BATON ROUGE — Independence Day weekend is a busy time for travel nationwide.

The American Automobile Association is expecting almost 71 million people to travel over this Independence Day holiday period. They predict over 5.7 million people will travel by air over the nine days from June 29 to July 7.

Ashley Alston and Darline Grider flew into Baton Rouge today from Pittsburgh. They said they are heading to New Orleans for Essence Fest, a common occurrence during the holiday weekend at the Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport.

"My plans are to eat so much that I can't even function honestly. I'm here for the food and the vibes," Alston said.

AAA said domestic airfare is two percent cheaper this Independence Day week compared to last year. Despite this, Baton Rouge's airport was more sparse than AAA could have predicted.

“The flight wasn’t bad at all. It was actually pretty cool. We didn’t do it last minute, it was actually kind of pre planned," traveler from Dallas Pernell Louis said.

Louis flew into Baton Rouge and he said that he was heading to New Orleans. He said he usually drives eight hours into the city but flying was a better option this year.