I'm leaving for Iceland in a little over a month. I'm very excited and very nervous. It will be the first time I've traveled internationally by myself. A friend was supposed to go with me, but she's leaving Monday to visit her parents in Singapore for two weeks, so there goes that. Over the last few years though it has been a goal of mine to do more things out of my comfort zone. I have been holding myself back for too long, so this is definitely a big step towards that.
Other than Iceland, I may visit my brother in Pensacola later this year, but haven't decided yet. My next big trip will be in 2.5 years. I'll be going to Alaska for my 45th birthday. Probably a cruise, we'll see. I'm constantly adding places to my bucket list.
Good for you! Traveling alone was the most freeing, amazing experience of my life! I couldn't do anything alone, and for me it meant holding on to relationships/friendships that weren't great for me just so I'd have people to be with. I bought myself a trip to Africa for my 30th birthday and life has never been the same since. I hope you have the best time in Iceland!!!
we're trying to figure out a cancer free trip. I finally convinced H to go to Mexico as I've always wanted to do an all-inclusive. A cruise is also an option. My parents/family is wanting to go, too, so that makes us have to go in July/August specifically which is annoying.
We don't travel much so I'd also like to do a trip for just H and I to somewhere different as I think we're leaning towards bringing DD (14) with us to the cancer free trip.
We're splitting eight days between Nashville and Chattanooga in May.
Then we're spending a week in Montreal in July. On the drive up we'll stop in the Hudson Valley. I'm especially excited about this trip because we have childcare in place. We'll do family stuff during the day and then DD will have a babysitter while we see comedy at night.
We have tentative plans to go to the Adirondacks in September for a balloon festival. This will likely happen but I haven't booked anything yet.
We'd like to start taking DD to Asheville during the holidays to see the gingerbread houses at Omni Park Grove Inn. My husband and I have done this a few times and we always thought it would be a neat family tradition. She'll be almost 2.5 next winter so we'll see if it makes sense.
We just got back from Maui (BTW joenali thank you for recommending the trilogy trip to Lanai'i - we loved it!).
We are doing two weeks in England and France over the summer. I haven't been to England in like 20 years, and H and the girls hae never been to Europe.
First, I have the Chase Sapphire Reserve card. I love it. The fee is high ($450 a year) but you get $300 in travel rewards, so it is a net $150 a year that you're actually paying. Included in that fee is a Priority Pass lounge access card. Depending on where you fly out of, that can be a great value or it can be fairly useless. Our local airport (BWI) has a lounge that is included, so we've taken advantage of that several times. There are also restaurants in several airports that give you a $28 per person credit toward food, so when we flew out of Houston last weekend we got a free lunch (our bill was $53 so it was covered completely, we just left a cash tip). So - I think the $150 fee is worth it. Not to mention, the rewards stack up quickly. We paid a whopping $81 for our hotels on our upcoming Italy trip (8 nights) because I used points for the rest. I use the Chase Freedom card as well (it gets 1.5 points per dollar on everything, the Reserve only gets 1 point for a lot of stuff but 3 points for travel, dining, and related expenses so they pair well together).
I also have the Capitol One Venture card. It was offering a great opening bonus last year, so I got it just for that. We used it to buy our airline tickets for our upcoming vacation, and I think we ended up spending only $280 of actual money on 2 round trip tickets to Europe. I will likely cancel the card after this trip, only because I am devoted to Chase and think I get better stuff there. But it's worth looking at if they are doing a bonus or if you decide against Chase for whatever reason.
We are leaving on vacation next Thursday. We are flying to London, attending my SIL's wedding, and then on Sunday we're flying to Florence. We'll spend 4 nights there, bus to Siena, then head to Rome the next day and spend 3 nights there. I'm so excited. I've been to Florence and Rome before, but only very briefly (and was sick and exhausted the whole time) so I'm really looking forward to having the time to see things in depth, eat more food, drink more wine, and explore with my H. He hasn't been to either place before so it will all be new to him.
We are also hoping to go somewhere in November with my parents. We'll do an AI (they have a vacation club) and we're hoping for Jamaica but have to look at pricing. If not there, perhaps somewhere in Mexico or another Caribbean resort.
The Reserve is the one I was looking at! For the Priority Pass - do you each have to have one, or can one person bring guests? It will be 3 of us, and our son is 9. I wasn't sure how that would work. I think we could rack up a lot from this trip, and then use the rewards in 2021. We have the Freedom that we use for most things now. It sounds like you make great use of it!!
You can have guests! IIRC you can have up to 3. I only ever just travel with my H so I've never used more than 1 guest, but it's never been an issue at all. I'd double check their site just in case I'm remembering incorrectly about the number. You do have to be together though (so if my H traveled on his own for some reason, he wouldn't be able to use mine).
