calypso726
Escaping reality one Disney vacation at a time
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2006
I don't have any advice except GO FOR IT! First world churning problems, indeed!
Thanks! We are planning to but will make definite decision at the end of the month. HAHAHA
Wow, all I ever get are invites by timeshare companies to stay in Washington DC or Ocean City, MD..LOL
We have had some invites to places here in Florida but we own DVC so I wasn't interested.
I'm so jealous of your problems...only advice I have is to GO!!!
Trying to think outside the box so we can!
what city is calypso from?
We are near Ft. Lauderdale but Miami isn't too far away either.
That sounds like a nice offer. I accepted a similar type of offer on the Big Island a few years ago, with Hilton, so I don't know if this will apply to Starwood, but... IIRC, I had to pay upfront and had a year to make my reservations and if I couldn't go within the year, then I would forfeit the money. Also, if I made a change within 30 days of travel then I paid a penalty to rebook. And it was on a space available basis, meaning that if it were a popular travel time then we couldn't book it. So you might want to check on the details of all that. We ended up going and everything did work out, including our award ticket flights (I put these on hold first before making my reservations), but DD had to miss school since we couldn't do it over a school vacation period (too popular a time to travel).
2nd piece of advice if you go: DO NOT BUY a timeshare through the developer (whoever the timeshare presentation is through). Seriously, and no matter what goodies they offer you. Give them your 90 minutes (set a timer) and be done. I wish I listened to my own advice on this (I have rescinded a couple of purchases so far bc I get caught up in the whole thing). You can buy these on the resale market for a fraction of the cost, even DVC (although DVC tends to hold its value better than others).
Thank you for the advice We are DVC owners at SSR, AKV, VGF and BCV. DVC retains value due to their ROFR rules. The rules and terms you received for Hilton seem very similar to what you describe in the offer we received.
Do you have status with a certain airline? Some will let you upgrade via miles, other won't. American does allow it:
https://www.aa.com/i18n/aadvantage-program/miles/redeem/award-travel/upgrade-with-miles.jsp
I don't know where you are flying from, but lie flat (while nice) really isn't completely necessary to Hawaii. I say that as a person who paid $4k cash for the luxury one time. I've flown to Hawaii several time first class in the old fashioned big seats, and that was just fine too. I've also flown coach, but I don't recommend it unless you have no other way to get there. Quite frankly, Hawaii is the literal definition of paradise - it's so worth the time, jet lag and money.
I've never stayed at the Westin on Maui but I'm sure it's nice. I've done the Ritz Carlton, Andaz Hyatt and Hyatt Regency. Go on this trip - do the road to Hana and eat at Mama's Fish House. Trust me.
Actually, I just got gold status with AA but don't know how it happened or what to do with it LOL Thank you for the link.
We'd be flying in from south Florida. When we did our first travel hacked flight which was to Scotland, we booked in first class. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, that experience turned DH into a or perhaps a He now refuses to fly in economy for any flight that is longer than 2 1/2 hours in duration. Sigh ...
We did go on a trip to Aulani which is on Oahu this past March. We also decided we'd be going back to Hawaii and visiting the other islands at some point. We just never anticipated it coming on so quickly. I would not want to do that flight in economy. We did book lie flat seats last time on the connection and would like to do it again if possible. Thanks for the advice!