2016 In Travel

Posted on December 31, 2016 by 2btravel

It’s time to take a look back at the travel I’ve done this year.  As usual I had a couple of ski trips and one multi-week trip overseas with a couple of long weekends too.  First, the visual of my domestic travel:

2016-12-31-domestic-travel

It’s hard to tell on the map because I hit up the same airports several times but here’s how it worked out:

January

A trip to one of my favorite places, Big Sky, Montana.  As usual, finding award seats was a challenge.  Add in the fact I had a friend traveling from Memphis with me and another friend in Nashville who wanted to use miles and we decided it was cheaper to take an extra day off work and leave on a Friday rather than buy a ticket to fly on Saturday with the rest of the ski club.  Splitting a hotel room made that an obvious choice for us.  With American Airlines flying into Bozeman for the first time this ski season, I’m hoping that in the future there will be more award space available than on the Delta flights.

Routing: MEM-DTW-MSP-BZN-MSP-MEM

February

My second ski trip was to Vail, Colorado.  I had no problem finding award space on the flight to Denver, which meant I could easily meet up with my ski club there.  However their return flight was in the late afternoon and the only DEN-MEM flights with award space were in the morning.  So I either had to pay for my own transportation back to Memphis or fly back from the Vail/Eagle County airport (EGE). Even though I had to book ground transportation from our condo to EGE, it was much cheaper than shuttling two hours back to Denver.

Routing: MEM-DEN // EGE-DFW-MEM

April

I took a long weeked to visit friends.  One lives in Chicago and the other in Milwaukee. So I flew into Chicago and spent a night there before we drove up to Milwaukee for the rest of the weekend.

Routing: MEM-ORD // MKE-ORD-MEM

August

Another weekend trip out to Denver and my first-ever summertime visit to Vail.  I’d originally purchased a MEM-DFW-DEN ticket for Friday night but my flight got cancelled. To get me to Denver as early as possible the next morning I was re-routed via … Charlotte.  I didn’t love getting up so early to catch that flight but I did get into Denver on time so for that I’m thankful.  A non-stop on Frontier proved to be the cheapest route home.

Routing: MEM-CLT-DEN-MEM

October

My longest trip of the year was a cruise on the Danube River.  I hope to start posting about it soon.  I flew to Chicago to meet up with my trip roommate and from there we flew to Prague via Brussels.  After a couple of days there we took a bus, a train and a taxi to Nuremberg, Germany, where we began our cruise,  and floated to Budapest, Hungary.  On the return trip I had visions of using my Miles & More miles to stop at Lufthansa’s First Class Terminal in Frankfurt but no award space ever opened up.

Routing: MEM-ORD-BRU-PRG // BUD-FRA-ORD-MEM

2016-12-31-international-travel

Not the most glamorous of travel destinations but I’d never been to any of the European cities that I visited and it was good to go back to some places that feel like home by now.

Next year will bring more new destinations in the form of a trip to Asia as well as going back to some familiar ski resorts.

Where will 2017 take you?

Categories: Year in Review | Tags: | Leave a comment

Earn 2x Starpoints in Early 2017

Posted on December 17, 2016 by 2btravel

Earn 2x Starpoints on your first three stays at ANY hotel in the SPG program from January 16 through April 15, 2017.

2016-12-17-spg-double-take
Once you register you’ll get a special offer tailored just to you.

2016-12-17-spg-registration
As you can see, mine was to earn an additional 10,000 Starpoints.  This would be a fantastic offer if I had planned paid stays for the first few months of 2017.  Unfortunately I doubt I’ll be able to take advantage of this offer.

What was your special offer?

Categories: Hotel, Hotel Promos, Starwood | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Register now for Freedom Q1 Bonus Categories

Posted on December 17, 2016 by 2btravel

Each quarter the Chase Freedom card offers 5x points in certain rotating categories.  Registration is now open for the first quarter of 2017.  The bonus categories are gas stations and local commuter transportation.  Note that this does not include parking, tolls or Amtrak purchases.  It also does not include merchants that do not specialize in selling automotive gasoline; for example, truck stops, boat marinas, oil and propane distributors, and home heating companies.  I assume this would include charges like Uber, however.

2016-12-17-freedom-1q-bonus

It frustrates me that these categories overlap with Discover this quarter.  I wish they’d switch off so that it would be easier to max out each card.

I do not recall getting an email from Chase reminding me to register so go ahead and do it now before you forget about it!