I bet flying from NJ you would have lounges that you can access. The priority pass website also lets you explore the list of lounges so you can see for sure.
I think the Freedom and the Reserve are a great combo. I carry both with me and just use whichever cards gets more points for whatever I'm buying. You can transfer points between accounts so I always combine them to make travel reservations. Our average credit card bill (between the two cards) is usually somewhere between $2500-3000 a month and I'd say I easily use $800-1200 worth of points per year, so you don't have to be a huge spender in order to see great rewards.
We are also going to Ireland this year. First time with the kids, though my husband and I have both been. We are going with several of my cousins and their families, and we are visiting family there, so it should be wild and fun. I cannot wait.
Also my husband and I are looking for a quick 3-4 night trip just us to Banff, Canada and he wants to see the Northern Lights.
Depending on when we book Ireland (definitely sometime in August) and depending on when our usual Lake George crew goes to Lake George, we may also throw that in. We go yearly for a week with the same group, and while we probably wouldn't go for the full week this year since it is in summer and we are toying with 2 weeks in Ireland, we might be able to pull off a Thursday to Sunday.
Also looking into DC for spring break for 2 or 3 nights, but we will have to see what the budget can handle. Haha.
We have no way to take child-free trips, so I'm glad my son is getting to a more fun age to travel. I went back to work this year, so we're hoping to make it a more regular event. We have a vacation house that we love, but there are places we'd like to see. Next year we hope to be able to go out west and visit some national parks, but it's hard to pick where we want to return to. And then there's places we haven't been even before son that we'd like to see. We definitely want to go to DC. I've somehow never been there, but we've talked about pairing that with a longer trip.
We are also going to Ireland this year. First time with the kids, though my husband and I have both been. We are going with several of my cousins and their families, and we are visiting family there, so it should be wild and fun. I cannot wait.
Also my husband and I are looking for a quick 3-4 night trip just us to Banff, Canada and he wants to see the Northern Lights.
Depending on when we book Ireland (definitely sometime in August) and depending on when our usual Lake George crew goes to Lake George, we may also throw that in. We go yearly for a week with the same group, and while we probably wouldn't go for the full week this year since it is in summer and we are toying with 2 weeks in Ireland, we might be able to pull off a Thursday to Sunday.
Also looking into DC for spring break for 2 or 3 nights, but we will have to see what the budget can handle. Haha.
Seeing the Northern Lights is so on my bucket list. What parts of Ireland do you think you'll see? I know I want my son to see the Cliffs, and I'm toying with the idea of Skelig Michael. I mentioned 2 weeks and people thought that was a lot, but I'm not sure we can go for less? I figure it's the airfare that's so expensive, why not stay and make the most of it? Maybe we'll do more like 10-12 so we have time to recover. We're going for a party, so my son is missing school and he is not the least bit upset about it.
Post by Poeticxpassion on Jan 3, 2020 11:24:49 GMT -5
June- Florida to visit my parents September/October- 10 day Disney Cruise that leaves from Dover, England. We stop in Ireland and Canada and disembark in New York. We will be spending time In London and Paris as well. I have tickets booked for the Harry Potter studio tour and I’m so excited! December- Florida again for Christmas
I’m also hoping I can talk DH to do little trips to the mountains so we can explore more of Colorado.
Post by exploding people on Jan 3, 2020 11:25:04 GMT -5
Our 10th anniversary is this summer, so we're planning a west coast road trip. Seattle to San Diego. I'd like to take a shorter solo trip also, but that's TBD.
Nothing booked yet. We want to take a road trip from WA through Yellowstone this summer.
I have a two week sabbatical this year for my 5 year anniversary at work in addition to my normal PTO. I've been trying to figure out what I should do. Kids will be 8 and 1.5. I'd love to leave them with my parents or ILs and take a solo trip with H but I'm not sure either of our parents are up for that with DS2. BUT I also don't think a long trip with a toddler sounds fun right now, so not sure I want to plan a trip with the kids. If we do take the kids, we're looking at San Diego for a short flight and kid-friendly activities (we'd do legoland for a couple days).
The Reserve is the one I was looking at! For the Priority Pass - do you each have to have one, or can one person bring guests? It will be 3 of us, and our son is 9. I wasn't sure how that would work. I think we could rack up a lot from this trip, and then use the rewards in 2021. We have the Freedom that we use for most things now. It sounds like you make great use of it!!
You can have guests! IIRC you can have up to 3. I only ever just travel with my H so I've never used more than 1 guest, but it's never been an issue at all. I'd double check their site just in case I'm remembering incorrectly about the number. You do have to be together though (so if my H traveled on his own for some reason, he wouldn't be able to use mine).
