Who I Read

This past weekend, I taught at my fraternity's leadership conference. When I introduced myself to these young men, I told them that I travel frequently on my own dime. Immediately, they wanted to learn more about miles/points/travel.

As promised I to them, here are the list of bloggers that I read on a frequent basis:

• The Flight Deal 

            This blog is focused on the best airfares out there for mileage run. However, many
            of the deals are great for short/long vacations, as well.

•   Deals We Like 

            A blog about the best deals out there to earn miles/points from airlines & hotels. His
            posts are centered around one particular promotion and how to make it work for you.

• The Travel Playbook 

          
           A young guy traveling the world for as little as possible. Talks more about the lifestyle
           of traveling than earning points/miles. Typically his posts are short ie what could be
           discussed in a 30 second timeout.

• Mile Nerd

          If The Travel Playbook's posts are what can be discussed in a 30 second timeout. Mile
          Nerd's posts are what can be screamed from the coach on the sideline to his players on
          the field. His motto is "just the most miles in the fewest possible words." He lives up
          to his motto with the occasional longer rant.

• Heels First Travel

                

          Keri and Jeanne are two fashionistas travelers. They are always travel for work and
          play and doing it in style. They have almost perfected the work/play balance; even
          thought it seems that they are constantly on an airplane to someone. For female
          readers, they constantly talk about the best travel wear and 3oz toiletries and
          cosmetics.

• View from the Wing

          Gary is the father of points/miles/frequent traveler blogger. He was one of the 

          bloggers the brought me into the community. Gary writes about a wide range of 

          travel topics from industry news to various promotions. 

If you are looking for additional blogs, you should can find them in there blog communities:

BoardingArea

First2board

Upgrd 

I hope these blogs help you learn more about the hobby that I love.

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A Crowne Plaza Stay Earn Me 22,917 Points

The other weekend, I did a mattress run to the Crowne Plaza DCA (National Airport) to complete 1 night for IHG's The Big Win Promotion. The cost of the night was $79 and I got breakfast and a drink out of it.
(Hotel Review to Follow).

A week after my stay, I checked my account to see if the stay credit and I was a little shocked:

I earned 22,917 points for one stay...say what?

I understood 945 points, as I bought dinner at the hotel, but could not figure out the other bonus points. Why did I get these points? Then it hit me! A few weeks early, View from the Wing wrote about stacking IHG promo codes and I must have load the promo codes into my account. 

What Are Promo Codes?

Promo Codes are the secret weapons to earn a lot of miles on stays. Each promo code is different, but overall they offer you xxxx points after stay xxxx amount of times. Most of the time you earn bonus points with one stay, as m account shows. View From the Wing's post has an excellent list of the promo codes, but also check out this Flyertalk Thread.

If you have a stay at an IHG brand hotel coming up, you would be silly not to load them to your account.

My one word of caution is to be careful about which ones you load. Don't load similar ones like Elite Bonus twice, as it will only work once. Save the second code for a later date.

Oh btw, I also earn 1,000 points for my first stay of The Big Win -

This one $79 stay almost earned me enough points for stay at the Intercontinental Buenos Aires.

On to the next stay.....

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How I Became Addicted: JD

I have to blame my friends. Yes, this hobby of collecting points is their fault. Some might, including many members of my family, call this hobby an obsession. Yes, my friends are to blame for this obsession of mine.

It was a Friday night in January. I had plans to meet my friends in the city for dinner and drinks. However, it was one of those rainy cold nights. At the last minute, my friends bailed on me, leaving me home on a Friday night with TV. After 2 hours of flipping through 300 + channels, I was bored, to say the least. (How is it that we can have so many channels, but there is always nothing on to watch!)

My boredom led me to check the latest news on CNN.com and an article about extreme frequent flyers. I want to say this was the time George Clooney’s Up In the Air was out and everyone was talking about the frequent flyer lifestyle. This article, in particular,  caught my attention because the writer interviewed, blogger Gary Leff (View from the Wing) was talking about how he flies around the world for almost nothing. I remember thinking this can’t be true, but I was willing to take the bait.

The article linked to his blog, and so started my journey. Gary’s blog was filled with tricks, tips and amazing trip reports. I was awestruck. How did I not know this frequent flyer community existed before this night? How does this secret travel community stay so secret?

Gary’s blog had links to other bloggers, who had links to other bloggers. At one point, I had close to 20 windows open on my computer. The next morning, I went back to my bookmarks and saw 20 new blogs…to give you an idea of the magnitude of what I was reading that night. Throughout the entire time I was reading, I kept saying to myself, these bloggers make it sound so easy. This can’t be true.

At one point, I looked up and it was 4am. I had been these traveler blogs for over 6 hours. It was time to go to bed, but I was addicted like a child to candy after Halloween. I needed to read every article, every travel deal (even if it was dead), for fear that I would be somehow blocked from the community next day. Eventually, I put myself to bed and I woke up the next morning afternoon asking myself “was what happened last night a dream?”

After being the “game” for little under 18 months, this community is not a dream. What you read in this blog and others are not fairy tales. However, it is not easy. If you want to travel the world for close to nothing, it will take work. It takes reading travel blogs, some blind faith and an adventurous spirit. Looking back, I don’t blame my friends for not wanting to go out on the rainy night in January, I thank them. And some of them are thanking me now, as newly minted travel addicts.