Travel Top Tips

Plan holiday as early as possible.

Book flights early. Use Sky Scanner's Flight Search Engine (www.skyscanner.net) to quickly and easily check flight availability and prices. Easyjet's summer flight schedule (April-September) become bookable around November/December. Subscribe to airline's email notification service and newsletters. Ryanair allows you to book flights earlier but they tend to be more expensive until other airlines start to compete.

Fly to Almeria as its the closest to the apartment. If you don't mind a slightly longer drive then flights to Alicante can be cheaper than to Almeria.

Check Easyjet first as it tends to be the cheapest in our experience. Then compare others to see if you can beat their price.

Check a selection of airports to depart from and return to as some routes at certain times are significantly cheaper. Generally Stansted is cheaper than Gatwick which is cheaper than Bristol. Mixing the Spanish airports is alright if you are using one of the larger hire car companies.

Local hire car companies are generally cheaper than the large European companies. Occasionally there may be special offers which make these large companies competitive, e.g. Avis 'Pay Now'. Easyjet hire car is a partnership with Europcar so is expensive in our experience. Try www.carjet.com and www.doyouspain.com to find the cheapest rates available. Centauro (www.centauro.net) and Solmar (www.solmar.es) both have offices at Almeria Airport. Avoid hire car companies which do not have an office at the airport.

Tesco Clubcard vouchers can be used to hire cars from Avis; although you can't take advantage of any special offers with these vouchers.

Hire a car with air conditioning during the summer months. Almost all hire cars have A/C as standard.

If you have any other tips then send them to us so we can publish them here.