How To Visit New York City On A Budget

Walking near Seaport across from Brooklyn

The big apple can take a big bite out of your wallet. But if you do some advance planning, you can visit New York City on a budget.
I always start with flights when planning my trips because when you travel as a family, you have to be flexible. For this trip to New York City, I was able to use Southwest points for my ticket and add my daughter as my companion so she flew for FREE.
You can read my previous post on how to earn the Southwest companion pass for two years here.
The hotel comes next. I start with awardmapper.com to see which hotels are in the city and how many points they require to book. For this trip, I tapped the Wyndham New Yorker for 15,000 points per night. Since I booked, Wyndham added three tiers for point redemption and unfortunately, they raised the points for this hotel to 30,000 per night.

Our hotel room at the Wyndham New Yorker Hotel

I still think the New Yorker offers great value even at the increased rate. It is well located just 5 blocks from Times Square and next to Penn Station.  Our room at the New Yorker was huge plus the hotel is historic and bursting with charm.
For transportation, there is no better way to get around New York City than with the subway and your feet. On the subway, each ride costs $2.75. When you are ready to go to JFK airport, take the LIRR to the Skytrain. Total cost will be approximately $20 per person. The subway is less, but takes much longer. And of course, taking an Uber is way more expensive and can take just as long depending on traffic,
Now that we have our flights and hotels booked with points, we can move on to food and experiences.

View from our hotel room and our yummy bagel

My favorite bagel store, Liberty Bagels, is located across the street from the New Yorker next to the Starbucks. They told me they are opening a second location too. If you like vegan cream cheese, this is your place. And a huge bagel with smear costs approximately $6. Wow!

The line moves fast and the slices are big! 

Joe's Pizza is also a steal of a deal. Located right off Times Square, you can get a huge piece of delicious authentic NY pizza for just a few bucks per slice.
There is so much to see in New York City, you will just have trouble deciding what to do. Remember to check out Todaystix.com and the half price ticket booth for Broadway shows.
And have fun!

Travel Deal Tuesday - Where To Find The Deals

After Black Friday and Cyber Monday, get ready for Travel Deal Tuesday! Yep, December 3rd may be the day for travel deals. According to Skyscanner, Travel Deal Tuesday usually has better deals than Black Friday, but not as good as Cyber Monday. 

However, Tuesdays are traditionally discount days to book travel. 

That said, here are some places to look for deals:

1. Travel Zoo - Great package travel deals, but do your homework. Some deals include $299 for an 8-day tour to China flights included, $599 4-night tour including flights to Iceland to see the Northern Lights. If you figure, just the flights alone could cost more than the whole package, it might be worth it. Wow! 

2. 3rd party sellers like Expedia.com, Travelocity.com, Cheaptickets.com and Orbitz.com

3. Watch the shopping portals for increased cash back 

Good luck! and happy traveling! 

Giving Gratitude When You Travel

My daughter handing out stickers to the children in the Zambia village

On this Thanksgiving Day, I feel thankful that I get to travel and help my children experience the world, history, traditions, other cultures, and people. But I also get to show them that no matter where we go we can give back to others. 

When we traveled to South Africa, we brought along stickers, toys and pencils for the children in the township and villages. When we were in Panama, we brought arts and crafts for the children in the Embera village. When we were in Cuba, we brought towels, socks and chocolates for the families there. 

In our own small way, we become not just tourists, but agents of goodwill and we model that for our children. I am also blessed to educate families about how they can afford to travel the world and have the same experiences. 

On this Thanksgiving, I am thankful for the blessings I experience and the ones I am able to bestow on others. 

Black Friday And Cyber Monday Travel Deals

Get ready for the biggest shopping days of the year, Black Friday or the day after Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday, the Monday following Thanksgiving. 

Though these shopping days traditionally focus on retail deals, travel won't be left out of the mix. 

Here are our top 5 places to look for travel deals:

1. Southwest Vacation Packages - already you can check out the site and offers range from $250 off to an extra night FREE. We did a quick search for a San Diego vacation and it came up with 3 nights at Paradise Point Resort with flights for two people for $662. When I checked, rooms at Paradise Point for those dates were going for about $160 per night and flights on Southwest were going for $295.92 for two people. So the vacation package is a savings of about $125. Not too bad. 

2. Cruises - like Celebrity Cruises are promising good deals starting on Nov. 26th. You can check those out here.  

3. Amtrak is promising a super sale going live on Nov. 29th. We don't know what type of deals the company will be offering at this point. 

4. Airline Deals - According to Hopper.com, look for flight deals from Aer Lingus, Air France, Cathay Pacific, Air New Zealand, Singapore Airlines and TAP Portugal. 

5. Legoland New York - will be opening July 2020, but on Black Friday, the resort will be offering 50% off an annual pass so the price will be $99. And the best part is that the pass will be good for 30 other Merlin Entertainment parks around the country. 

