Using your free night on Hotels.com

The most expensive items whenever you travel are your plane tickets and your hotel. Hands down. So, whenever I plan a trip, the first thing I do is secure FREE plane tickets with points whether those are airline points or credit card points. Then I move on to the accommodations. You have so many options now with hotels, airbnb.com, vrbo.com even couch surfing if that's your thing. 

Let's assume here that you have searched awardmapper.com and you can't find any hotels that work for you either because you don't have enough points or they don't offer the right amenities like FREE breakfast or airport shuttle. Those are always my toppers! 

Other options to try include booking.com and hotels.com. I prefer Hotels.com because I also have the Capital One Venture card and through January 2020, Capital One is offering 10x points if you book a hotel on Hotels.com. That's in addition to the Hotels.com loyalty program. 

Even if you don't have the Capital One Venture credit card, with the loyalty program, for every 10 stays, you get 1 FREE for the average value of the 10 stays. 

So you can really optimize your bonus here. 

Here's how it works:

1. Use the Capital One/Hotels.com link  if you have the credit card, if not use the regular hotels.com website

2. Be sure you are signed into your Hotels.com account or create one if you don't have one yet

3. Search for your hotel with dates, guests etc. 

4. Book your hotel and pay with your Capital One Venture credit card if you are using the 10x link, pay with any credit card (hopefully the one that earns you the most points for travel) if you are using the regular hotels.com website

5. Capital One will credit you 10x miles which you can use to offset any travel including this hotel booking

6. Hotels.com will count the booking in its loyalty program

Once you book 10 stays and a stay is each night that you sleep in a hotel, you are awarded a free night with a value of the average of your past 10 stays. 

After a college trip and a few other one-night hotel stays, I received this email. You can see the value of my FREE night is $110.93. No judgments. I freely admit that I tend to stay in the budget friendly hotels that offer FREE breakfast. It works for my family. 

When you go to redeem your FREE night, you just book your hotel like you normally would and then at the end of the booking process, click use free night. It will credit the amount of your FREE night. If you cancel, your FREE night credit will return to your account. 

Pretty simple. And by combining this with the Capital One 10x promotion, (average nightly hotel $110 at 10x points = 1100 points per stay x 10 stays is more than 10,000 points which equals more than $100), I actually earned two free nights on my 10 stays. Pretty sweet! 

New Lyft Pass Savings Offer Ends April 16th

If you use Lyft frequently or plan to travel in the next month and use Lyft, you may want to get in on this new savings pass. Lyft is offering $9.99 passes good for $5 off your next 10 rides. That's a $50 savings. 

The pass is good for all types of rides except scheduled and scooters. 

The pass is good for 28 days or 10 rides whichever comes first. If you use all 10 rides and still have time left on your pass, you will get 5% off any rides until the pass is exhausted.

So if you are an avid Lyft user or planning to travel and use Lyft in the next month, this is a no brainer. This offer ends April 16th so don't wait. 

If you do not have a Lyft account yet, please use my referral link. You will get $5 in ride credit and I'll get a credit too so I can keep blogging about cool travel spots. 

What To See In Maui With Kids

Road To Hana - Amazing!

Now that Southwest flies to Hawaii, you might want to head to Maui especially if you have the companion pass. 
And Hawaii doesn't have to be expensive even in the popular summer months. 
We spent more than a week in Maui for almost FREE. That's right. Here's how we did it and what we did while we were there. We are a family of 5, but for this trip, we just took our 8-year-old.

The other two kids went on separate trips with family. 

Since Southwest didn't fly to Maui yet, we booked 3 round trip tickets on American Airlines with miles. 25,000 points each. Easy. 

Then we booked an airbnb.com for 3 nights in Kihei. If you use my link, you will get a $40 credit on your first airbnb reservation. There are tons of available rentals and since there were only 3 of us, we booked a one bedroom, one bathroom with full kitchen across from the beach. The unit had a pool too. Very convenient. Safeway Supermarket was down the street so we ate most of our meals at home. We did dine at Coconut's Fish Cafe in Kihei and had probably the best fish tacos ever. And we are from San Diego so that says a lot.

