Austin: Kauai for $11.20

A post by Austin today!

"Next month Anona and I are going to Kauai! I’m a little unsure about Kauai, I’ve only been there once before, and wasn’t super impressed. When I was in Kauai, I was by myself, and stayed at a Courtyard by the airport. It didn't exactly compare to a couple’s vacation at the Andaz in Maui. 

                                    Courtyard in Kauai                                        Andaz in Maui

  

Next month when we go, we’ll be staying at the Grand Hyatt Kauai on the (hopefully) sunny south side. 

This is how we are paying for the trip (total for two people):

Flight there: SLC-HNL-LIH (on Delta/Hawaiian) – 48,640 Citi Thank You Points

Rental Car: (4 days) – 12,196 Citi Thank You Points

Lodging: Grand Hyatt Kauai (4 nights) – 50,000 points and two free night certificates
Flight back: LIH-SAN-SLC (on Alaska Air) – 32,500 American Airline Miles (with AA Aviator card we get 10% of our AA miles rebated up to 10,000 in miles rebated a year)  plus $11.20.

We got the Thank You points by each signing up for the Citi Thank You Premier card (50,000 points per person). The card requires $3,000 in spend in the first three months. For spending $3,000, you get 53,000 points, or about $530 in points if used for travel. So by both applying, we ended up with over $1,000 in points. The nice thing about using Thank You points for flights is that it’s a paid ticket, so we’ll both earn miles for the flights, and medallion qualifying miles that go towards maintaining my Delta Platinum status. Status isn’t really all it’s cracked up to be anymore. Unless you are Diamond with Delta, getting upgrades is rather infrequent. But I do enjoy Comfort + seats, and the (normally futile) hope of getting an upgrade.

The Hyatt stay is compliments of one of us signing up for the Chase Hyatt card and getting two free night certificates after spending $1,000 in three months. The card also came with 5,000 bonus points and a $50 statement credit. The remaining 45,000 points came from our stash of Ultimate Reward points (from the Chase Sapphire and Chase Ink cards). I’ve been Diamond with Hyatt for the last few years, but didn’t travel quite enough in 2015 to maintain the status. If you have Hyatt status, it lasts through February of the next year, so we’ll get free breakfast in the club on this trip which should cut down a bit on the food costs.

The flight home is from the amazing 100,000 Citi Executive American Airline offer from 2014. Anona and I were able to get that card three times each, so we’re still sitting on quite a few American Airline miles. I hope to plan an epic trip to the South Pacific before March 22, 2016 when the miles get devalued. We both have an AA Aviator card from Barclay’s that gives us 10,000 miles on our card anniversary each year and rebates us 10% of any miles used each year (up to 10,000 miles per AA account). So the 35,000 mile cost for two people one-way from Hawaii to the mainland gets reduced to 32,500 miles after the rebate.

All in all, our four day vacation will cost us 32,500 AA miles, 50,000 Hyatt points, two Hyatt free night certificates, 60,836 Citi Thank You Points, and $11.20. Of course, activities while on the island and eating out for four days will cost money, but most of the trip is being paid for with credit card sign up bonuses. Cash flight costs when I booked in November were about $600 roundtrip per person and the hotel we’re staying at was about $500 a night. The rental car was about $122. To save us a total of $3,322, we are using points and $11."