For our two nights in Osaka, we stayed at the Hyatt Regency. I had ended up booking this hotel without paying too much attention to its location, ultimately selecting it on the basis of a good cash and points rate being available, over the Sheraton. The hotel is a bit out of the way, on the western edge of the city. There is a shuttle service to Osaka Station, but it ends relatively early.

Breakfast was at the hotel restaurant:

In the evenings, a selection of snacks and cocktails were available in a sectioned off part of the lobby.

For my last night in Milan, I booked another night at the Sheraton Milan Malpensa Airport hotel.  While my experience a few months prior was lackluster, the airport is really convenient for early morning flights.

This time around, I was upgraded to a deluxe room.

After checking in, I took a look at the club on the third floor, where a spread of snacks and beverages was available. The next morning, I returned to the club for breakfast.  One of the TVs was playing news coverage that Ethiopian Airlines Flight 702 bound for Milan had been hijacked.

I finished my breakfast and walked over to the airport terminal, ultimately thankful that the media coverage of the hijacked flight didn’t translate into pandemonium at the airport.

For my night in central Milan, I picked the Four Points, located near Milano Centrale.

As I had come off an overnight flight and no shower facilities were available at Malpensa, I happy to get to the airport and check in to my room without further delay.

As seems to be fairly common in midrange Italian hotels, breakfast was complimentary.  (The Park Hyatt is a bit beyond “free breakfast” territory.)

Since I had a morning flight out of Frankfurt Airport, I decided to stay at the Sheraton rather than try to stay in city center.  While Germany has terrific trains to most (I’m looking at you, Tegel) of its airports, it’s hard to compete with taking an escalator and walking across a skybridge to the airport terminal building in the morning.

I was given a king room on the 8th floor with a not particularly exhilarating of a view of the airport terminal.

Having settled into my room, I ventured up to the club lounge.

Late in the evening, most of the food options had been picked up, but a few deserts remained.

In early 2013, I had signed up for the Chase Hyatt Visa card on the eve of losing Hyatt Diamond status. As a result, I had two free suite award nights for any Hyatt worldwide.  While I had managed to use one night in October at the Park Hyatt Milan, I still had a night expiring in mid-January.

To make the best of it, I decided to use it at the Park Hyatt Zürich.

Upon check-in, the clerk escorted me to my suite and showed me around.

For my two nights in London, I booked a category 6 award with Club Carlson for The May Fair Hotel for 50k points per night.  As part of the 2014 Club Carlson devaluation, this hotel is now 70k points per night.

As a Club Carlson Visa cardholder (a refrain heard often on this trip), my last night was free, so my stay only cost 50k points for two nights.  At the time of my stay, room rates started at around 350 GBP/nt.  Since I wouldn’t actually be willing to pay that much, even for a hotel in Central London, I can’t claim to have truly received 2.3 cents per point of “value” from this redemption.

At check-in, I was assigned a standard room with a king bed.  Unfortunately, the windows overlooked an small airshaft rather than anything remotely scenic.

As a Club Carlson Gold member (thanks to my credit card), I found a small box of chocolates and a handwritten note of thanks in my room when I arrived.

For my two nights in Berlin, I booked two nights at the Park Inn Berlin Alexanderplatz.  As this is a category 4 hotel, awards cost 38k points per night.  Coupled with my Club Carlson Visa which saw a lot of use this trip, my cost was effectively only 19k points per night.

While this was not the absolute “best” value for Club Carlson points (my stay at the May Fair in London later on in the trip was far better), I’ve been keen to taper my Club Carlson balance to a more reasonable level.

As a bit of a history lesson, this hotel opened as the Hotel Stadt Berlin in 1970.  Fortunately, the hotel was renovated in 2012.

As a Club Carlson Gold member via my credit card, I found a fruit and wine amenity waiting for me when I checked in to my room.

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Club Carlson is finally devaluing, after running their points printing presses for the last few years.  Most significantly, 9 category 6 hotels are being moved into a newly created category 7 tier, priced at 70k rather than 50k points per night.  As a refresher, the category 7 hotels are going to include:

• Radisson Royal Hotel, Dubai
• Radisson Blu Le Dokhan’s Hotel, Paris Trocadero
• Radisson Blu 1835 Hotel & Thalasso, Cannes
• Radisson Blu Le Metropolitan Hotel, Paris Eiffel
• Radisson Blu Hotel Champs Elysees, Paris
• The May Fair
• Plaza on the River, London
• art’otel, Amsterdam
• Radisson Royal Hotel, Moscow

I wrote about these changes in greater detail when they were originally announced.

For my stay in Vienna, I booked two award nights at the Radisson Blu Palais hotel.  As a Club Carlson Visa cardholder, my second night was free, so this award only cost 44k points.

As I was researching this stay, I noticed that all of the room rates advertised a complimentary minibar.

In early December, I visited Boston and stayed at the Sheraton Commander Cambridge.

For my three nights in Hong Kong, I stayed at the Hyatt Regency Tsim Sha Tsui.  The hotel occupies part of a mixed-use building in Kowloon, shared with a mall on the ground floor and residences on the higher floors.

Room rates were hovering a bit north of 250USD/nt, so I decided to redeem 15k points/nt for my stay.  This was done as very practical booking, rather than an aspirational one.  Further, category 4 standard rooms were untouched in the great Hyatt devaluation.

The graylish slab to the right of the bed is a sliding door that exposes a window to the bathroom sink.

In late October, I had a visit to the Bay Area. Room rates on the west side of the Bay didn’t quite work out as desired, so I booked a stay at the aloft Newark. This hotel was formerly the W Silicon Valley until it underwent a rebranding. While the lobby has been redone, the rooms themselves didn’t fit the normal cookie cutter aloft pattern that I’m used to.

In mid-October, I found myself on another trip to Pasadena.  As my hotel chain choices were restricted to Hilton, Marriott, and Starwood, I chose to stay at the Westin Pasadena again.  During my previous stay in October 2012, I was a mere SPG Gold member and was upgraded to an Executive King.

I wound up arriving to the hotel rather late in the evening, having previously been delayed on my way from San Diego by my train hitting a truck.  I even tweeted about it!

As I made my way from Union Station to Pasadena, I glanced at spg.com’s room availability for the hotel that evening, finding that they had executive kings, suites, and speciality suites available.  I was consequently a bit surprised that I received a rather small, standard room after being told that I had been “upgraded” when I checked in.

Starwood’s list of SPG Platinum benefits includes:

“Upgrades to best available room at check-in, including Standard Suites.”

Unfortunately, at many hotels, elites aren’t upgraded and are left to be vexed by their first world problems.  One Mile at a Time has written about this phenomenon extensively.

I decided to venture down to the front desk to investigate.  The front desk clerk was apologetic, but insisted the hotel was “completely full” after asking me to confirm my room rate–I had booked my stay with a best rate guarantee.  He even went so far as to show me a random number on his computer screen that was to prove it to me.

Unphased, I asked what would happen if I booked a Rose Suite (or two) at that moment online with my phone.  At this point, he realized that he was now a bit in over his head with his earlier claims, so he grabbed his manager.  After the two of concluded that the hotel had suites available (and wasn’t planning on walking guests making bookings at 11PM that very night), I had a new set of room keys in hand.

While Starwood specifies “standard suites” in its benefits language, I received a Rose Suite upgrade after all was said and done.

