I know it’s supposed to be more of an experience than a hotel but I’m just not into Star Wars enough. I’ll wait for reviews first. I’m sure there will be done good vlogs after it opensI heard about this too im scared tbh because take my $
Add to that that there’s Presidents’ Day and the half marathon. I just don’t want to wait too long to get pictures done so I was hoping to get them done before March. If it really gets to be too high of a price we can drive home. It’s kind of a pain but saves money
Thank you for your help! I have joined the Reddit group, and was just approved for the Priority through one of the support links! Now debating whether I want to go for the MDD tomorrow (which I was not familiar with until @SouthFayetteFan gave me some tips via PM) or just wait a bit and try for a business card in a few months.
Yes, when they first opened the prices were definitely cheaper than WF, which is too far for me to visit regularly. There are definitely some I pass over because I know I can get them cheaper at HEB. The prices are a bit lower than Natural Grocer so when I need some specialty gluten free item I tend to check there first then Sprouts.
Thanks for posting this, I need to file soon.
So typically I would reach out to add you via PM. You need to make 10 comments on the DIS to send a PM though. You can go your “post count” here:
speaking on bonbon, I am on hold with them as they try to figure out how to use my 7 night travel package certificate. ridiculous.
I haven't seen it that cheap for my Jan, Feb, or Mar trips, so I'd go for it if I were you.
We were just there the last week in January and paid $99/night for a preferred room in Toy Story section!
thats awesome! To be fair, my Jan dates were set b/c I was moving DD down for her DCP and it was a marathon or something that weekend, so we ended up off property. My feb dates are pres day weekend, like Haley is looking at, and my Mar dates are just a random week, but apparently they expect it to be very busy. I got a good price last March. Not sure what the difference is.
Both are doing Pop. One is weekend after next and one is April. Both paying about $250. I have pop for $209 next weekend on ap rate. Movies is available for $186 rack rate.
I think a lot of schools have spring break in March. I know we do 3/13-22.thats awesome! To be fair, my Jan dates were set b/c I was moving DD down for her DCP and it was a marathon or something that weekend, so we ended up off property. My feb dates are pres day weekend, like Haley is looking at, and my Mar dates are just a random week, but apparently they expect it to be very busy. I got a good price last March. Not sure what the difference is.
I also have helped 2 friends book trips and both had to pay rack rates, which is I have never ever done ever.
Times are tough.
yeah they are nice Im up in March im going to call see what they offer me if they offer me another certificate to stay I might I've have it for a good 10 years I actually think it was my first Amex card, when it was SPG.
Tomorrow it’s $84! I really wish we could go tomorrow and stay at YC for $281 but it just won’t work.
Absolutely aspirational travel. Wow. Question about your Plan B - were you planning on getting them with MR to get the 35% back or were you planning on paying $$ for them and wiping the charges? I don’t understand how the cost ties into the MR redemption. I know im missing something but I have MR now and I’m trying to learn how to use them for best redemption.An account of why I am an opportunistic hoarder that advocates having multiple plans and diversifying one's miles and points portfolio. AKA, I booked our flights today for the Dubai/Africa trip over Christmas and New Year's.
When I began planning this trip it was supposed to be only to Africa so we could hit our 7th continent and stay one night at the Giraffe Manor. Giraffe Manor books up very quickly and there was only one night open for our time frame and it happened to be smack in the middle of the trip. It's a bucket list item and I was wiling to plan a trip to Africa just to cross it and our 7th continent off the list.
There are other countries in Africa I wanted to explore, but with Giraffe Manor smack in the middle of the trip and wanting to spend as little OOP as possible I began to realize I'd have to adjust my plans. The other countries I wanted to visit and things I wanted to do in Africa were rather expensive considering we are trying to not spend much money for this particular trip. After our night at Giraffe Manor we decided to book the Fairmont Safari Club for the rest of our time which is an all inclusive and includes two safari game drives per day. Those are being paid with URs.
Initially, I planned to book flights on Qatar using miles with a partner airline that has currently been shutting down many frequent flier accounts and cancelling award flights. That was plan A. With that airline going all scorched earth, I was not about to take a chance that I got burned down the line. So, not touching those miles. Must come up with another way to get there. I needed a plan B if you will.