Coconut's in Kihei, Maui - Yummy fish tacos

We took a full day and drove the Road To Hana. This is something we would never do with all 3 kids, but with just 1 it was totally doable. My advice start early like 6am. It is a long drive and day. Think like 12 hours long kind of a day. Bring changes of clothes, towels, snacks, couple pairs of shoes and check out the FREE app tours on itunes or android. They will talk you through the drive and tell you exactly where to stop and where to skip. Be sure to pick up some banana bread along the way.

While in Kihei, we took a one day snorkeling trip to Molokini. We like to spend money on experiences and then use miles/points for travel and hotels. Snorkeling was a bit cloudy as it was very windy that day, but enjoyable. 

Snorkeling in Molokini

After a few nights in Kihei, we moved to Kanapali. Both my husband and I opened Chase Hyatt credit cards so we each had FREE nights at any Hyatt. We cashed them in for 4 nights at the Hyatt Kanapali (Category 5 hotel with rooms starting at 20,000 points per night). Usually you have to pay for parking, but the machine was broken so Hyatt comped our parking for all 4 nights too. Nice. 
The current deal for the World Of Hyatt credit card is 25,000 points with a $3,000 minimum spend and a $95 annual fee which is not waived. So that would get you 1 free night at the Hyatt Kaanapali and if you and your spouse opened the cards, you would get two. But Chase Ultimate Rewards transfer to Hyatt at a 1:1 ratio. So if you open the Chase Sapphire Preferred credit card, you will get 50,000 bonus points for a $4,000 minimum spend and the $95 annual fee is waived the first year. This gets you two nights at the Hyatt Kaanapali plus if you and your spouse each open the card, you get 4 nights FREE. Much better deal! 

Hotels at Kanapali

While staying at the Hyatt, we drove to Lahaina for breakfast, a bit farther north is a nice hike to the geyser and of course, Ululani's for shaved ice. 

Great breakfast place in Lahaina

Nice walk in northern Maui to see the geyser

Otherwise, we just hung at the Hyatt, enjoyed the activities and the beach. The problem with the big hotels is that you are captive to the high prices in the restaurants. We utilized the happy hour at the Hyatt for dinner one night and stocked the in room fridge with sandwich makings and breakfast items. We also attended the luau one night which included dinner. Expensive, but our daughter had never attended a luau so it was totally worth it.

Hyatt Kanapali offers bird visits, daily crafts, penguin and koi feeding

Our favorite, shaved ice at Ulelanis

Remember to ask for the coconut ice cream under the shaved ice. YUM! 

Check Out My Inbox - Credit Relief!

ID theft is a real thing. It's always a good reminder especially if you are using credit cards for FREE travel to utilize the services of various credit monitoring services. Even if you don't open credit cards on a regular basis, data breaches are becoming more and more common. For example, just recently, Toyota, Facebook, and Aerogarden announced breaches. Of course, in 2017, Equifax, one of the three credit reporting agencies, revealed that it had also been breached. 

In 2018, it is estimated that 4.5 billion records were exposed and already in 2019, a collection of 2.7 billion records were found for sale on the dark web. 

You might be surprised to find that credit card issuers will actually offer free monitoring services and free credit score checks. In 2014, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau urged all issuers to offer this service. 

Bank of America, Discover, Capital One, Chase, Barclaycard, Citi and American Express each offer some credit information on at least some of their cards. Capital One and Discover offer free services and you don't even have to be a customer to use them. 

Love that right after I applied for a Capital One Venture card, all of these emails showed up in the inbox. Remember even if you use a service or a few of them, monitor your credit cards for unusual activity and examine your credit report a few times a year. 

Did You Activate Your New Chase FREEDOM Categories?

Hopefully, last quarter you maxed out the Chase FREEDOM 5% bonus cash back at gas stations! I did and earned a whopping $36. That's FREE money! That's like getting an entire tank of gas FREE just for using that credit card to buy gas. 

I called it "leveraged spending". I was going to buy the gas anyway and by using the right credit card, I got more bang for my buck. Since I was not trying to hit the bonus on another card, I chose to use my Chase FREEDOM card and earn 5% cash back with every fill up. 