The suite’s first bathroom was just off the entrance foyer.

As I had a somewhat “early” departure (10:25AM) from Milan to New York, I decided to stay at the Sheraton at Malpensa Airport the night before.  Room rates were on the pricier side, so I booked a cash and points award for $55 and 3.5k points when I spotted some availability open up.

Reviews of the hotel on FlyerTalk suggested that the front desk was a disaster and I feel they were spot-on.  With one person ahead of me, check-in inexplicably took about 30 minutes.  Further, after finally getting to my room, I decided to investigate the club lounge, finding that my room key didn’t work as my key hadn’t been made correctly.

The hotel has a long central corridor with small hallways jutting out periodically for guest rooms.  The building itself spans nearly the entire length of Malpensa Airport Terminal 1, and I managed to be given the furthest possible room from the elevator bank.

During my visit to Italy, I never quite figured out the alarm cables that were setup in every hotel shower.  In principle, it might be a good idea.  In practice, I’m not quite sure how useful an out of reach string is when you slip and fall in the shower.

The club lounge had a sizable breakfast buffet of hot and cold food items, so I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast before checking out and walking to the terminal to catch my flight to New York.

Overall, I had a few takeaways from this hotel:

• The location is superb (for those transiting Malpensa Airport).
• The “high speed” internet service was terribly slow when it was working but management seemed unconcerned.  At some point in the evening, a note was slipped under my door informing me that the pay-per-view cable service was out of order.  I’m a bit doubtful that more guests were worried about that than their broken internet connection.
• SPG Platinum recognition was nonexistent.  I didn’t initially have lounge access and I did not receive my Platinum points amenity initially.

Just prior to my Hyatt Diamond status expiring in early 2013, I signed up for the Hyatt Visa card and completed my minimum spending, yielding me two suite award nights at any* Hyatt worldwide.  As part of my visit in Milan, I decided to use one night to stay at the Park Hyatt Milan.  At the time I booked, the retail price of a suite was about 810 Euros per night.

The Park Hyatt places floor plans of its suites online for convenient reference.

While hotel check-in was at 4PM, I arrived at about 1PM to see if any rooms were available.  The front desk clerk took down my information and, after being a bit confused by my Irish cell phone number (“There aren’t any more digits?”), sent me on my way.  I took to wandering around the Duomo and its nearby plaza.  He called me back about 30 minutes later, informing me that my room was available and I should return to the hotel.

For those reading the Hyatt brochure at home, I would have certainly liked to have received an Imperial Suite, in all 2745 square feet of glory, but I doubt these awards are given much consideration for upgrades.

My room overlooked a very quiet side street.  Just under the archway lies the Piazza del Duomo.

At some point while I was exploring Milan, the hotel staff stopped by to drop off a bottle of wine, bottled water, some dried peppers, and a handwritten note in my room.  (Scroll up to the earlier picture of the table…  I’ll wait.)

The Park Hyatt Milan is exceptionally centrally located.  Unfortunately, this hotel was one of the six Park Hyatts to be elevated into Hyatt’s new formed Category 7 hotels in January 2014, so a single night in a standard room is now 30k points and a single night in a suite is 48k.  While I can point to the retail price to convince myself how good of a “value” I would receive for redeeming points at this property, it’s hard to justify when there are reasonable–albeit not quite as nice–alternatives nearby.

* While this offer was on-going, the Park Hyatt Sydney was restricted to standard rooms, rather than suites, for credit card night redemptions.

Carlson announced a devaluation of its own today, joining last year’s Hilton bloodbath and last month’s Hyatt changes.  The announcement is on the Club Carlson website and will go into effect March 15th.

The key takeaways, roughly prioritized by significance:

• Carlson is creating a new Category 7, 70k points per night, tier that will initially include:
• Radisson Royal Hotel, Dubai
• Radisson Blu Le Dokhan’s Hotel, Paris Trocadero
• Radisson Blu 1835 Hotel & Thalasso, Cannes
• Radisson Blu Le Metropolitan Hotel, Paris Eiffel
• Radisson Blu Hotel Champs Elysees, Paris
• The May Fair
• Plaza on the River, London
• art’otel, Amsterdam
• Radisson Royal Hotel, Moscow

The full list of changes is on Carlson’s website.

• The online booking bonus will be restricted to promotional periods, rather than for all bookings.

• The points bonus on stays is being cut to 35% for Gold Elite and 15% for Silver Elite members.

• Award nights will count towards status.

• Hotel restaurant spend will earn points

Hack My Trip points out that this devaluation was inevitable, following the overly generous promotions in the last two years.  I agree:  It’s hard to be surprised that any of these one-for-one stay promotions were sustainable in any way.  More importantly, the changes could have been worse.

To top things off, the signup bonus for the Carlson Visa works out to about four free nights (by strategically booking two stays of two nights) at any top tier hotel.  That’s quite a bit more than Hyatt (two nights), Starwood (not even one night at a Category 7), or the Citi Hilton card (two nights).

With the cobranded Visa card, I have Gold Elite status with Carlson.  The points bonus cut stings ever slightly, but historically, I’ve earned 90% of my Carlson points from various promotions (50k points for a $80 stay?  Sign me up!) and the credit card signup bonus.

Even with award nights now counting towards status, I would not be much closer than I was from just revenue nights (maybe 9/35 instead of 2/35 last year).  Absent shifting my hotel stays nearly completely to Carlson, I’m still hopelessly far from hitting the Concierge level at 75 nights.  Doing so would involve completely forgoing SPG status (and my stays), which have served me quite well for my many trips to Hawaii.

As part of Hyatt’s January 7th devaluation, they announced that awards booked prior to that date would be eligible for changes using the old award chart until February 15th.

The 15th is almost here, so it’s time to make some last tweaks before those bookings are set in stone.

With a pile of Starwood points to burn, I chose to stay at the Westin Princeville Ocean Resort Villas for five nights during my visit to Kauai.  As a newly minted SPG Platinum, I had received a 35% off redemption certificate.  Coupled with Starwood’s fifth night free for award nights, my five night stay cost a “mere” 52k points when the rate was $300/nt (plus taxes).

At check-in, I was told that I had been upgraded to a one bedroom suite.  As this is a timeshare property, I was expecting minimal Platinum benefits but found that the property consistently overdelivered.

My room’s patio had an partial ocean view.

The hotel is located on the lush north shore of Kauai.

Princeville is a short drive from Hanalei.

For beach lovers, the one drawback of this hotel is that it does not have ready beach access of its own.  The hotel itself is situated along a cliff, but there is a trail to a public beach nearby.

Additionally, the hourly shuttle to the St. Regis allows Westin guests to visit the beach on Hanalei Bay.

I took the shuttle over on my last night to see the St. Regis’ champagne sabering, but it felt a touch inconvenient compared to choosing a hotel with its own beach, such as the Sheraton Kauai.

St. Regis’ champagne sabering begins with a brief historical lesson before the main event:

For SPG Platinum members, the hotel offered a free continental breakfast plate.  There are some out of date posts on FlyerTalk suggesting that breakfast is not served every day (and consequently can’t be offered as a benefit).

The breakfast seating area was frequently overrun by birds, the best efforts of the guests and staff to scare them off notwithstanding.

The complimentary continental breakfast plate had a nominal value of about $18.  The hotel offers its breakfast buffet for about $25, but allows Platinum guests to upgrade to the buffet for just the price difference.