Categories: Chase, Credit Card Promos, Freedom | Tags: | Leave a comment

Register now for Q1 Bonus Categories

Posted on November 17, 2016 by 2btravel

Three credit cards have quarterly bonus categories where you can earn bonus points or cash back for purchases in those categories.  Registration for Q1 bonuses for US Bank Cash+ and Discover is now open.  Registration for the Chase Freedom card should open on December 1.

US Bank Cash+

The US Bank Cash+ card allows you to choose one category where you’ll earn unlimited 2% back and 2 categories that will earn 5% back for up to $2000 in purchases.  To activate those categories, see the email you should have received from US Bank.

These are the bonus category selections for the first quarter of 2017:
us-bank-q1-2017-bonus-categories

Discover Card

Discover Card bonus categories for Q1 2017 are Gas Stations, Ground Transportation and Wholesale Clubs.  Click on this link to be taken to the activation page.
discover-q1-2017-bonus-categories

As a reminder, Q4 bonus categories may still be activated if you haven’t done so already and any purchases in the bonus categories will be retroactively applied.  Bonus categories for Q4 2016 are Amazon.com, Department Stores and Sam’s Club.  So don’t forget to activate your bonus categories today!

Categories: Cash Plus, Credit Card Promos, Discover | Tags: , | Leave a comment

Review: Hyatt Place Denver Downtown

Posted on October 13, 2016 by 2btravel

After spending a night in Vail in August, my friends and I drove back down to Denver to spend a day sightseeing there.  We mapped out things we wanted to do and then looked for a hotel central to those locations.  Since there were three adults I specifically looked for a Residence Inn or a Hyatt Place knowing that the layout of these hotel rooms usually works well for us and that breakfast is included.

The only hotel-provided parking available is with the valet. We thought about parking on the street but the valet pointed out it was cheaper to park at the nearby Pavillions shopping center.  He even watched our car for us while we checked in.  Of course that meant we had to walk a few blocks to the car but that was not an issue for us since the weather was so nice.

What we like about Hyatt Places is that there’s a separate area with a large sleeper sofa which along with the 2 queen beds meant that we each had our own place to sleep.

hp-denver-2q-beds

Hyatt Place Denver 2 Queen Beds

Continue reading →

Categories: Colorado, Hyatt, Lodging Review, North America, United States | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Review: Holiday Inn Vail

Posted on October 10, 2016 by 2btravel

My travel buddies and I needed a weekend getaway to escape the heat of our respective cities.  I read an article about fun things to do in Vail and as Colorado is a 2-3 hour flight for each of us, it made a nice, central place to meet up.

Knowing that lodging wouldn’t be nearly as hard to get in the summer as in the winter, I’d hoped to get a 2-bedroom condo at a reasonable price.  That way we’d each have our own bed and plenty of space.  It turns out that most of the condos can’t be rented for a single night.  I did have a travel agency track down one place but they wanted $300 for the one night.  No thanks.

I looked at what hotels were available on points and there weren’t a lot of reasonably-priced choices there either but I did find the Holiday Inn had a room that could sleep three adults.  The hotel is actually across I-70 from the resort but during the summer, there’s no charge for the parking deck at Lionshead so we were only a short drive away.

The valet greeted us promptly upon arrival. Leaving the car with the valet is really the only parking option but the price is cheaper in the summer than in the winter.  In the end, we were not charged at all.  I don’t know whether that’s due to my Platinum status, because we booked the room on points or if they just forgot.  But when I checked out there were no charges billed to the room.

Once inside we had a brief wait while other customers were being assisted but then were welcomed warmly and our room was assigned quickly.

hi-vail-hallway

Hallway to our room.  Carpet could use refreshing.

Continue reading →

Categories: Colorado, Hotel, IHG, Lodging Review, North America, United States | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Donate to Hurricane Matthew Relief, Earn UA Miles

Posted on October 8, 2016 by 2btravel

2016-10-08-ua-relief-efforts

As Hurricane Matthew has now passed through some areas, relief efforts are kicking into high gear.  United Airlines is offering its MileagePlus members the opportunity to earn bonus miles for donating to one of four charities aiding those affected.

  • The American Red Cross is a humanitarian organization that provides emergency assistance, disaster relief and education inside the United States
  • Airlink is a rapid-response humanitarian relief organization that links airlines with pre-qualified nonprofits.
  • Americares is a non-profit disaster relief and global health organization providing immediate response to emergency medical needs and supporting long-term health care initiatives for people in the United States and around the world
  • Operation USA is a non profit humanitarian organization dedicated to helping communities alleviate the effects of disaster, disease, and endemic poverty throughout the world by providing privately funded relief, reconstruction, humanitarian aid and development aid.

