A trip to Europe? In this economy? Expensive flights keep vacations closer to home

Lee Collins waits for his flight back to Atlanta from Washington, D.C., on April 28. He is considering fewer flights to visit his family this year due to higher airfares. Stephan Bisaha/NPR hide caption toggle caption Stephan Bisaha/NPR Stay up to date with our Up First newsletter sent every weekday morning. If there's anything as painfully expensive right now as buying a ticket for a concert, it's buying one for a flight. James and Lea Ridgeway already spent hundreds of dollars on tickets to see The Cure in Ireland this summer. But they can't stomach how the cost of the flights they were planning to take has risen by thousands of dollars. They're leaning toward canceling their trip. "The tickets are so high. It just eats up a lot of the money that we had set aside for the holiday," Lea said. "It is very disappointing," James added. Flying is getting more expensive, mainly due to the price of jet fuel roughly doubling since the war in Iran began. Not every fare has jumped up by thousands of dollars — the Ridgeways were planning to fly business class and make multiple stops. But on average, an international flight was about $150 higher in mid-April compared with a year earlier, according to the travel site Kayak . That's causing some Americans to change their travel plans, either choosing closer and cheaper destinations or not planning a trip at all. …