I had a visit to San Francisco where I chose to stay at the Hyatt Regency SFO.  It’s a short walk from the Burlingame Caltrain station.  While it only sees weekend service, this was fine for my purposes.

As I wanted to check-in early in the morning, my room had a view of the 101 expressway.

For Memorial Day weekend, I decided to go to Seattle (with a small dash of Canada added in as well).  For our three nights in Seattle, we stayed at the Hyatt at Olive 8.

I had booked this reservation speculatively before my Hyatt Diamond status ran out at the end of February 2013.  While my status dropped away for purposes of enjoying a free breakfast that View from the Wing raves about, it seems to have lead to a considerable upgrade to a 740 square foot Premier Queen room.

Just so we’re clear, allow me to repeat: 740 square feet.  Larger than my New York apartment.

To the right of the hallway, there’s an entrance foyer as well.

As I discussed in March, I successfully booked two nights at the Moana Surfrider Waikiki under the old award chart by calling when the website began showing the new rates prematurely.  I spent 24k points for two nights when the cash rate was hovering around $400/nt.

While valet parking is available in front of the main hotel building, self-parking uses the Sheraton Princess Kaiulani’s lot.  At night, it tends to be at capacity, so it’s always an adventure parking a car there.

The lobby: I received an “upgrade” to a partial ocean view room.  After looking at the main tower, however, it’s not clear to me what rooms don’t have some glimmer of an ocean view.

The room itself had normal Westin finishes and stylings.

On my last morning, I had breakfast at the hotel restaurant, which overlooks the ocean and the hotel’s 100 year old banyan tree:

From further down Waikiki Beach, it’s possible to appreciate the relative size difference (and appearance) of the main Moana Hotel building and the adjacent tower.

Starwood is running another promotion very similar to last quarter’s… except a bit worse.

This quarter’s “Bring on the Nights” promotion offers 2.5k bonus points per 5 nights stayed at Starwood hotels between January 5th through April 30th.  Registration by February 28th is required.

The last promotion for 2013 offered a similarly tiered bonus system for nights but also came with double base points on stays.  I’m unlikely to go out of my way to collect stays at Starwood properties for the sake of picking up points from this promotion; but given I had 50+ nights with Starwood last year, it’s hard for me to not expect a few stays this spring.

For my three nights in Munich, I opted to stay at the Westin.  Due to a rate quirk, I wound up with two double beds rather than a single bed.

Overall, the hotel was well-situated by being a short walk away from the Arabellapark U-Bahn Station.

Carlson is running its first quarter promotion from Monday (January 6th) to April 13th, 2014:  Stay 3 nights and earn 38k points.

Importantly, there are three take aways:

• As no further (bonus) points are earned by staying more, this promotion is geared towards the infrequent Carlson guest.
• Registration is required before the first eligible checkout date, so it’s worth registering now rather than forgetting.
• 38k points isn’t quite for a night at a top-tier hotel (50k are needed).  It’s not the promotion of yesteryear, but it’s a reasonable bonus for the odd Carlson night here or there.

Hyatt’s changing its award chart effective January 7th (tomorrow!), bumping up the prices for Category 5 and 6 hotels slightly and introducing a new Category 7 for several of its Park Hyatt hotels.

Today is the last day to book at the old rates.

Right on the heels of United’s massive award chart devaluation (and Delta’s “interim” award chart enhancements), Hyatt announced that it’s updating its award chart effective January 7th, 2014.  The full summary is on their website.

First, rooms are getting more expensive:

New Award Chart – Effective January 7, 2014:

Second, as noted on the above award chart, Hyatt is creating a new Category 7, which will be occupied by the Park Hyatt Beaver Creek, Milan, Paris, Vendrome, Sydney, Tokyo, and Zurich.  Some hotels are going down in category, but under the new award chart, will still cost more points per night than they did in the past.

Third, Hyatt’s points-based upgrades on paid stays is now switching to a per-night fee rather than a fee good for 4 nights (as advertised on View from the Wing).

Starwood has opened up registration for their double take promotion for summer 2013.  As the name indicates, they’re offering double Starwood points on all stays between May 1st and July 31st, subject to a few hotel exclusions.

As an additional kicker, stays during the promotion booked with the Android or iPhone mobile apps earn an additional 500 point bonus.

Hat Tip: Loyalty Traveler.

Today’s the last day to book SPG awards under the old categories.  While many hotels have stayed put, for others, tomorrow has already come and SPG.com is showing their new rates.

The good:

The bad:

There have been a number of hotel program updates in the past few weeks, nearly universally for the worse.

Starwood announced its annual category changes on MilePoint and FlyerTalk, effective March 5.  Amongst hotels that stood out for me, the Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort Villas moved up from a category 6 (20-25k/nt) to a category 7 (30-35k/nt).  For other Hawaii properties, the St. Regis Princeville moves up to a category 7 (from 6) and the Moana Surfrider and Westin Princville move up from category 5 (12-16k/nt) to category 6.

Hilton’s seen a major devaluation as the number of categories and the points required have gone up.

Locating a sanely priced hotel was the main logistical consideration in this trip. During my previous visit to Maui in 2011, I had stayed at the Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort Villas thanks to Starwood’s Free Resort Nights promotion earlier that year. For this trip, I spotted a cash and points rate for the nearby Westin Resort for 4.8k points and $90 per night. To contrast, the cheapest available nightly room rate was $359 (plus resort fees and taxes). The other neighboring properties’ rates were in excess of $400 per night.

I had booked a basic room (as part of my cash and points booking) but was upgraded to an ocean view room with a private balcony during check-in.  (The hotel unfortunately did not have any rooms free with queen/king beds.)

The hotel’s pool and open air lobby have several artifical waterfalls.

Hyatt’s More Possibilites promotion is now open for registration.

• Every three nights earns 3k Gold Passport points.
• Hyatt Visa holders earn an additional 600 points per 3 nights (a 20% bonus).

It’s not the most exciting promotion, but it’s a slightly stronger rebate than Starwood’s current promotion (2k points per 4 nights).

For my 9 hour layover, I once again stayed at the Westin LAX. As I came down to the lobby to see the first shuttle to LAX pulling away, I had 15 minutes to kill.

Rather convieniently, the hotel has trackers for the two shuttles servicing it:

It doesn’t indicate whether the shuttle is on the arrivals or departures level of the loop, but it’s better than nothing.

Back in December, I had a quick one-night stay at the Westin Washington D.C. City Center.

Until a few months ago, I would always religiously use hotel websites to book my stays, occasionally stopping by Expedia for quick comparison shopping.  In September, my glance at Expedia turned up a better rate for the Sheraton Kauai Resort than the rate I had already booked, so I did a Best Rate Guarantee with Starwood.

I now religiously check Kayak first, then weigh my options.  For instance, I’m going to Washington D.C. this weekend and need a hotel room for Saturday night.  If I venture over to Hyatt’s website, they have decent rates for some properties in the city center.

The Grand Hyatt usually hovers at a higher rate and I’ve certainly paid more for the Hyatt Regency in the past.  Ordinarily, this would be a great time to go book, but a detour to Kayak is in order.  For those with a particular brand affinity, whether due to status or personal preference, it’s a convienent search.

