Cold-Weather Discounts Get Hotter in New Year

January is a bargain month for travel. Even to the sunny Caribbean, travel slumps immediately after New Year’s Day and remains slow until about Jan. 25. Travel suppliers try hard to reverse or at least reduce the drop-off with special cut-rate offers:

* Resumption of the All Asia Pass: On Jan. 15, Cathay Pacific Airlines will revive this highly successful airline promotion. Travelers will be able to fly in that month not simply to Hong Kong but to 17 other Asian cities from Hong Kong, as often as they wish in a 30-day period, for $999 per person. And for the first time, they will be able to set off not only from Los Angeles but from San Francisco too. The cities in Asia to which you can then fly (from Hong Kong) are Bangkok, Cebu (Philippines), Colombo, Denpasar (Bali), Fukuoka, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, Nagoya, Osaka, Penang, Sapporo, Seoul, Singapore, Surabaya, Taipei and Tokyo; telephone (800) 233-2742.

* January cruises: All the cruise brokers (discounters) have loads of cabins at cut-rate prices for departures from Jan. 3 to 20, especially for the standard Caribbean itineraries. Even later in the month, on Jan. 24 and 31, White Travel, tel. (800) 547-4790, has inside cabins for only $549 per person on seven-night sailings from Fort Lauderdale on the Italian-style Costa Victoria and Costa Romantica. While the price doesn’t include air fare or port charges, the same cruise broker will secure round-trip air fare for $399 from Los Angeles. On a more exotic 14-night itinerary from Buenos Aires to Santiago, skirting much of the coast of South America, a company called Moment’s Notice, tel. (718) 234-6295, can book the Jan. 2 and Jan. 16 sailings of a well-known ship (we’re sworn to secrecy) for as little as $1,439 per person, inside cabin double occupancy, plus air fare.

* Hawaii on sale: At least through the earlier part of January, a price war to Hawaii should once again be raging between Pleasant Hawaiian Holidays and the British-owned Sunquest Holidays. The latter has recently been selling round-trip air fares as low as $229 between Los Angeles and Honolulu, and fly-drive packages there from $319. And a seven-night stay near Waikiki Beach, including round-trip air fare from Los Angeles, is now as low as $379. If the pattern of last year prevails, those same products and prices will be available again immediately after New Year’s Day. Call Sunquest: tel. (800) 357-2400.

* Transatlantic skiing: Those remarkable air-hotel-and-ski-lift-ticket packages that fly you to the Italian Alps are selling at reduced prices, competitive with the Rockies, through most of the coming winter. But if you leave on Jan. 9, you can enjoy such arrangements for as little as $839 from Los Angeles, including round-trip air, seven nights’ lodging in a hotel studio shared by four and a six-day ski pass at the Bormio resort from Central Holidays, tel. (800) 935-5000. (Those flying from L.A. must leave a day earlier and stay over in Milan to meet the rest of the group from the East Coast the next day; lodging for one night in Milan is $56.)

* Paris or Prague: And finally, trips in January to major European capitals will sell at their lowest possible level: $784 for five hotel nights in Paris, including round-trip air from Los Angeles from Air France Holidays; tel. (800) 2-FRANCE. Or how about six nights in Prague combined with transatlantic air fare from Los Angeles for $759? Call Paul Laifer Tours, tel. (800) 346-6314.