In addition to these top deals, you might want to check out hotels.com which will be offering scratch off card discounts and Priceline.com which will offer daily deals. 

And if that's not enough, Travel Deal Tuesday is December 3rd. Travel experts say the best deals actually fall on Tuesday as travel operators try to entice procrastinators to book a winter getaway. 

Good luck and happy travels! 

Early Black Friday Deal: Cash Back At Amazon!

If you do most of your shopping on Amazon, it's hard to find cash back deals on that platform. Amazon does not participate in most of the shopping portals. And as you know, I love shopping portals because it's a great way to double or even triple your miles/cash back from a single purchase. You can check out this past post on how to use shopping portals.
Now Rakuten, formerly Ebates, is offering up to 5% cash back on Amazon.

When you click on the Amazon link from Rakuten, there is a quick list of the cash back offers in different categories. Here's a look at that list and you can see it varies greatly, but it's better than zero which is the norm for Amazon.

If you use my referral link to Rakuten, you will get an additional $10 off your first purchase of at least $25. Happy shopping!

How To Upgrade For FREE On Southwest

        One of the perks of the Southwest Priority card is 4 upgrades on flights per year. So is this perk worth it? And how does it work?
        Southwest has a different kind of boarding plan. When you check-in 24 hours before your flight, you are assigned a boarding group and a number. The number is your place in line to board. Then once you are on the flight, it is open seating. When you check-in, if you get boarding group A, then you are styling. But if you get boarding group C, then you might want to think about using your upgrades if you like window or aisle seats or if you are concerned that the overhead luggage bins may fill up.

If you are a family with children under the age of 5, disabled or military, Southwest has special boarding between the A and B groups. However, the upgrade is good for spots A6-A15 which could make a difference.
With the Southwest Priority credit card, you get four upgrades per year. You can use them for yourself, family members or friends. You can use them all at once or one at a time. Upgrade typically costs between $30-$50 and you buy it from the counter at the gate.
On a recent flight from Las Vegas, NV to Buffalo, NY, we noticed the flight was very full.
Even though I had boarding group B23, there were a lot of children waiting to board.
And the upgrades are use it or lose it, they refresh on your anniversary.
So I decided to test it out. The charge to upgrade on this flight was $50 per person and I upgraded both my daughter and I because my anniversary is in November. Use it or lose it!

We upgraded from B23 to A10. So there was plenty of space on the plane to choose from when we got on board. We were able to sit in one of the first few rows and we were able to secure an entire row which was nice so my daughter could sleep on the late-night flight.
You need to pay for the upgrade with your Southwest Priority credit card and because my daughter was flying with me on a companion pass, she had to run it as two transactions.
The Southwest employee told me that the credit wouldn't go through until my anniversary date, but it actually went through immediately.

Here are the details on the  Southwest Priority  credit card

• $149 annual fee for the first year
• $75 Southwest credit 
• 7,500 anniversary points annually
• 2x on Southwest purchases
• 1x on everything else
• 4 FREE upgrades 

If you decide to apply for this card, please consider using my referral link. Same deal for you, but it helps me continue to bring you tips and advice on how to travel for almost FREE. 

How I Flew To London r/t For Just $350

My daughter and I in front of Buckingham Palace

     When my daughter finished the entire series of Harry Potter, six months faster than I anticipated, I started thinking about a quick fall trip across the pond.
     And guess what? Best decision ever.
     October is what they call in the travel biz, low season or off-peak. That means great deals for you if you can adjust your schedule. Usually, I use points to travel, but this trip, I was able to find a flight for $125 from JFK to London Gatwick on Norwegian Airlines. I reviewed what it was like to fly on  Norwegian Airlines in this post. For that price, it's worth it just to pay cash. I purchased the flight with my Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card since I was trying to reach the minimum spend on that one plus travel earns 3x points so it's a win-win. This is my new favorite card and you can check out the reasons why here. If you decide that the Reserve is too steep, then check out the Preferred and use my link. 

London offers so many awesome things to do

      On the return, I looked at flying back to JFK, but found that flights all the way to Los Angeles cost the same price about $225. So why waste time and Southwest points to get from New York to the west coast.
      So for $350 per person, we got two round trip tickets to London. Since the Sapphire Reserve includes a $300 travel credit, we actually spent just less than $500 for the flights. Plus made a dent in the minimum spend and got 1,500 Chase Ultimate Reward points. I talk about how to use those points for incredible savings in this post.
      I'll talk about some great things to do with tweens in London in a future post, but the bottom line is if you can swing an off-peak trip to Europe, it will save you a ton of money and miles.
       If you decide to apply for the Sapphire Preferred, please use my referral link. It will help support this blog.