“$86 difference across 13 sites” sounds appealing.  Hyatt has a fairly straightforward best rate guarantee:  Call with a competing rate and if they validate it, they’ll beat it by 20%.

Starwood offers a choice of 2k points (as I did at LAX) or a 10% discount off the better rate (as I did in Kauai).  While calling is inconvieient, it does provide more immediate feedback (and reduces the likelihood that rates shift before they examine the claim).

I fly on AA185, the late evening JFK-LAX flight, on a regular basis.   While the flight is conveniently timed for making it to the airport with plenty of time between work and the departure time, it unfortunately arrives after midnight (with scheduled arrivals closer to 1AM).

Recently, I adopted a new approach to getting to sleep quickly after arrival:  Stay near the airport.  With the help of Kayak, I was able to find a $80 rate at the Westin LAX when Starwood’s going rate was $100.  With SPG’s Best Rate Guarantee, I picked up the lower rate and 2k SPG points.

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The next leg of my business trip adventure involved a single night at the Sheraton La Jolla.

While property is visible from La Jolla Village Drive, its actual driveway is on a side street with minimal markings.

Like a few other Sheratons that I have stayed at, guest rooms were scattered among a few standalone buildings.

Most, but not quite all, of the doors to the right were “enhanced” rooms.  As an SPG Gold member, I received an “upgrade” to one of the rooms on the right with a view of the pool.

While my room was comfortable, I couldn’t help but shake that dated feel when contrasted with Westin.

In a rare business trip, I found myself spending 3 nights at the Westin Pasadena.

As I was checking in at 11AM, having made my way from the first flight in from New York, I did not have especially high expectations for my room.  The front desk found me a high floor room, 921.

At the door, I tried my keycard.  Nothing.  Figuring my swiping technique was somehow lacking, I tried a few more times.  Nothing.  To see if the lock was even powered, I swiped a Starbucks card.  Still nothing.

Thoroughly confused, I went back to the front desk.  The apologetic front desk clerk realized that I was actually supposed to be in room 912 and that the rate card was incorrectly marked for 921. My return to the 9th floor was far less eventful.

Lately, I’ve been noticing that I’ve been spoiled by the decor of Westins.  I’m perfectly willing to admit that it could just be an elaborate marketing gimmick (or success, for that matter), but the rooms at Sheratons lately have felt much more… tired.

Before I find myself taking back everything I said about Westin, the white balance of my camera was off.

While I didn’t choose the hotel, Starwood’s current Better by the Night promotion, offering triple points on 3+ night stays, worked out nicely.  Ordinarily, I’m much more stay rather than night-driven, as I tend to make only brief stops in locations and to try to maximize stay-based bonuses (and progress towards elite status).

I’ve started a listing of the best options for purchasing points outright.  While these are only occasionally a good value, the option to buy points can often be useful in topping up  an account for a specific award redemption.

Club Carlson is offering a 50% bonus on points purchases from now through November 10th, 2012.  As points are normally priced at $7 per 1k points, this brings the cost to $4.67 per 1k points.  Club Carlson imposes a 40k points per year purchase cap (or under this promotion, effectively 60k points).

Carlson’s top-tier properties normally run 50k points.  While there have been far cheaper ways of obtaining 50k points historically, purchasing points can be cheaper than paying the nightly room rate.  For one night in Paris, July 12th-13th room rates for the Radisson properties are hovering around $410+.  In comparison, buying 50k points would cost $233.33 under this promotion.

Club Carlson offers additional redemption options in the form of transfers to airlines.

• 2k points to 250 airline miles (8:1)
• 50k points to 8k airline miles (6.25:1)
• 100k points to 18k airline miles (5.56:1)

United is currently running a tiered bonus scheme for transfers from hotel programs to Mileage Plus through November 30th:

• Transfer in 5k miles: 1k bonus.
• Transfer in 10k miles: 2.5k bonus
• Transfer in 25k miles: 5k bonus
• Transfer in 50k miles: 15k bonus

While Loyalty Traveler discusses converting Carlson Points to United Miles en masse to take advantage of this.  Buying 60k points (for $280) for an account with orphaned (6k or more) Carlson points in it can be a viable option as well.  The combined 66k balance converts to 10k United miles hitting the 2.5k bonus tier.

Ordinarily, United charges $37.625/1k to buy miles directly.  This scheme, primed with a small amount of orphaned Club Carlson points, brings the cost down to about 2.24cpm.

Last weekend was an adventure, to put it mildly. I was visiting San Jose on a $233 United fare that I had booked back in June, out Saturday and back Sunday night.

Standing in line at LGA to board, I ran into another FlyerTalker who I met on the $120 NYC-PDX fare.   While I mostly napped on my LGA-DEN leg, I ended up getting asked by my seatmate about what she could do in San Jose… for 6 hours while waiting for her flight back.   Under most normal circumstances, this question would puzzle someone; but I apparently have a “FlyerTalk vibe,” so there was no confusion about what was going on.

Saturday night, I get an email from United telling me my Monday morning CLE-LGA flight is cancelled, beginning my string of flight cancellations up until Wednesday morning.  Placed on a map, my various reroutes gave impressive coverage from a single, SJC-NYC one-way trip.

Due to automatic rebookings, it’s very likely I overlooked a few flights:

1. Morning SJC-LAX flight, connecting to UA1001, LAX-EWR.  UA1001 cancels at 8AM.
2. Rebooked at SJC to AA, AA1922 to AA746, SJC-DFW-LGA.  AA746 cancels at 9:30AM.
3. Rebooked AA1530, SJC-ORD, then connecting to AA392, ORD-LGA, on Tuesday.  While I was eating lunch, AA392 got cancelled 2 days in advance.
4. At the ORD Admirals Club, I got rebooked on AA366 for Wednesday.  I ultimately move it to AA398, the 6AM Wednesday departure, over the phone.  It got cancelled Tuesday morning.
5. I got rebooked on AA2488, ORD-BOS, ultimately  moving onto the earlier departure, AA1184, on Tuesday.

As this itinerary ultimately left me with two overnights in Chicago, I wound up staying at the aloft Chicago O’Hare (which is identical to past alofts I have visited) for 4k SPG points and then the Sheraton Chicago O’Hare on a 2.8k/$45 cash and points rate.  I booked a two room suite, which is uncommon for a basic points redemption.  Check-in required prompting to receive internet for free ($9.95/nt otherwise) as my Gold amenity.

My one and only complaint with the room itself was its proximity to the elevators.

Otherwise, I had exactly what I was promised, a two-room suite.

As I was staying on a weeknight, the hotel was charging about $210/nt for prepaid, nonrefundable rates and $249/nt for flexible rates.  In comparison, using the cost of replacement for the points, my nightly rate was approximately $123/nt and fully flexible (cancel by 6PM on the day of arrival).

Nonetheless, as ill-advised as flying into a hurricane might be, buying a walk-up fare on American Sunday morning for ~$480 would have cost about as much as my two nights in Chicago, a one-way car rental from Boston, gas, and tolls ultimately did for my return to New York.

SPG is currently running a 20% off promotion on purchased SPG points, bringing the cost down to $28 per 1k points.  SPG limits accounts to purchasing 20k points per year.  The promotion ends November 30th, 2012.

If tied to particular redemption plans, buying points can capture value.

