farther destinations.
“Travel is of course a personal decision,” Val Anthony, lead research analyst at Tripadvisor, told HuffPost. “We do know this ― those who are booking for 2022 are booking bigger vacations. The average price of stays being booked for January 2022 is twice that of the stays being planned for September 2021. And 2022 trips are longer, more than double the duration of trips booked for the remainder of this year ― six- to seven-night stays versus three.”
But given ongoing uncertainty around the pandemic, is it advisable to book those big 2022 trips now? Or is it better to wait and see how things shake out in the coming months? Below, travel experts share their advice.