Charleston: Rich History and Southern Charm
In 2023, we found a deal where we could status match our Marriott Gold status for Spirit Gold for a year for just $99. We jumped on it because many of Spirit’s flights were less than $50, and with gold status we could get a carryon and a checked bag, choose from any of the preferred seats, get a drink and snack, and priority boarding all for free! We’ve used it quite a bit, but it expires in a week, so we decided to play Spirit roulette and use our status one last time. The rules were that it had to be a) a non-stop flight b) to somewhere on…
Deep in the Heart of Texas: Exploring San Antonio
I love to travel, and I love that even though my kids are adults, we still take family trips. But the ones that I enjoy the most, are where I get to spend time with them one on one. Once they grow up you just don’t get that time with them anymore as you’re both immersed in your own lives but travelling is the perfect way to make sure that happens. In January my middle daughter Brynna was about to return to college for her last semester of grad school, so we decided that we’d take advantage of Spirit Airline’s cheap flights and take a trip, just the two of…
Chasing the Northern Lights in Finland
My best friend Lizzie likes to travel just as much as I do, and recently she went on a trip with a luxury travel group to Turkey. I thought it was an amazing itinerary with nice hotels and interesting activities, so I started to peruse their site to see if there were any trips that I’d like to take. One of the trips immediately caught my eye, a trip to stay in a glass igloo and see the Aurora Borealis, which had been on my bucket list FOREVER. I quickly realized however, that I would not be able to afford ANY of the trips that they were advertising. I wanted…
London, Wales, and a little bit of Brynna….
This year my middle daughter Brynna graduated from college. Not only did she do it in three years, and graduated Summa Cum Laude, she also maintained a 4.0 grade point average over all her collegiate coursework! To celebrate her success and the fact that she’s way smarter than I am, we told her that we would take her on a graduation trip to wherever she wanted to go (within reason lol), and she decided on London. We flew American Airlines from PBI to PHI to LHR. Most flights from the East Coast of the US to Europe depart at night and arrive the following morning and this one was…
Why the hell are you going to Qatar?
It’s no secret that we play the miles game, or that we love to travel and want to see All.The.Countries. When people heard about our most recent trip, instead of the normal, “oh that’s awesome!”, many of the comments we got were – “Why the hell are you going to Qatar?” The answer to that quite simply is, “because I want to go everywhere and I got a really good deal!” If you had asked me this time last year, I could not have told you anything about Qatar. Not what the capital was, not what the people were like – all I would have been able to tell you…
Exploring Amsterdam one Stroopwafel at a time
Our points strategy has always been to try and find economy seats for the least amount of miles so we can take as many trips as possible. Since Deb’s back and ankle surgery, our strategy has changed and now we are looking for international flights with lie-flat seats for the least amount of miles (getting older is NOT for sissies!). While pouring over the chat rooms and forums looking for points deals, I came across an ad that Jet Blue was adding a new route from JFK to Paris, and they were going to have a 2-day sale for the inaugural route. Jet Blue’s international business flights have Mint Suites,…
Mamma Mia – Here we go again!
Spain, Andorra, France, Monaco, Italy, Malta, Greece I want my daughters to experience the world, so for each milestone (16th birthday, high school graduation and college graduation) I offered to take them on a trip. They would tell me where they wanted to go, and as long as I could find a good deal, I would make it happen. Our youngest daughter turned 16 and our middle daughter graduated high school in 2021 during the pandemic, so we weren’t able to take them on a celebratory trip – but now that travel is in full swing, we decided to take that make-up trip! Our oldest daughter and her fiancé, my…
Cruising in Style on the Scarlet Lady
A cruise with no kids, all specialty dining, free gratuities, free fitness classes, free basic beverages and free WiFi – sounds like a dream, right? Well now your dreams can come true on the Scarlet Lady, the new cruise ship from Virgin Voyages. Owned by British billionaire Richard Branson, Virgin invites sailors to expect the unexpected and unleash your wanderlust. We originally signed up to sail in October of 2020 for my 50th birthday celebration, but we all know what happened that year and the launch of the Scarlet Lady was delayed. When cruises started up again in 2021, we decided to give it another try. At the time all…
Alaska – Land of the Midnight Sun
I told each of my three girls that when they graduated high schooI, I would take them on a trip to somewhere that interested them. My oldest Kaleigh went to Ireland, as she wanted to learn more about her roots. My middle daughter Brynna is a budding photographer and wanted to see the Greek Islands for her graduation trip – but, Covid had other ideas. We were very fortunate in that we were all able to get vaccinated earlier in the year and decided that we would find a destination in the United States where we could visit yet be socially distant. Alaska seemed like it might fit the bill. …
Craigslist Rentals – Scam or Bargain?
My girlfriend and I had some amazing vacations planned in 2020, all to be cancelled due to the Coronavirus, or what we loathingly call it – The Rona. Our first vacation was a dream trip to Bali, Singapore and the Maldives, with a scheduled departure date of March 20th. Of course, everyone knows the world came to a screeching halt that week and everything closed, hotels, flights and even entire countries. We had a second trip scheduled in July to go to New York to see some Broadway shows, and since New York is the world’s largest Covid-19 hotspot – that was cancelled as well. We love to travel but…