• My night at the Sheraton London Heathrow was a Cat 2 weekend redemption for 3k points, saving $100 (3.3cpp).
• My stay at the Sheraton Brussels Airport was a Cat 4 cash and points redemption for 4k points and $60, saving $180 net–from a normal $240 nightly room rate (4.5cpp).
• Loyalty Traveler demonstrates value in purchasing points to stay at the Westin Resort and Spa, Ka’anapali.   Similarly, there is value for the other Starwood properties (4.83cpp as an outright award for the Sheraton and 2.99cpp for cash and points at the Westin Resort Villas):

Even in “low-value” territory close to the 2.8cpp price, award bookings can offer flexibility that the lowest rates don’t carry.

As I had a string of Starwood stays last week, I was far more concerned with SPG’s Better by the Night promotion and overlooked the other promotions that were more quietly announced.  Loyalty Traveler notes another promotion, one for Aeroplan miles, that stacks for nights between September 10th and December 9th:

• 3 eligible nights earns 3k Aeroplan miles or 5 nights earn 5k miles.
• If at least 3 nights are in Canada, SPG is offering an additional 3k miles.

As I’ve had 6 eligible nights since September 10th already, I went ahead and registered today.

While Aeroplan suffered a number of devaluations last year, both explicitly in its award chart and more quietly in the form of fuel surcharges, the program has still been quite good to me in the aftermath.

As part of my short trip to Washington, my second stay was at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City.

Carlson is offering a buy one, get one free night promotion for its North American Radisson hotels, limit one free night per person.  While the promotion is limited to the first 50k signups, that limit hasn’t been reached even though the promotion has been open for nearly a month.  Rather importantly, stays must be booked by October 31st (for dates between now and December 31st, 2012) to qualify under the promotion.

While it’s not as good as the 50k points–good for a night at any Radisson worldwide–for a single Radisson stay offers of the past, there can still be considerable value to be extracted.  A cheap $75 night in San Jose yields a $250-300 night at the Radisson Hotel Fisherman’s Wharf.

In addition to this free night promotion,  Carlson is offering bonus points on a sliding scale based on the number of nights stayed between October 1st and December 31st:

• 2,000 bonus points per night when you stay one to five nights
• 4,000 bonus points per night when you stay six to nine nights
• 6,000 bonus points per night when you stay 10 to 20 nights

For my stay of 4 days/3 nights in Kauai, I booked the Sheraton Kauai Resort.  A bit more than a month out from arrival, I came across a $309/nt base rate (plus taxes/resort fee) for Labor Day weekend.

As I wasn’t entirely thrilled by a $300+/nt rate, I continued to explore my options with Expedia periodically, eventually stumbling upon a $225/nt rate for the Sheraton offered by Expedia.  Starwood offers a fairly generous best rate guarantee, requiring a booking only after a claim is approved.  I took the 10% discount (over 2k SPG points), which brought my nightly rate down to $202/nt.

Overall, my room wasn’t anything extraordinary compared to a normal Sheraton property.  As of late, I’ve taken an appreciation for the fresh feel of Westins (at least amongst Starwood properties).

My trip intersected with the Kauai Marathon, making getting in and out from the property a bit more difficult in the morning one day.  I chose to eat at the hotel’s restaurant, finding the $25 breakfast buffet to be disappointing (and leaving me appreciating the Hyatt Place I had just stayed at).

For my trip to Hawaii this past Labor Day weekend, I flew to Kauai by my now traditional route: Honolulu.   While the Sheraton Princess Kaiulani looked “good” at $189/nt plus resort fees for a flexible rate compared to other hotels, the Hyatt Place Waikiki dropped its nightly rates to $139/nt with no resort fee three days before my departure.  As the hotel was limited to valet parking, I parked at the Ewa Hotel Waikiki next door.

The open-air lobby is the first I’ve seen at a Hyatt Place.

As a Hyatt Diamond member, my basic city view room was upgraded to a high floor, partial ocean view room.  Considering the location of the hotel relative to other buildings, I doubt there was much room for improvement.

Breakfast was served at a covered buffet.  The open seating area lent itself, however, to attracting a variety of birds looking for handouts, the signs discouraging feeding the birds notwithstanding.

Overall, I was quite pleased with my stay, but it seems rare that the nightly rate of the Hyatt Place falls below the other Starwood properties in the area, particularly when cash and points rates are considered.

With a 10AM departure out of Brussels back to New York, staying near the airport was a good strategy.  Convienently, at the time of booking the air travel, Starwood had a cash and points rate available for the Sheraton Brussels Airport hotel at 4k SPG points and 60USD.  In comparison, the hotel’s nightly prepaid, nonrefundable rate was typically running around 190 Euros for weekday stays.

The hotel is quite close to the airport.  Since the arrivals level is undergoing construction work, the advertised claim of “39 steps from the airport entrance” wasn’t quite accurate due to poor signage, but getting to and from the terminal on the departures level was straightforward enough.

At the end of checking in, the front desk clear had completely forgotten about the SPG Gold amenity.  Figuring that internet would run 10-20 Euros, I asked about it.  He stated my options and I indicated I wanted the internet (as paying 10 Euros for 250 points is a miserable value).  At checkout, the fee for internet access wound up appearing on the bill as apparently my amenity hadn’t even been entered by the clerk the previous day.

Switching to the nonstop to Honolulu meant I had an overnight to find myself accommodations for.  At about $100/nt (plus the resort fee and taxes), I chose the Sheraton Princess Kaiulani again (I had last stayed here for my Honolulu overnight in September).

This time around, I actually had a city view room (rather than parking lot view) with a small balcony.

My stay served its purpose:  To get a few hours of sleep before my flight.  My only complaint?  The front desk doesn’t sell stamps.  Combined with the early departure from Honolulu, I had to wait to San Francisco to mail a postcard.

For my stay in Manila, I chose the Hyatt Manila and used one of my Diamond member suite upgrades to confirm a better room for myself.  I received a Regency Suite King room.  At 74 square meters (per their website description), the suite was bigger than my Manhattan studio.

The bedroom:

The room had excellent views of the city from the 26th floor.

I recently stayed at the Hilton San Jose for a conference.  Thanks to the combination of mix up in my booking (my Hilton HHonors number had been left off) and a sold out hotel, I wound up with two double beds rather than a single king/queen sized bed.  To make up for it, the front desk offered me access to the executive floor lounge, even as a HHonors gold member.

Since I was going to the San Jose convention center, the hotel had an excellent location.  In light of my slow progress at requalifying for Hyatt Diamond, I’m wondering if I would have been better off at the Hyatt Place across the street.

My only complaint about the hotel is that it sits approximately under the flight path of San Jose airport, so I heard planes going over during most of my waking hours in my room.

My flight from Istanbul was delayed, so I wasn’t on the ground in Germany past customs until about 9PM, hardly enough time to go into Berlin, catch some sleep at my hotel, and make my flight 12 hours later, so sadly, I chose to go straight to my hotel.

This left me wandering around Berlin Tegel Airport, looking for the hotel shuttle stand.  I made a loop around the concourse having found none.  I checked the hotel website again and realized I had to arrange the shuttle in advance, so I went out to the cab stand instead, finding a driver very excited to practice a few lines of English with an American.

The room had two halves with a moving partition (hence the two beds pictured).