If you donate via the United Airlines link, you may earn bonus miles based on the amount of your donation:

  • Donate $50–$99 and earn 250 bonus miles
  • Donate $100–$249 and earn 500 bonus miles
  • Donate $250 or more and earn 1,000 bonus miles

United will award up to five million bonus miles to MileagePlus members who donate and they will match up to $100,000 of customer donations.  Note that because the donations are administered via CrowdRise, they will not count as United spending if you use your MileagePlus credit card to make a donation.  The donation might, however, count as a charity donation if you have a card that gives a bonus for that category.

Note that the deadline to earn miles for your donation is October 21, 2016.

Categories: United | Tags: | Leave a comment

Bonus Starpoints for SPG Amex Cardholders

Posted on October 5, 2016 by 2btravel

Today I received an interesting email from Starwood.  By enrolling in their latest promotion I can earn 5,000 bonus Starpoints if I spend $5000 on my SPG American Express between now and the end of the year.  This is a no-brainer for me.  I make sure I put enough spend on my SPG card each year to maintain Gold status with them so I should easily reach this goal by the end of the year, even with time off for vacation and holidays.

Here is the email I received:
2016-10-05-starwood-email

Continue reading →

Categories: American Express, Credit Cards, SPG Amex, Starwood | Tags: , | Leave a comment

Register now for Discover Q4 bonuses

Posted on October 2, 2016 by 2btravel

Yesterday was the first day of the last quarter of 2016.  With it comes a new opportunity to earn 5% back when using your Discover card.  This quarter’s bonus categories are Amazon.com, Department Stores and Sam’s Club – all places that can be useful for holiday shopping.  You may earn 5% cash back in these categories for the first $1500 in purchases through the end of the year.

Some Sam’s Club locations also sell Visa and/or MasterCard gift cards so that’s an easy way to max out your bonuses.

Registering for the bonus

I received an email from Discover that looks like this:

2016-10-02-discover-q4-bonus-registration
Or you can log into your account at Discover.com to register for the bonus.  Either way, it’s a very simple process.

And if you haven’t already registered for the Freedom 5% bonus categories, now’s the time to do that too!

Categories: Chase, Credit Cards, Discover, Freedom | Tags: , | Leave a comment

Marriott-Starwood Merger Complete, Link Accounts Now

Posted on September 25, 2016 by 2btravel

Late Thursday evening the merger of Marriott and Starwood cleared its last hurdle with Chinese regulators granting approval.  Other bloggers have already covered this in great detail so I’ll just provide the links here:

One Mile At A Time

Frequent Miler

Immediately after the approval it was announced that Marriott/Ritz-Carlton and Starwood accounts could be be linked.  There are a few execeptions but, in general, if you had a higher status in one program than the other, you’ll now have that higher status in both programs.

My experience linking accounts

I received emails from both Marriott and Starwood, each providing links that began on their site.  The Starwood email looked like this:
2016-09-25-spg-link-accounts

And the Marriott email looked like this:
2016-09-25-marriott-link-accounts

I clicked on the link from the Marriott email and was directed to a webpage where I could select any of the three impacted programs: Ritz-Carlton, Marriott and Starwood.  I chose the Marriott link and was directed to a special login on their site.  Once that was accomplished a pop-up box notified me I’d be transferred to the Starwood site.  From there I entered my credentials on the Starwood site and at that point my accounts were linked.

I received the following email as confirmation:
2016-09-25-accounts-linked

I found it interesting that even though I initiated the process from the Marriott site, the email I received was from Starwood and included my SPG number.  Don’t know if there’s anything to read into that or not or if it’s simply because the SPG site was the final step in the process and therefore was the one to send out the email.

Update: Overnight I received an email from Marriott confirming my accounts were linked.

Before the linking I had Silver status with Marriott and Gold status with Starwood.  Once the linking was complete I noticed my Marriott status had changed to Gold as well.  I’m hoping that means we can get free breakfast at a Marriott stay I have coming up next month!

The linking procedure couldn’t be easier…as long as you can remember your passwords.  There’s no reason not to do it now and, believe me, the IT departments would much prefer you make the links yourself than depend on their software!

Categories: Marriott, Starwood | Tags: , | Leave a comment

Blog at WordPress.com.