Holiday Hustle : Low Air Fares, Long Weekend and Valentine’s Day Make a Sweet Deal for County’s Busy Travel Agents

Travel agent Liz Tanacsos has two words for anyone just now deciding to take advantage of this long holiday weekend by planning a little vacation: forget it.

People have anticipated this long weekend for months in advance, said Tanacsos of Associated Travel Services Inc. in Fullerton. Flights may still be available, she said, but travelers may have nowhere to stay.

“Trying to find an available hotel room now would be very difficult,” she said. Business at her agency has increased about 80% over a normal weekend.

This Presidents Day holiday weekend combined with the new round of low air fares has enticed people to take off for places hither and yon. But most are going to locations more hither than yon, said some Orange County travel agents.

“People are staying pretty close to home because of the time period,” said agent Donna Reilly of On-the-Go Travel Service in Santa Ana. Las Vegas, San Francisco and San Diego are three of the more popular spots, she said.

At a busier-than-normal John Wayne Airport on Saturday, hitches in travel plans were being met with both humor and frayed nerves.

Beverly Minney, 44, of Newport Beach and her 17-year-old daughter, Kim, had arrived more than an hour early for an 11:35 a.m. AirCal flight to San Francisco, where they planned a weekend of shopping and dining. But the flight was delayed.

“We’ve been waiting for about four hours,” Kim Minney said.

“If we don’t leave in a half hour or an hour,” her mother said, “it won’t be worth going. . . . What will we do, sit in our room?”

She said she was beginning to regret that they didn’t drive. “Maybe we’d be there by now!” she said.

Jeremy James, a spokesman for Pacific Southwest Airlines, said the return crowd will peak Monday.

“This weekend is going to be very busy,” he said. “There is going to be quite a lot of activity between Reno, Vegas and Phoenix and between Los Angeles and San Francisco.”

Larraine Rank of Travel Affairs in Fountain Valley said there may have been a third incentive for people to plan short little trips: Valentine’s Day.

“We’ve got lots of trips booked to Santa Catalina, San Francisco and San Diego. It’s because of Valentine’s Day combined with the long holiday weekend,” she said.

For Beverly and Kim Minney, the day managed to slip them its own Valentine, albeit a backhanded one. Their flight took off shortly after 3 p.m.