If we’re lucky, once a year we get to go away for up to 3 weeks in the fall based on our work schedules and the times we can take time-off. In the last few years, we’ve been really lucky with our trips that often include numerous stops on the same itinerary to maximize time, points, and budget. We are especially proud of our most recent itinerary that took tons of work, planning, and luck too. In this post, we share a recap of our December 2018 trip and related posts.

The Trip:

We ended up flying 27,129 miles on 10 flight segments. Here are the details.

Flights:

• YVR-SEA-LAX: We redeemed Alaska Mileage Plan miles to fly on Alaska Airlines in First Class.
• LAX-DXB-MLE: We redeemed Alaska Mileage Plan miles to fly on Emirates in First Class.
• MLE-DOH-DPS: We redeemed American Airlines miles earned by flying WestJet to fly on Qatar Airways in Business Class.
• DPS-TMC: We used our American Express Platinum Travel Credit to offset the cost of two return economy tickets on Garuda Indonesia.
• DPS-TPE-YVR: We redeemed Aeroplan points to fly on EVA Air in Royal Laurel Class.

Hotels:

• Dubai: We used points to stay at the Al Maha Resort 1 hour away from Dubai.
• Maldives: We stayed at the Anantara Dhigu a 45 minute speedboat ride away from the airport.
• Doha: We stayed at the JW Marriott Sharq Village and paid for the stay as we needed the stay to get Platinum status again.
• Ubud, Bali: We stayed at The Purist Villas and Resort and paid for the stay.
• Sumba Island: We stayed at Nihi Sumba and paid for the stay. We received a signficant discount as we were eligible for an airline employee rate.
• Seminyak, Bali: We stayed at the W Seminyak and paid for our stay. We used a VISA promo to stay for 3 nights and pay for 2.

Our private pool villa at the W Bali in Seminyak

Summary:

As you can see, a lot of planning and research goes into these trips: from earning points for future trips, to maximizing the return on investment of points redemptions and finding the best deals. As glamorous as our trips appear to be, we invest a lot of time and money into them and need to even stay on top of things during our travels.

Do you like planning trips?

Related Posts:

• How We Use Points for Hotels and Flights – Our Trip to Vietnam, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka
• Flight Review – Emirates First Class A380 LAX – Los Angeles to DXB – Dubai
• Flight Review – New Emirates First Class 777 DXB – Dubai to MLE – Male
• Plan: Qatar Airways Business Class Review A350-1000 QSuites from MLE-DOH and 777 from DOH-DPS
• Emirates First Class: A Really Fun Thing We’ll Never Get To Do Again
• Stay: Review of Al Maha Resort in Dubai
• Stay: Review of The Purist Villas in Ubud Bali
• Review: Our Maldivian Vacation at the Anantara Dhigu
• Plan: The Maldives on a $500 budget per day
• Plan: 24 Hours in Doha
• Indulge – Indonesian Food in Ubud Bali
• Overtourism: Did “Eat Pray Love” Ruin Bali?