Gotta Get away
Major travel site crowns one Texas city among nation's best for a quick trip
Vacations this year might not be far-flung, weeks-long affairs. Instead, we're looking for cheaper spots that are only a quick drive away, and planning much shorter stays to test our comfort with traveling.
Austin just happens to be one of those spots, at least according to Hotwire. The online travel site ranked ATX as No. 8 on its list of America's best cities in 2020 for a "quickie" — getaway, that is.
Hotwire analyzed more than 10,000 internal and external data points across 250 cities based on three factors: best bang for your buck (20 percent), ease of arrival (20 percent), and things to do (60 percent). It identified the top major, mid-size, small town, and "itty bitty" cities, with Austin being placed on the major list (600,000 residents or more).
Population is also a factor, with travelers preferring less crowded spots. Even though Austin has the biggest population in the major-city top 10, it still earned a composite score of 114.87, beating out No. 9 Denver and No. 10 Portland.
Though the top spot officially has a population somewhere in the middle, it is definitely known as a vacation destination where folks tend to spend 72 hours or less: Las Vegas.
Sin City has the highest leisure score to pair with a moderate value score, earning it a total of 281.03.
According to another recent survey by Hotwire, more than four in five (or 81 percent) of adults agree that after quarantine, they're looking to take quick, local trips. Nearly all Americans (90 percent) prefer short getaways of three nights or less versus a longer vacation, with millennials in particular fueling the dramatic rise of the quick getaway trend, according to the survey.