After paying for my visa and entering Turkey, I located the Turkish Airlines Hotel Desk.  For passengers connecting in Istanbul, Turkish Airlines offers a choice of either a hotel room or a guided tour of Istanbul, coordinating both offers from the “Hotel Desk.”  (Its name is not completely intuitive to its purpose for those looking to take the city tour.)

Since I was interested in taking the city tour the next day, I had made my own hotel arrangements, selecting the Holiday Inn.  While it is billed as an airport hotel (and it offers a shuttle), it is about 6 miles from the airport itself.

For my stay in Tokyo, I chose to stay at the airport.  While the first part of my plan (checking in early to freshen up) did not go quite as expected, it was convenient for the second half of my plan:  Being able to get to the airport at a leisurely pace for my late morning departure.

As a Hilton HHonors gold member, I was given a voucher for a complimentary breakfast at their restaurant.  The buffet was a vast collection of Japanese and Western dishes, but I chose to not take photos as it was rather busy and I didn’t feel like explaining what I was up to.

For my night in Bangkok, I chose the Aloft in Sukhumvit.

Overall, my room felt like a cookie-cutter replica of my previous Aloft stay last summer.

For my stay in Zürich, I chose the Holiday Inn Express near the airport. The S-Bahn into the city was a short five minute walk from the hotel, so I was minimally inconvenienced.

One Mile at a Time mentions that Hyatt is offering a 90-day trial of its mid-tier Platinum status for Visa Signature card holders.  Notably, Platinum status comes with free internet access when staying at Hyatts.

As a result of some plans to take the Amtrak Coast Starlight from San Jose to Los Angeles not going quite to plan (I would have only had a few hours in Los Angeles to sleep before catching a plane back up to SFO so I could pick up my existing flight back to New York), I had a prepaid reservation at the Hyatt Regency Santa Clara to make use of.

Interestingly, it was cheaper to stay at this Hyatt Regency, a “full service” Hyatt location, over a few nearby Hyatt House and Hyatt Place locations.  As a current Hyatt Diamond member, this translates into a 1k point amenity (instead of 500).  Further, as this location’s lounge is closed on weekends, I picked up a further 2.5k point bonus, bringing my total for the stay to about 4k points for $80 before considering the ongoing Hyatt promotion.

For perspective, a category 1 award night (in a standard, non-suite room) runs 5k points.

For our third night, OWMD stayed at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza.

Earlier in the day while we were at the Museum of Flight, I had noticed suite availability and attempted to confirm an upgrade.  I was told to call back later, and so I did… on the bus to the hotel from LAX.  At check-in, I was given a Century Suite.  At 700 square feet, it’s larger than my Manhattan studio.

Having had a few hours to kill between breakfast and my timeslot to visit the Flagship Check-in area at LAX, I chose to take the tour of the hotel they offered.

For our second night, oneworld MegaDo stayed at the Hyatt Regency Bellevue.  Shortly before the festivities started, I managed to confirm a suite upgrade using one of my four soon-to-be-expiring certificates that I received with my Hyatt Diamond status during StarMegaDo3.  I received a small, but comfortable one bedroom corner suite.

oneworld MegaDo started off in Dallas, where we stayed at the Hyatt Regency.  Having taken an early flight in on US Airways, I was glad that they were able to find me a room.

The weather made for a very bleak day at DFW.

While the type of crowd that the MegaDos attracts tends to be more focused on points than food amenities, the Hyatt delivered an apple, pear, and bottle of water as the diamond amenity.

Prior to receiving the “Crazy Water” information card, I hadn’t appreciated the number of types of water that I could have.

Since I had an early morning flight to Dublin, I decided that I would stay near the airport.  Initially, I was considering rooms with roughly 100USD/night rates as I just needed a bed and a shower.

Having accumulated a large stockpile of SPG points from the Starwood Amex last summer (30k for $4.5k in 3 months), ordinary spending, and Starwood stays, I noticed that the Sheraton London Heathrow is a Category 2 hotel.  For weekend stays, Cat 2 hotels are only 3k points per night, giving me a 3.3cpp valuation for my redemption while offering the added flexibility that a prepaid, nonrefundable rate would not have had.

My main annoyance with the hotel is that they do not run their own shuttle and instead rely on the Hotel Hoppa bus service which runs a few pounds each way.  Further, since I had not picked up any cash at an ATM, I had to wait inside at the information desk to pay with a credit card.  The customer in front of me had no hotel room for the night and patiently listened to the agent sell him on all the great benefits of the London Heathrow Hilton (for roughly 160 pounds per night).  The guy agreed and stepped off to get some cash.  Rather than service me after I stated I just needed a bus ticket, he reminding me that the guy was coming back (yeah, right…).  Eventually, the other clerk told him to just take care of the line of waiting customers rather than hope that the guy would come back.

The front lobby is undergoing maintenance, so the bus drops off and picks up passengers at the back of the hotel.

When I came to the desk, I thought it was incredibly well designed to have three types of outlets.

Unfortunately, the US outlet was slightly out of spec and permitted my cables to float freely in the outlet without making electrical contact.  With my set of plug adapters, I reached a simple. albeit less than ideal solution.

When I was looking for hotels in Auckland, I came across the Best Western President Hotel Auckland at 50% off via American Express Travel, bringing the nightly rate to just over 60USD.  Had it been a complete disaster, I would have been able to walk away from the room and check-in to another Auckland hotel.  For the rate, the stay was comfortable, but obviously not the lap of luxury.

The front desk clerk was friendly during check-in, but the more manager-type working the desk began muttering “look at the rate for his room.”  I played dumb and asked what the matter was to “discover” that the going rate was just over double what the hotel was being paid.  I’m still not quite sure if the point of this exercise was to lower my expectations even further given the rate I was paying.

For my three days, two nights in Sydney, I booked a revenue stay at the Four Points by Sheraton Sydney Darling Harbour.

I was quite pleased by the location, as it was a short walk from the restaurants and shops of Darling Harbour while still remaining close to the central business district of Sydney.

From exiting customs at the airport, I took the train and immediately headed to my hotel.  I was able to check-in at 10AM, but the best room available was on the third floor.  I took it, happy to be able to take a shower.

LCD TV notwithstanding, the room was showing its age.  In terms of upkeep (or simply an oversight in design), the door bar had made a small, but sizeable dent in the plaster of the wall.  In more practical areas, I was most disappointed by the internet access, especially at 24.50 AUD per day.  The connection in the room was wired and was rather slow.  The experience reminded me of the present state of wifi on airplanes within the United States, except that the wifi on airplanes is cheaper (order $12.95 for a transcontinental flight) and faster.

With my flight from New York arriving from San Francisco a bit early, I had a 24.5 hour layover at SFO.  After the Club Carlson 50k promotion went live, I registered and began looking for a chance to stop by a Radisson to participate in the promotion.  Even as I plan to use the points towards a night for a substantially more expensive hotel abroad, I couldn’t bring myself to mattress run locally (even with the $100/nt rate that showed up at the Radisson Lexington in December).  Since I needed to overnight in the Bay Area, I chose to stay at the Radisson San Francisco Airport Bay Front hotel.

I “splurged” and spent $5 at the time of booking for a bay view room.

I’ve come to set a few minimum standards with my hotel stays.  I want a comfortable bed.  I want a fast internet connection.  I want peace and quiet for when I’m trying to sleep.  For hotels with airport shuttles, I want the shuttle service to be frequent and run during the hours posted (unlike what happened at the aloft Dulles North to me in July).

