2017 holiday gas prices will be the highest in three years

Last year’s Thanksgiving Day trip to Grandma’s house was fueled by gas prices so cheap, most families could afford to bring an extra pie.

This year, it’s the oil barons who can buy all the pies.

Sorry, Grandma. You’re also stuck baking the holiday pies this year because crude oil prices on the global market are keeping Metro Orlando’s gas prices 44 cents a gallon higher than they were entering Thanksgiving weekend of 2016.

Orlando’s average price for a gallon of regular unleaded checked in at $2.43 Wednesday morning, having dropped a penny overnight and 7 cents in a week’s time, according to travel club AAA. In Florida, the average pump price for a gallon of unleaded gasoline Monday was $2.48. A year ago, the statewide average was $2.10 — 38 cents cheaper.

The silver lining is the average price is resuming its slow, lazy drift lower — a penny here, a penny there, maybe a nickel over a few days. Florida’s average price on Wednesday was 4 cents cheaper than a week earlier.

Plus, Florida’s average gas price was a nickel less than the national average of $2.53, but significantly higher than neighboring Southern states including Georgia at $2.38 and Alabama at $2.24.

A further downward drift should continue through the weekend, thanks to increased oil production boosting U.S. gas and oil inventories, AAA said in its weekly gas price update.

“Gas prices should decline five to 10 cents through Thanksgiving weekend,” AAA spokesman Mark Jenkins said. “Although gasoline demand will be high this week, it will be cheaper for gas stations to purchase their fuel than a week ago.

“Since retailers profit more off of concessions in their convenience stores than the sale of gasoline, they will be more likely to lower gas prices as a way to attract passing motorists.”

That could help ease the burden for holiday travelers making long trips, whether headed out of Central Florida to see loved ones or out-of-towners who made plans to see tourist attractions here before hurricanes pushed prices higher.

Where and when should you look for these lower prices?

Jenkins said gas stations often wait until Friday to lower their prices. And you might need to leave the highway and drive into areas with multiple stations close to each other, where competing stations often use lower prices to lure in locals to buy higher-profit convenience store items like coffee, beer, lottery tickets, tobacco products and meat sticks.

The highest gas prices tend to be in rural areas, along highways and near airports, he said.