Dates
When to go
The calendar is worth more than the city. Four windows to book, four to avoid.
The weddings are August 5 and 7, so May or June it is. Memorial Day is Monday May 31 and Father's Day is Sunday June 20. A Wednesday arrival gets the cheapest flights and puts golf on Thursday and Friday when tee sheets are open; stretching to Monday makes it five nights. Vegas is the one place the weekend nights roughly double the room cost, so a Sunday to Thursday pattern is the Vegas version.
After graduations, before Memorial Day. The mildest window: Orlando and Austin in the mid 80s, Nashville and New Orleans at their most comfortable, Vegas and Phoenix still under 95. Myrtle Beach golf still at shoulder prices.
Same logic, midweek start. Barefoot drops to $135 to $149 from May 17. We-Ko-Pa is $169. Crawfish still on in New Orleans.
Innisbrook and Streamsong at low season, New Orleans hotels at the trough, Scottsdale resorts at summer rates from May 31. Before CMA Fest.
Cheapest golf: Caledonia and True Blue summer rates start June 22, We-Ko-Pa drops to about $109. Hottest of the four windows.
Memorial Day weekend. Saturday hotel nights run 36 percent above midweek, flights spike, lake rentals peak.
CMA Fest in Nashville, 100,000 fans a day at the new Nissan Stadium. Rooms vanish.
Father's Day weekend, plus any guy with kids is out.
July 4 week and Essence Fest in New Orleans. Peak heat in Vegas and Phoenix, peak humidity in Florida. Tahoe's celebrity golf week follows July 7 to 11.