Check out the rewards breakdown. You can see I earned a bonus of $25.17 for gas and $11.08 on everything else. Pretty awesome!

Chase actually breaks it down even further so you can see how much you earned for each purchase. Check out the gas stations and pharmacy. You can see how the bonus points really add up. Now just a reminder, we were on a road trip. That's my excuse for all the Starbucks too! 
And the rewards never expire so you can save them and then use them for a FREE trip, car rental or just cash back. 
This quarter, the bonus categories are grocery stores and home improvement stores. Now if you don't have a Chase FREEDOM credit card yet, please use my link to sign up. You will get $150 cash back if you spend $500 in the first 3 months and it will help me pay for the blog. I have had my Chase FREEDOM card forever, it's my go-to no annual fee card. 
If you have the Chase Sapphire Preferred or Reserve, you can even transfer your points to different hotels and airlines for FREE travel. 
That's how we do it at almostFREEfamilytravel.com 

What Its Like To Eat At One Of The Top 50 Best Restaurants In The World

Behind an unidentified door in the Casco Viejo section of Panama City lies one of the top 50 restaurants in the world, according to The World's 50 Best Restaurants. A panel of 1,000 culinary experts votes to come up with the annual list. 

So what is it like to dine at one of these exclusive top dining spots? We wanted to find out on our recent trip to Panama City. Donde Jose has two seatings, an early one at 7pm and a late seating at 9:30pm.  We were able to make a reservation about two months ahead of time. The restaurant only has 16 seats so you need to reserve early. It is a set menu, but you are able to let them know in advance about any dietary restrictions. Be very specific because if you say no red meat, they will still serve you pork. 

Since there is no sign or address, it's a bit tricky to find the restaurant. But once you find it, you are welcomed into a small dining room with tall ceilings. It is cold inside so bring a sweater. 

Your set menu price does not include alcohol and the drinks are pricey. The menu price is approximately $100 per person with a $100 deposit. 

The 10-course menu features unique and innovative dishes that use fresh ingredients. Check out the menu from our meal. Obviously, the menu changes depending on what is in season. And to be totally honest, the menu doesn't really tell you what the dish is and some listed dishes actually include several plates. But the server explains the meaning behind each dish, the ingredients and what the chef was trying to do. 

 Each dish is supposed to tell a story about Panama. Some I understood, others not so much. Check out some of the dishes below. Most notable, the one on the far right. Since we do not eat pork or red meat, they created this dish with fish and edible sand. 

The main dish was actually quite unimpressive. It was a very small bony half chicken with a sauce. But the chef redeemed himself with dessert. The courses were equally as creative with a delicious shaved ice and a course called Coffee With My Grandpa. It was made with the famous and super expensive Geisha coffee, chocolate and cake or brownie. It was delicious! 

So was it worth the high price tag? Maybe. Yes, we can say we ate at a top 50 restaurant. The food was creative. Was it the best meal I've ever had? Probably not. Would I go back? Probably not, but I'm pretty frugal. Would I recommend it to my friends? Yes. 

La Quinta - Transfer Your Points By March 30th

If you have La Quinta rewards points, you will want to pay attention. On April 2nd, La Quinta will officially merge with Wyndham and end its reward program. 

According to the La Quinta website, 

• Now through March 31st, you can continue to earn and redeem La Quinta Returns points. 
• You can match your La Quinta Returns status to a Wyndham Rewards members level
• You can transfer your La Quinta Returns points to Wyndham at a 1:1 ratio (After March 31st, Silver members will receive 1 Wyndham Rewards point for every 2 La Quinta Returns points

On April 3rd: 

• La Quinta Returns account will be closed 
• Any remaining La Quinta Returns points will be converted to Wyndham points at a 2:1 ratio
• You can start redeeming Wyndham Rewards at La Quinta hotels

To transfer your points:

• just login to your La Quinta account
• click on La Quinta Returns
• enter your Wyndham account information (your name and email must match on both accounts)
• click submit (it takes about 48 hours for the transfer to complete)

Wyndham Rewards is changing its redemption system on April 3rd to a three-tier system. Right now, all hotels are 15,000 points per night. The three-tier system will change some hotels to 7,500, 15,000 and 30,000. Check out my post for more details.