ITM301 Module 4, Case 4

ITM301

Module 4, Case 4

My group was not in communication so I did this research all by myself. The location I decided to choose for this case was Barcelona, Spain. This location is one of my favorite cities I would like to visit. Mainly because I am a hug fan of Lionel Messi who plays on the Barcelona soccer team. I choose to for my departing destination to be Denver, Colorado. I gave myself enough time to plan accordingly for the trip so the dates for this trip is not until September. The exact dates for the is 10 September 2020 to 17 September 2020. This would actually be an ideal trip for me since the dates is my birthday weekend. For all of my travels, my go-to website is Kayak. It has always been a website I can rely on to plan at trip no matter the destination. The other travel sites I will comparing to Kayak are Expedia and Travelocity.

The first thing I look at when I am planning a trip is the price of the airfare. Kayak’s lowest airfare was $727 for the roundtrip, Expedia’s lowest airfare was about $500 more of what Kayak was and Travelocity’s lowest airfare was about the same as Expedia. On Kayak website, they are able to show you various flight and you can also sort it by cheapest, quickest or best. Another cool feature Kayak offer is that they give you the option to compare the flight with other travel websites and if they don’t have the lowest price, you can click on a link that will redirect you to the cheapest flight. The table below show the price differences among each travel website.

To continue on this trip, I would have to find a hotel to stay at for the duration of the trip. When traveling to foreign countries I believe it’s best to find a hotel in the city and not rural areas even though most times would be the cheapest route to go. I was able to search different hotels between all three websites and they fairly had the same prices across the board. Kayak seemed to give me the better option of prices but they all had option where I was able to sort the hotels by stars, price and location

The hotels were fairly easy to access on each travel site, but the only advantage Kayak has is that the list how much each of the hotels cost on other travel site. This is really good because a customer would always want to get the best price possible and Kayak gives to that option to see if you can find a deal cheaper on other travel sites.

Barcelona is one of the well-known cites in Spain other than Madrid. They have a lot if tourist attraction all around the city. I used trip advisor site to find the top tourist attractions in Barcelona and their prices. The table below shops the top 5 attractions according to trip advisor and how much it will cost.

There’s so much to see in the city of Barcelona but trip advisor was able to break down each attraction and list them in order of the most desirable attraction. And the site was also able to show the times for each attraction and their price if any.

The currency used in Spain is Euro. Most of the European countries use the this same currency. The conversion rate from Euro to Dollars is 1.10. If I am planning to have $2000 dollars with me for my trip, I will convert it before I leave or convert it when I arrive at the airport in Barcelona. $2000 with a conversion rate of 1.10 will give me 1820.94 Euros.

Travel tips are always helpful when traveling especially when going to a whole new country and city that you are not familiar with and also a language that you are fluent in. These days most people can download a translator on their phones and this should be able to help them communicate if they run into someone that doesn’t speak English. Most people in the city will understand a little bit of English but if you travel to the rural areas not so much. Another travel tip would be to do all your sight-seeing and touring in common areas. Don’t go to segregated areas where there are no people around because you never know what can happen.

In conclusion, Kayak was the better travel site to use and this come to me as a surprise since I use it for all my travels. Compared to Travelocity and Expedia, Kayak had better navigation and options when accessing the site. I always recommend Kayak to anybody I know trying to plan a vacation or travel. They just make it easy to use their site and show you all recommendations and comparison with other travel sites.

References

Kayak. Flights to Barcelona & Hotel in Barcelona Retrieved from https://www.kayak.com/flights/DEN-BCN/2020-09-10/2020-09-17

Expedia. Flights to Barcelona & Hotel in Barcelona https://www.expedia.com/Flights-Search?flight-type=on&starDate=09%2F10%2F2020&endDate=09%2F17%2F2020&mode=search&trip=roundtrip&leg1=from%3ADenver+%28DEN-All+Airports%29%2Cto%3ABarcelona%2Cdeparture%3A09%2F10%2F2020TANYT&leg2=from%3ABarcelona%2Cto%3ADenver+%28DEN-All+Airports%29%2Cdeparture%3A09%2F17%2F2020TANYT&passengers=children%3A0%2Cadults%3A1%2Cseniors%3A0%2Cinfantinlap%3AY

Travelocity. Flights to Barcelona & Hotel in Barcelona. Retrieve from https://www.travelocity.com/Flights-Search?flight-type=on&starDate=09%2F10%2F2020&endDate=09%2F17%2F2020&_xpid=11905%7C1&mode=search&trip=roundtrip&leg1=from%3ADenver+%28DEN-All+Airports%29%2Cto%3ABarcelona%2C+Spain+%28BCN-Barcelona+Intl.%29%2Cdeparture%3A09%2F10%2F2020TANYT&leg2=from%3ABarcelona%2C+Spain+%28BCN-Barcelona+Intl.%29%2Cto%3ADenver+%28DEN-All+Airports%29%2Cdeparture%3A09%2F17%2F2020TANYT&passengers=children%3A0%2Cadults%3A1%2Cseniors%3A0%2Cinfantinlap%3AY

Tripadvisor. Top Attractions in Barcelona. Retrieved from https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attractions-g187497-Activities-Barcelona_Catalonia.html