My shuttle arrived within a few minutes of stepping out of the terminal.   Check-in was fast and painless.  Upon entering my room, I heard the occupants next door.  Since it was 10PM and I had little intention of going to bed right away, this didn’t really bother me as I wanted to catch up on my email and use the internet connection for a bit.  Around 1AM PST, my neighbors were still talking and laughing.  I wound up calling the front desk and was able to get moved to a new room on a quieter floor.

By the time I called, I had heard four distinct voices next door.  As I was leaving, I passed another party of four going into that room carrying several cases of beer into the room.  Needless to say, asking for another room was the wisest move I made all trip.  With my basic priorities of hotel stays satisfied, I settled in for the night.

I traveled just over 144k miles this year, approximately 125k of which were revenue flights:

I wound up with four redemptions:

• 2 nights at the Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort Villas as part of Starwood’s Free Resort Nights promotion.
• 1 upgrade from coach to p.s. business class on a redeye (20k UA miles)
• New York to Sydney to Auckland to Los Angeles to New York in business class from Aeroplan (76k Amex Membership Reward points)
• A trip to Asia (via Europe) in business class for early 2012 from Aeroplan (50k Amex Membership Reward points)

I earned miles and points from a number of sources:

• United/Continental had 102.5k EQM (mostly from flying, a bit from UA spending) or about 205k redeemable miles from flying.  I earned the 50k signup bonus on both the United Mileage Plus Select Visa Signature card and the Continental One Pass Plus card.  I picked up another 25k Mileage Plus miles from rental cars (until the end of August, 1k per rental from Hertz) and spending on my credit cards.
• American had about 35k EQM from flying (or 70k redeemable miles).
• US Airways Grand Slam yielded about 119k redeemable miles for about $400 in marginal spend.
• I earned 30k SPG points from the Starwood Amex signup bonus (for $4.5k in spending over 3 months).  I picked up another 12k SPG points from 10 revenue stays (including Foursquare/Facebook check-in bonuses) and credit card spending.
• I earned 55k Club Carlson points (50k bonus, 5k for the stay itself) for staying in a US Radisson Hotel by New Years.
• I earned 75k Membership Reward points for the Amex Premier Rewards Gold card and 50k for the Amex Platinum card for $1k in spending in 3 months for each card.
• I’m well on my way to 50k Chase Ultimate Reward points from my Chase Sapphire card (for $3k in spend over 3 months).
• I picked up 40k Alaska Airlines miles from the Bank of America Alaska Airlines Visa Signature card after my first purchase.
• I earned about 10.2k in Hyatt Gold Passport points from 5 revenue stays.

To give perspective on my ability to meet credit card spending thresholds, I spent approximately $22k on credit cards.  My total spend on flights occurring in 2011 (inclusive of StarMegaDo3) was $8367.49 for revenue flights and $431.27 for award flights.  I spent $2703.62 on hotels (19 stays and 23 nights) and $1727.10 on rental cars (inclusive of insurance, but not gasoline, for 19 rentals, 34 rental days).

SPG is offering bonus points on multinight stays between 1/9 and 4/8.  Two night stays earn double points; three night or more stays earn triple points.  The offer has a number of nonparticipating hotels.

MilesQuest points out a Priority Club promotion for watching a short video:

1. Go to priorityclub.com/visa1000

2. Enter in one of the promo codes

   SKAEXGTNC4 SKAEXR6WC4 SKAEX8M4C4 SKAEX9KYC4

3. Watch the video.

As my second Seattle-area Hyatt visit last weekend, I stayed at the Hotel Sierra Redmond.  For this stay, I booked a one bedroom king with a balcony.

The bathroom and vanity:

As a one bedroom, the sitting area was more well defined.

A simple, yet functional desk:

A more nicely finished kitchenette than the Hotel Sierra Bellevue:

The front desk desk also asked for my preference in Diamond amenity, although the clerk spent a minute trying to see if it could be credited to US Airways (like the rest of my stay was).   Since the acquisition of Hotel Sierra two months ago by Hyatt, it seems the check-in clerks have been reasonably well-trained.  Three days after my stay, I received an email offering me the ability to sign up to earn “Stash Hotel Rewards.”  A quick glance at the website showed that it seems to be an independent hotelier rewards program, leaving me to chalk up the email as a legacy of the acquisition.

I had my NEXUS interview last weekend at the Blaine, Washington enrollment center.  Admittedly, the Canadian officer was rather puzzled by my place of residence in New York but went along with it after I explained why I wanted NEXUS:  “I find cheap airfares for weekends and go jetsetting.  I’d like to visit Canada with minimal fuss at the border.”  In an impressive show of government efficiency, I was approved at my interview last Sunday and received my card this past Thursday. Since I got into the Seattle area on Friday night, I went hotel hopping to score two last hits for the U.S. Airways Grand Slam.  I managed to find two Hotel Sierras (now owned by Hyatt) in the area at $90 per night two weeks in advance.  While I didn’t manage to find a third Hyatt stay in my schedule to stack the “Possibilities” promotion, these stays worked out nicely as other hit-eligible hotels in the area had more expensive rates. When I checked-in, the front desk clerk recognized my Hyatt Diamond status and asked for my choice of Diamond amenity:  500 Hyatt Gold Passport points or a $5 market credit.  With no desire to eat an overpriced bag of candies or a drink, I took the points.  The clerk was also able to tie my US Airways number to the stay.  From my reading of Hyatt’s policies, it is necessary to do this at check-in rather than in advance as Hilton allows. I booked a king bed studio and received one. Hotel Sierras seem to have marketed themselves more into the extended stay arena and feature kitchenettes:

I woke up rather late so I came in to the breakfast area right at its official close time (10AM), so it meant that they had stopped putting out more food.  Since I was going to be meeting a friend for lunch, this wasn’t that much of a problem.  I was able to grab a bowl of cereal and a cup of coffee and be on my way.

During StarMegaDo3, the existing Hyatt Diamonds raved about the value of having a private line agent.  A few weeks ago, I decided to request to have one assigned to me without fully recognizing the immediate value.  I now do.  On Tuesday evening I noticed that my stay for this hotel had credited to Hyatt (according to FlyerTalk, this is apparently typical with Hyatt) and without the Diamond amenity, so I sent an email over to my PLA.  I received a response the next day asking for confirmation of my US Airways number and found that everything had been taken care of a few hours later when I checked my Gold Passport account.  No phone calls.  No hold music.  No frustration at ensuring my Gold Passport number is recognized by the automated prompts.  Asynchronous, yet responsive interaction is something I wish I could have with the airlines I fly.

So I stayed at two Hyatt-flagged hotels this weekend.   This afternoon, I got an email from Hyatt:

Thank you for participating in our latest Hyatt Gold Passport™ promotion. You’re just 2 night(s) away from your first reward of 5,000 Hyatt Gold Passport bonus points. As a reminder, you’ll earn 5,000 Hyatt Gold Passport bonus points for every three eligible nights you stay at any Hyatt™ worldwide through November 15. It’s the perfect time to earn points quickly. And with no blackout dates, it’s always the perfect time to redeem them. After all, points are really possibilities waiting to happen. So what possibilities will you discover?

