This Valentine’s day we did a quick one day Getaway. We drove to San
Antonio, TX. It was rather relaxing we went on saturday morning and came back sunday night. First day we San Antonio Childrens Museum, then we stayed and relaxed in the hotel, it was at Eilan Resort & Spa. I want to make this post more of Hotel Review. Elian Resort & Spa is an Autograph Collection Hotel. Its one of Autograph Collection where you can use Marriott Points or Certificate. According to Marriott its a Marriott Category 5. Personally I think it needs to be higher then that I have stayed at Marriott Category 5 in Miami, Madrid, San Juan PR, and Plano TX, non were like Elian Resort & Spa. The one in Madrid was Autograph Collection and San Juan PR was a Courtyard and those were more like Category 3. I used my Free 1 Night Certificate which I received from my Marriott Credit Card on its 1st year renewal. Elian Resort & Spa is set in San Antonio Hill Country next to Six Flag over texas. The view from the hotel is amazing so are its sourrounding you can see the pictures below. It has Junior Olympic size indoor swimming pool (didnt take pics there were ppl in the pool). The fitness center was big (also didnt take pics thre were people in the gym). Being a Elite Gold member I received a coupon for free breakfast.
Spirit Airline, many
of us turn our head way or make faces when we hear the name of these budget
airline, and say things like I will ‘I will never fly’ and many other, but if
you go to the Spirit airline boarding area the scene is completely different. Since many of us are not use to paying fees
on other airline we complain about Spirit charging fees. Like all other airline
Spirit is in the business of making money, and the extra fee is where that
gives them the profit margin. There are other budget airline in Europe and Asia
that uses the same method of making money by charging fees. I recently booked 3 one way tickets which
included baggage fee from Kuala Lumpur to Langkawi for only $148.00 on Air
Asia. I was stunned. So when flying on
budget airline you have to understand and accept the fact that you’re paying
for a Bus in the Air. Once you accept that the service or the fees will be more
acceptable. Please see the Example blow.
I looked up a flight from DFW to TPA (Dallas TX to Tampa FL) it cost $ 58.99
for a non-stop flight. Now if you were to go on Greyhound bus it will cost you $89.00
for advance purchase and $204 for refundable fare, which will take 1day 7 hour
to get to Tampa with 2 transfer.
Yesterday I was talking to my friend in Atlanta, I called him up checking up on how he was dealing with the Crazy Cold weather in Hotlanta. During the conversation he asked me how he can get/earn spg points because he wanted to stay at the Sheraton Maldives Full Moon Resort & Spa for 3 nights. Places like Maldives, Bora Bora etc. are very expensive and the hotel stays are very expensive too. When I looked up on spg website there were two spg properties W Retreat Maldives and the Sheraton Maldives. The W Retreat is on a private island which is amazing but its crazy expensive, room rates in December are over $1000/night and it looks like W Retreat participation in starwood perferred guest program is limited.
Limited Participation in spg
The Sheraton Maldives does have a lower rate but it's also of a lower category and requries 25000 spg points per night, so for a 3 night stay he is looking at 75,000 spg points. And in order to obtain that he will have to apply for Amex Spg Card, both Personal and Business version, which will give him 50,000 spg points after spending $10,000 in 5 month. So with min spending met he will only have 60,000 spg points still short of 15,000 points.
My suggestion to him was to stay at the Conrad Maldives Rangali Island which is also in an island separate from the main island and is Hilton Category 10 also cost over $1000 a night. I asked him to apply for the Citi Hilton Reserve Card for himself and his wife, which will give him 2 weekend night free, and his wife 2 free weekend nights at any Hilton property. So with 4 free weekend night on his pocket he can book the say for Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights. Also having Citi Hilton Reserve card will give Hilton Gold status, which is very useful as the benefit provides free internet and free breakfast. When you are stuck on an island you have very few option when it comes to food as you might end up spending lots of money eating in the hotel becayse sometime that is the only option.
Southwest Airline is offering 1,700 Rapid
Reward points for Valentine’s day flowers, for purchases over $29.99 or more
from 1-800-flowers.com . Each order over $29.99 will earn RR points. You have
to go through the Southwest Airlines Shopping portal in order to earn these
points. Also any point earned through the shopping portal is eligible towards
Southwest companion pass. Make sure you use the code RR46 and also provide your
Rapid Rewards account number. I love southwest airline because of its companion
pass. My wife has the southwest companion pass and ever since she got it last
year have I have traveled free with her to Miami, Puerto Rico, Orlando and Boston in 2013.
I recently
posted about Citi offering CitiAAdvantage World Master Card for 100,000 bonus AA miles. The Deal is still
live, so you can still take advantage of this. But for those of you who have
applied and may have not got the card on mail yet. First Citi will UPS you the
cards agreements, Terms & Conditions and other details, then couple of days later
the card come via UPS too. I got my card yesterday and it comes in an
impressive box. You open the flat and then slid out the box to get your card
and a catalog of Cardmember Benefits. Please
see below
We had 3 of
our travel Plan canceled between December 2013 and Jan 2014 they were
1.San Francisco 3 days due to bad
weather in Dallas
2.Abu Dhabi and Bangladesh Christmas break
canceled due to bad political situation in Bangladesh
3.Los Cabos,
Mexico: canceled and it was my fault, didn’t
check with wife if she could get off during the MLK,and she didn’t, I was very excited about
because I booked stay at the brand new All Inclusive Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos
So we
decided to go to Austin, Texas. We stayed at Hilton
Austin Hotel, I had two weekend night certificate I received after I signed
up for Citi Hilton Reserve Card, which was about to expire in a month. We have been to Capital building before, so we
decided not to visit it this time.
Day 1
Hill
country Austin is an amazing place; there are lots of activities available for
all ages. Most of our activities were around our two year old E. Like most kids
E loves museum, train and playground. So we decided to go toThinkery. This place is amazing if you have very young kids.
The whole time E was constantly occupied. There are so many different types of
activities available. Make sure to pack food, there is no cafeteria, only
vending machine. But outside the Thinkery is a park
and next to the park on the weekend you will see what looks like a small
farmers market. You can buy organic produce; they sell Mexican, French and
Indian food. The food is pricy but I like to support small individual business,
and that is where we had lunch. That evening we walked in downtown checking out
different kind of store and had dinner. We made sure we were back to the hotel
before the 6th street party people came out.
Day 2
After
breakfast we checkout of the hotel and headed toward the Zilker Metropolitan Park. This park is big, how big 350
acres big. Our plan was to do the train ride. Most of the vendors including the
train ride accept only Cash. They do have an ATM machine which charges fee;
luckily I had my Charles
Swab Checkingaccount with Free ATM
worldwide. The train runs for approximately 30 min all and the kids love it.
Also the train runs on schedule, so if you see a line at the ticket counter its
most likely not for the one immediately about to depart, but the one next. E was tried by now, so we headed to South Congress Ave
where all the Austin famous food trucks are. We had some Jamaican Food at Gemma Love food trailer. I
had OX Tail and wife had Jerk Chicken, both were amazing but the OX was spicy
too. Then we headed back home to Dallas. There are small European ethnic
communities by I-35, and there is a Czech community, so we stopped at the
famous Czech Shopto buy some sweets and Jalapeno Beer bread.
Hotel Review
Hilton
Austin Hotel is centrally located in downtown Austin. Most of the stuff was
within walking distance. The lobby is huge, they have Macs for the hotel guest
in the lobby, and rooms were nothing special. You can see the pictures below
.jpg)
