Flights in space: the Net results

By BARBARA HARRIS

The advent of dirt-cheap transtasman flights on the e-market gave the travel industry a jolt. It signalled that the gloves were off and the first round of the fight to offer travellers real bargains had begun.

Punters were quick to snap up return fares to Sydney of $189 from the Flight Centre and $199 from travel.co.nz. And the sparring is bound to get more intense when Flight Centre goes online in July.

When it comes to searching the Internet for hot deals, the biggest bugbear is that it is time-consuming. It's also easy to get diverted by teasers to Hawaii, New York...

Colleagues who regularly surf the Net find it a valuable research tool but have yet to tackle that last hurdle and acutally book a holiday online. While they don't think twice about buying books and CDs on the Net, it seems that parting with around $4500 still requires contact with a human search engine.

Meanwhile, trawling the Net last week for bargains to the Gold Coast, using a departure date of July 4, returning July 11, showed these deals:

Return flights (Child fares 67 per cent)

Flights Direct

Adult fare with Garuda for $688.

Air New Zealand

Two adults, two kids, $5526. Believe me this is what the site showed.

Travel For Less

Adult fare with Garuda for $688.

Travelocity

Flights on Air New Zealand and Qantas at $US377.40 ($770) each.

travel.co.nz

Adult fare with Air New Zealand at $697 and with Garuda at $699.

Travel Online

$688 on Garuda.

Car hire (seven days)

Travelocity

$US208.49 ($425.48) using Thrifty.

Travel Hops

$A746.67 ($922) using Avis but using Aircond Car Rentals, $A35 ($43.20) a day. Total $303.

Travel Online

From $59 a day.

Accommodation

Travel Hops

Seven nights in a two-bedroomed apartment at Biarritz for $A896 ($1106)

Jasons

San Simeon Absolute Beachfront Apartments $A580.($716)

Travel Online

Diamond Beach Resort at $A108 ($133)a night and Magic Mountain at $A128 ($150) a night.

All the Net

Great Aussie Holidays. Equinox Sun Resort, two-bed apartment, $A49 ($60.50) a night, $423.50.

Theme parks

about.com

Superpass $A113 adult ($139.50), $A73 child ($90)

Dreamworld

$A46 ($57) adult, $A28 ($35) child.

Remember to watch the small print. GST of 10 per cent kicks in from July 1 and some sites indicated that will be added to the price.

Conversions of 0.81 for $A and 0.49 for $US were used.