While brainstorming how to keep this vacation budget friendly we decided to stop in Dubai on the way to Giraffe Manor first and spend some time at the Al Maha Desert Resort and Spa. Meals and two activities per day are included. We visited last year and have been wanting to return. So, that was 400,000 BonBlah points and get the 5th night free. Our trip now requires flights to Dubai and then to Nairobi. Ok, I start looking at pricing via the Amex travel portal. I figure I will use MRs to pay for flights in business and get 35% of the miles back since we have the Amex biz Plat cards. When I began looking to get an idea of what the pricing might be our dates were not available for booking yet. I was seeing flights in the $3900 - $4700 per person range and we have enough MR points to make that do-able. However, once the flights started getting closer to the holidays, they started to creep up in price. Now they were ranging from $6700 to $11,000 per person for our dates. Deal breaker and there goes Plan B out the window.
Plan C for flights is going to be award flights. We decided to go with Emirates. We've flown them before in first, some of you may remember last year's shower in the sky picture. We did a short haul in their business class, and it was PlanePrincess approved for a long haul. Total for the two of us, 470,000 MR points transferred to Emirates to book the award flights in biz plus a whopping $3567 in taxes and feesAre. You. Kidding. Me. I thought BA taxes and fees were super high on our London award flights. Emirates is all, "hold my beer." Those were paid with a CSR and will earn 3x URs and the charge will be promptly wiped off with a statement credit. Now that I had to deal with award flight availability I had to accept the fact that I may need to position. Sure enough, no award flights were available to or from FLL. We will be positioning to MCO and will use BA Avios or United miles for the short haul flight. Then, on our return we will be flying in to JFK as there was no award availability at FLL or MCO. So we will use BA Avios or United miles for that too.
I'm still not done with the planning as I haven't booked our first two nights in Dubai or our first night in Kenya. If I wasn't an opportunistic hoarder, I would not have the well over 1.5 million points and miles I will be blowing on this trip. I also wouldn't have the flexibility to switch from Plan A, to B and then to C. If I didn't diversify the miles and points portfolio, I wouldn't be able to switch plans easily and I would be very limited on what I could do. Here I was planning to use airline miles from a particular airline and when that wasn't an option, pay with MR points, then that option wasn't possible so I had to transfer MRs to airline miles but wound up with cray cray taxes and fees which I will pay with URs. BonBlah points to the rescue for part of our trip to make it a bit more economical and some BA miles and United miles thrown in for good measure. So far the trip is already at about $24,000 and counting if we were paying real money. Definitely not my best redemption for 1.5 million points and miles but still worth it for me since we are still at $0 out of pocket.
I’m sorry that happened. It really does taint your perspective of people for a while.We got #BonvoyedI know we have people here who travel often for work so I am channeling my annoyance from the events of a few days ago into what is hopefully a useful post...
DH and I are both in LA for work this weekend. We were at the W Hollywood for one night. As I'm sure you can guess, we did not choose this hotel. My employer booked it. DH's company uses Hilton & he has never, ever had these issues. In fact, we are now at an HGI courtesy of his employer. My employer offered to cover the first night because we were arriving early & they were glad not to have to pay the other nights. We thought this would be nice.@ us
2. The woman at the front desk, who was smiling so nicely at the couple in front of us, stopped smiling as soon as she saw us. (For those who don't know, my DH is Japanese.) She asked us for the reservation name, then "have you recently traveled through China?" & "are you currently experiencing a fever or any other symptoms?" I could have gone either way on this. Maybe it's something they ask everyone. But sometimes, when you smell a rat, you know it's a rat. So I admittedly acted like a creep & went to stand where she couldn't see me, and listened as she checked in the next three groups. Not one person was asked a single question about China or the virus. I really didn't want to waste any more time but this was a "manager, now" situation & for his part, he seemed horrified. Not sure if it was really sincere but he called her away from the desk & we didn't see her again for the rest of the day or the next morning, so
I'm really trying to find something nice to say about the hotel. It has a nice staircase? The bathrooms are nice? There's free yoga? I mean, overall, the accommodations are fine, but I was so put off by the check-in experience that I could not enjoy it at all.
So, if anyone has any upcoming Marriott stays booked on a corporate rate, be ready to fight for your points if you want them. And, if you or someone you're traveling with is of East Asian descent, be prepared to be treated like you're carrying the plague. You keep hearing that folks are being "tested" for the virus & the results take days to come back. Well, good news for all... coronavirus testing done on sight! Coming soon to a Marriott hotel near you
My husband and kids have a Chinese last name from his grandfather (via Cuba). He says he wasn’t asked anything on his last trip - let’s see how it goes on our April trip.
I’m paying $209, $240, $240 for Pop on a FL resident rate in March which I find ridiculous but my son is playing at a band competition and I need to go that weekend (first time EVER going to Disney for something like that - so excited!!!). I haven’t even told my husband the cost.
They haven’t given us a schedule or cost yet so I haven’t bought tickets or made FP. Let’s see how this goes.