I bet flying from NJ you would have lounges that you can access. The priority pass website also lets you explore the list of lounges so you can see for sure.
I think the Freedom and the Reserve are a great combo. I carry both with me and just use whichever cards gets more points for whatever I'm buying. You can transfer points between accounts so I always combine them to make travel reservations. Our average credit card bill (between the two cards) is usually somewhere between $2500-3000 a month and I'd say I easily use $800-1200 worth of points per year, so you don't have to be a huge spender in order to see great rewards.
Thank you - this is great to hear! That's about where we fall, especially in months that I can put big payments on it (insurance, etc.) I figured I would apply near when I'm ready to start booking, so we'll have no trouble hitting the spending required to get the bonus miles. I always imagine that we don't spend enough to really make the points worth it, but maybe my thinking has been wrong. I love that you can transfer the points, because then they're worth more on the travel redemption, if I'm reading that correctly.
June- Florida to visit my parents September/October- 10 day Disney Cruise that leaves from Dover, England. We stop in Ireland and Canada and disembark in New York. We will be spending time In London and Paris as well. I have tickets booked for the Harry Potter studio tour and I’m so excited! December- Florida again for Christmas
I’m also hoping I can talk DH to do little trips to the mountains so we can explore more of Colorado.
I'm not big on cruises - but this sounds like one I'd take. And I think Harry Potter might be the thing that gets us to Disney one day.
I currently have planned: Boca Raton, FL (for work) in February Barcelona, Seville, and Madrid in April or May Las Vegas in August Charleston for Thanksgiving
We will also do a trip in June for our anniversary and something at Christmas but those locations are tbd
I'm currently looking at booking flights for the Spain trip so if anyone has any advice on how long to spend in each place, please share!
- for the kids February break from school we are going to Florida - in July DH, DS2, and I are doing a week in California. Starting in San Diego to see some family and then driving to San Francisco with various stops along the way to visit friends (DS1 will be at overnight camp) - August we are going to London for a few days and then heading to Scotland - around 10 days total
That’s all we have set right now. We will likely do a long weekend in Vermont for Columbus Day plus a weekend or two on the Cape
ETA - totally forgot we are going to Mexico over Memorial Day weekend! This is a family get together. We usually do the family reunion trip over the summer but my MIL insisted on rescheduling so DS1 can go lol (he’s doing a full summer at overnight camp this year)
We have nothing booked yet but will 99% go back to mexico with the kids for fall break in Oct. Other than that we talked about taking the kids to vegas over spring break with some family friends. I'm sure we will go to the mountains at least a couple of times during the summer. I'd love to do another adults only trip to FL with my BFF and her hubby again in the spring but we will see.
Every one of these sounds great. Except I'm already in NJ namasteak. LOL I love hearing about other people's trips.
My favorite relatives live there and my kids think their basement is pretty much the coolest place on earth 😂 I’d love to spend more time in NYC but DH hates big cities so I’ll just do a day trip with Ds1. Probably do a night in a hotel if I can find something reasonable.
June- Florida to visit my parents September/October- 10 day Disney Cruise that leaves from Dover, England. We stop in Ireland and Canada and disembark in New York. We will be spending time In London and Paris as well. I have tickets booked for the Harry Potter studio tour and I’m so excited! December- Florida again for Christmas
I’m also hoping I can talk DH to do little trips to the mountains so we can explore more of Colorado.
I'm not big on cruises - but this sounds like one I'd take. And I think Harry Potter might be the thing that gets us to Disney one day.
Harry Potter is at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure in Orlando. I’ve been wanting to go and hoping we will get there next year.
We have a week and a half on Kauai booked for June. We used points for our flights (chase sapphire reserve, coach for our flight to Kauai and first class for the painful red-eye home).
I’m sure we will do some other, smaller trips but nothing else has come up yet. Dd has a week off in February but we are planning to stay home and just do a bunch of touristy things in our city that we’ve never done.
You can have guests! IIRC you can have up to 3. I only ever just travel with my H so I've never used more than 1 guest, but it's never been an issue at all. I'd double check their site just in case I'm remembering incorrectly about the number. You do have to be together though (so if my H traveled on his own for some reason, he wouldn't be able to use mine).
I bet flying from NJ you would have lounges that you can access. The priority pass website also lets you explore the list of lounges so you can see for sure.
I think the Freedom and the Reserve are a great combo. I carry both with me and just use whichever cards gets more points for whatever I'm buying. You can transfer points between accounts so I always combine them to make travel reservations. Our average credit card bill (between the two cards) is usually somewhere between $2500-3000 a month and I'd say I easily use $800-1200 worth of points per year, so you don't have to be a huge spender in order to see great rewards.
