Rolling the dice on Round the World award space
In order to improve my Round the World award plans, I took a chance... I cancelled an award with the hopes that available award seats would re-appear on certain segments. I lost that bet,...
Roomers Frankfurt, Marriott Design Hotel. Bottom Line Review.
My wife and I just concluded a trip to Germany. On the final two nights of our trip, we stayed at Roomers Frankfurt -- for free. A few years ago, we had two rooms...
Aeroplan increases redemption rates for many awards
Just in time to make one of my 3 Cards 3 Continents awards out of date before we set off on our trip (grrr), Air Canada Aeroplan has announced some award chart changes that...
American Airlines Flagship First vs Flagship Business
I recently had the chance to fly American Airlines both to and from Europe. My flight to Europe was in American's Flagship First Class on the New York (JFK) to London (LHR) route. On...
Best uses for Marriott free night certificates
Marriott has a huge number of hotels worldwide. For this post, I've collected suggestions for the best hotels that are bookable with Marriott free night certificates. Marriott offers annual 35K and 50K free night...
Round the World Award Booked! Lessons learned.
Yesterday I booked an around the world business class award for two! It wasn't easy, but it's done! But... I made a few mistakes along the way. In this post I'll offer up some...
Tips for booking ANA’s Round the World award (Updated)
For the 3 Cards, 3 Continents Challenge, I've been busy finding and pricing various ANA Round the World awards. As a result, I've learned some new things since originally publishing this post. The post...
Fixing Flying Blue’s forever hourglass
Air France-KLM Flying Blue miles are easy to get (transfer from nearly any transferrable points program) and they often offer very good value for both economy and business class awards. One huge frustration, though,...
Virgin Atlantic opens award space gates [when booked directly with Virgin points]
Virgin Atlantic recently vowed to make at least 12 award seats available on every flight: 8 economy seats, 2 premium economy seats, and 2 business class seats (they call these Upper Class seats). In...
Air France & KLM across Europe for less [Sweet-Spot Spotlight]
Since this post was originally written, I've stumbled upon a neat little trick. It is sometimes possible to reduce award prices by flying with a connection through Paris or Amsterdam. For example, business class...
Gambling on Qatar’s 40% transfer bonus #3Cards3Continents
Ever since Draft Day, I've been madly working on plans for my 3 Cards 3 Continents challenge trip. As a reminder, Nick, Stephen, and I are competing to see who can build the most...
The best points-bookable new hotels in the world (2022)
One of the things that I love most about collecting points and miles is that it gives me the opportunity to book incredible travel experiences that are otherwise so expensive that I never would...
Delectable international sweet spots
When planning international trips, I imagine that most people search for a round trip route: from Point A (home airport) to Point B (destination) and back. Because my wife and I have worked online...
Got an expiring Hilton free night certificate? Maybe it can be extended (YMMV).
Some previously-extended Hilton free night certificates are set to expire this Friday, July 1st. My wife just called to use two certificates that were set to expire. I had written her a script for...