Given that the promotion ends tonight, I do not think I’m going to get two more nights in…

Carlson is opening its first Radisson Blu in the United States.  For the first 50k registrants, staying one night will yield a 50k Carlson Club point bonus.   Based on the Carlson award chart, this ranges from 1 to 5 free nights for a single stay, depending on category.

I had the chance to spend some time in one of United’s A320 simulators as part of a charity auction on behalf of the Captain Jason Dahl Scholarship Fund.  Jason Dahl was captain of United 93 on September 11, 2001.  The Dahl Fund provides aviation scholarships to students.   While I won’t post my simulator photos here at the request of the volunteers who helped out and made the opportunity available, I did come across a copy of a 1938 United Airlines advertisement by artist Arthur C. Radebaugh:

We stayed at the Grand Hyatt Denver.

The Diamond amenity was three pieces of fruit from a family-run, local orchard.

On Saturday, my subtour group visited Wings over the Rockies, a local aviation museum built on the site of Lowery Air Force Base.

I didn’t return straight to New York from Kahului.  Instead, I ventured to Chicago via San Francisco and Las Vegas to pick up the start of StarMegaDo3.  My upgrades to First Class cleared for OGG-SFO-LAS-ORD, making the redeye from Kahului substantially more bearable.

Since I had the same aircraft and cabin crew for the LAS-ORD segment as I had for SFO-LAS, the flight attendants were understandably confused when they saw me get back onto the A320 to sit in the same seat in first class.  The routing ended up being a quirk of pricing:  The cost of OGG-SFO-LAS plus LAS-ORD was lower than the comparable OGG-SFO-ORD fare.  With a few minutes to kill before boarding commenced, I snapped off a picture of the welcome sign near the United gates:

The first night for StarMegaDo3 was at the Hyatt Regency Chicago O’Hare.  Because Hyatt had gifted Diamond status, the top-tier with the Gold Passport rewards program, it was difficult for the hotel to deliver substantial upgrades.

The Hyatt Diamond amenity, normally a choice of either a snack or 1k points, was restricted to just the snack.  It was delivered to our rooms while at the StarMegaDo reception at the Park Hyatt downtown.

While the reception at the Park Hyatt was too dark for my camera to capture well, the two Tulip-branded, United wine classes that we were given as swag survived my trip around North America long enough to make it back to New York with me… and to be photographed:

From my six Starwood stays during the earlier promotion, I had two free resort nights that I used for my stay at the Westin Ka’anapali Ocean Resort Villas, a Category 6 Starwood hotel that normally retails for a minimum of $329 (base) per night or 20k Starwood points.

After parking my rental car, I ended up in the main lobby to find that I was booked for the neighboring north complex:

At dusk:

The hotel lobby:

Under the free resort nights promotion, stays booked into the least expensive room on the property:  A “Deluxe Island View Studio Villa.”

While not necessary for my stay, the couch also serves as a double bed.

Since this property is actually a timeshare resort, it came with a kitchen for extended stays.

The bathroom featured a whirlpool and a closeable window out to the main room.

As is custom, I offer my unexciting TV picture.

Each of the complexes is built around open pool and lounge areas.  There’s a Koi pond in the foreground.

The hotel has an extensive beachfront:

To reach Honolulu, I flew on United 421 from Newark to Honolulu with a stop in San Francisco to change planes from an A320 to a Boeing 777.  Since United’s domestic non-p.s. first class is rather uniform, I’ll omit the standard photo of the seat and legroom for brevity.

United flights to Hawaii have a “Halfway to Hawaii” game sponsored by Hilton.  The prize is just a CD; previously, the prizes had ranged from wine to Hawaiian-produced nuts.

I stayed at the Sheraton Princess Kaiulani.  While the hotel felt old and dated, the prepaid rate of $69 (after a $40 discount from American Express) seemed decent for a hotel on Kauakana Avenue in Waikiki.

The room could have used a bit of work on its view:  The parking lot.

Starwood announced its Triple Up promotion.  For stays involving a Thursday or Sunday night, there is a triple SPG point bonus; for all other stays, there is a double SPG point bonus.  There’s a few nonparticipating hotels as well. Registration opens on September 6th for stays booked between September 6th through December 18th.  Registration closes November 15th.

Priority Club has a brand diversity-driven promotion from September 15 through December 31.  Stays earn a 500 point or 100 mile bonus.  Staying at 2-4 distinct brands gives a multiplier for a bonus to appear at the beginning of 2012.  Registration is currently open.

Marriott has a targeted fall MegaBonus promotion for stays between September 15th through January 15th.  My offer was for one free night (at a Category 1-4 hotel) every second stay with a limit of 2 free nights.

I’m not thrilled by any of these in comparison to the three stays for a free night promotion that Starwood ran earlier this year, but alas, it’s better than nothing.

Hyatt announced their newest promotion on FlyerTalk: Every 3k eligible nights earns a 5k point bonus up to a total of 30k bonus points.  Registration opens on September 15.

For reference, the Hyatt award chart starts at 5k points per night for Category 1 hotels and works up to 22k points per night for Category 6 hotels.

To top off my last stay with last quarter’s Starwood promotion, I stayed at the Westin Washington Dulles.

Two weekends ago, I was in Washington DC to visit and wrap up another three stays as part of SPG’s Getaway Free promotion.  For my second stay and night, I was at the aloft Dulles North.

The room itself was fine.  The shuttle could use a bit of work.  It’s scheduled to run until 11PM, but for a number of hotel guests and myself waiting around at 10PM onwards, it stopped running much earlier.

I went hotel hopping with Starwood last weekend to combine a trip to Washington DC with picking up another free reward night during the last days of the Getaway Free promotion.

My match to Starwood Gold status from Hilton yielded a nice room on the 14th floor.  Tomorrow’s post will discuss the value of having a decent floor.

The desk had two sets of power outlets.  Two on the lamp and two in a retractable powerstrip that was embedded in the desk.

To kick off completing my three stays under the Visa Signature promotion, I stayed at a Hilton for my trip to New Mexico.

I’ve been busy with other posts up until now and I’m going on another trip this weekend, so it’s time to post a few photos from my stay at the Sheraton Sunnyvale.   The stay rounded out three stays under the stay three times, get a night free promotion that ends at the end of the month.

Courtesy of a match over from Hilton, I’m currently at the midtier with SPG.  When I asked about whether I could receive an upgraded room for having status, the front desk clerk declined to do so.  The second desk clerk pulled up my reservation and informed me that I had an interior-facing room rather than an exterior one (facing part of the near by expressway).

Hilton released the details of their third quarter promotion:  Double points or miles.  I’m not quite as wooed by this as the remaining month or so of life that the Starwood second quarter promotion has left in it, but it’s better than nothing while completing a few stays to retain the gold tier through March 2013.

It’s already mid-June so a hotel program promotion summary is in order.

• Starwood Preferred Guest:  I’m currently at the Gold level (Middle tier).  My hotel stays lately have been directed here as part of the Stay Three, Getaway Free promotion.
• Hilton HHonors:  I’m temporarily at the Gold level (Middle tier) thanks to having a Visa Signature card.To retain it past August 31st, three stays are required so I’ll shift over here after securing a few nights with SPG.
• Marriott Rewards:  I’m currently at the Silver level (Low tier).  Through August 31st, two stays nets a free night in a category 1-4 hotel.
• Priority Club:  I received the Platinum level from a giveaway they had last December, but I haven’t made use of it this year.