Thank you - this is great to hear! That's about where we fall, especially in months that I can put big payments on it (insurance, etc.) I figured I would apply near when I'm ready to start booking, so we'll have no trouble hitting the spending required to get the bonus miles. I always imagine that we don't spend enough to really make the points worth it, but maybe my thinking has been wrong. I love that you can transfer the points, because then they're worth more on the travel redemption, if I'm reading that correctly.
You can transfer them to a number of travel partners. Though to be honest, I haven't done that. I've only ever booked via the Chase portal, which I've found to be on par with pricing on Google flights and hotel booking sites. Maybe my to-do list this year should include looking into transferring to partners, but I've never been loyal to any particular airline or hotel so I haven't been all that motivated to figure it out.
Honestly I think any amount of spending is worth it. Assuming you pay off the card in full each year, as long as you're earning more than the fee, you're coming out ahead. We are going to spend the money anyway, so we may as well get points for it. I've never done cash back or any other rewards simply because I love to travel and this seems like an easier way to save up for it than trying to allocate cash or a piece of our savings account or whatever. I know this money is ONLY for travel so it makes it easier to budget (for me).
DH turned 40 last year, 15 year anniversary is next week, I turn 40 this year. We are planning a week in St. Lucia for this summer SANS KIDS. We honeymooned in St. Lucia when we were young and poor and are going to spend $$$ this trip. Planning started yesterday and I am so freaking excited. We use Amex for everything and are using points for at least a portion of the trip. Amex concierge should be able to get us some upgrades.
We are taking our travel trailer and driving from PA all the way to CA and back. Hitting Dollywood (my DH's wish), Grand Canyon, Disneyland, Sequoia National Park, Mt. Rushmore and the Ingalls Homestead in SD on the way. Plus anything else we stumble across along the way. We're going for a month. It's going to be amazing.
DS is a budding geologist and has requested Niagra Falls. I also want to get to DC to see friends and DH wants to hit NYC. Not sure if we'll do one long trip with all three or what. Timing is most likely spring break on that one, so I have to get on it, though DS's break is late, in mid-April.
I'm going to try to do a quick girls trip with BFF this winter, maybe to Las Vegas or someplace else warm.
We'll probably do our family's cottage on Lake Michigan this summer, since we didn't go at all last year, and then we're thinking about Grand Cayman for Christmas next year.
ETA: Another option is Mexico, but I've been wanting to do that with BFF and her family and we haven't been able to figure out the logistics.
Our kids are 2.5 and 12 weeks. We’re closing on a house in March and BIL is getting married a 5-6 hour car ride away in May. So I’m guessing I’ll be lucky to get to the grocery store.
I’d love to go somewhere warm in November or December, but I’m not sure it’ll happen.
The Rock Boat cruise in 3 weeks. I’m most likely going solo bc H is waffeling. He loves cruises, but this one is too much for him. Too much people (and they are all extroverts!), too loud, too much drinking, etc.
I have hotel reservations in yellowstone this summer. We were going to go last year, but I literally had a stroke while I was pricing flights. Then the whole cancer thing. I should put the rest of that trip together.
In Dec, we have a 10 day southern Caribbean cruise.
I'm leaving for Iceland in a little over a month. I'm very excited and very nervous. It will be the first time I've traveled internationally by myself. A friend was supposed to go with me, but she's leaving Monday to visit her parents in Singapore for two weeks, so there goes that. Over the last few years though it has been a goal of mine to do more things out of my comfort zone. I have been holding myself back for too long, so this is definitely a big step towards that.
Other than Iceland, I may visit my brother in Pensacola later this year, but haven't decided yet. My next big trip will be in 2.5 years. I'll be going to Alaska for my 45th birthday. Probably a cruise, we'll see. I'm constantly adding places to my bucket list.
Good for you! Traveling alone was the most freeing, amazing experience of my life! I couldn't do anything alone, and for me it meant holding on to relationships/friendships that weren't great for me just so I'd have people to be with. I bought myself a trip to Africa for my 30th birthday and life has never been the same since. I hope you have the best time in Iceland!!!
Africa is on my bucket list as well, though I have no idea when I'll fit it in.
Our kids are 2.5 and 12 weeks. We’re closing on a house in March and BIL is getting married a 5-6 hour car ride away in May. So I’m guessing I’ll be lucky to get to the grocery store.
I’d love to go somewhere warm in November or December, but I’m not sure it’ll happen.
What are you, Superwoman? LOL My rule with a newborn was "No one is going anywhere. No one leaves."
We are taking our travel trailer and driving from PA all the way to CA and back. Hitting Dollywood (my DH's wish), Grand Canyon, Disneyland, Sequoia National Park, Mt. Rushmore and the Ingalls Homestead in SD on the way. Plus anything else we stumble across along the way. We're going for a month. It's going to be amazing.