I’m now comfortably back home after a terrific Wild Card trip to Panama, Colombia, and Melbourne. I loved my trip, but there’s no question that Nick and Tim’s trips were more impressive. Congratulations to both for showing us all how it should be done.
That said, I want to shine a bit more light on the part of my trip planning I’m most proud of. In the post “Outside the box – miles for hotels, hotel points for flights,” I described how I used my hotel budget to book a lie-flat business-class flight to Australia and my airline mile budget to book hotels. On the surface, it looked like I got awful value from my Delta miles (only 0.7 cents per point), but that’s not the whole story. By swapping my points the way I did, I got far more value from my point budget (both objective and subjective) than I otherwise would have. In this post, I’ll explain…
What is the Wild Card challenge? For this challenge, our contestants have chosen from wild-card decks to set the parameters of their trips. First, they selected travel destinations, then hotel, airline, and transferable points cards that set their points-and-miles budgets. And finally, they selected power-ups and obstacles to make their travels a little more realistic to the challenges our readers and listeners face and make things a little more interesting! Learn more about the challenge here.
Next up: Travel is done! All three contestants made it to Melbourne and are now safely back home. The final step is for the judges to name a winner. The judges, Stephen and Carrie, will crown the winner during our final Wild Card Livestream on YouTube on Wednesday, October 7th at 9 PM ET.
Trip Overview
| Card Draws | |
|---|---|
| Destinations | Panama -> Colombia -> Melbourne, Australia |
| Credit Cards | Delta Gold Business: 90K Miles, $150 Delta Stays credit |
| Bonvoy Brilliant: 150K Points, $250 Statement Credit | |
| Amex Gold: 100K Points, $50 Resy credit | |
| AA MileUp: 15K Miles | |
| Obstacle | The Night Owl (no flights before 10 AM) |
| Power-up | Stay in the Zone (I got to reselect a destination card to stay in one zone, the Americas, for my first and second destinations) |
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- Pre-trip: Trip planning. Before the trip started, I described several booking options I had considered, then announced that I had come up with a crazy new plan, which I would reveal later. See: My abandoned plans and a wild new one.
- Tuesday: Traveling in style. I set some lofty goals for myself for this trip: fly mostly in business class, stay in interesting hotels, and truly enjoy the destinations. See: Traveling in style — my style.
- Wednesday: A missed connection followed by fun in Panama. Yesterday, my flight to San Salvador (with an onward connection to Panama City) was delayed. I missed my connection, slept in a lounge Sleep Room, then arrived at my Panama City hotel around 9 AM. I then toured Panama City’s old town (Casco Viejo) and the Panama Canal. See: My missed connection to Panama.
- Thursday: An awesome historic hotel in Panama. I found the perfect hotel in the perfect location. The problem? It wasn’t a Marriott. So, instead of using my Marriott points, I booked it with my Delta miles. See: An awesome hotel in Panama City’s historic old town courtesy of Delta miles.
- Friday: Adventures in Colombia. On my first night in Medellin, I enjoyed a street-food tour. The next day, I did an all-day adventure which included a boat ride, a visit to the touristy but adorable town of Guatapé, and the chance to climb the biggest rock I’ve ever seen. See: Colombian food, fun, and a giant rock.
- Saturday: Back to the U.S.A. This morning, I checked out of my Medellín hotel, enjoyed my Avianca business-class flight to Miami, transited cheaply to Fort Lauderdale via Tri-Rail, and used my Resy credit for an awesome dinner at The Katherine. See: Adios Colombia, Hello Fort Lauderdale.
- Sunday: Bonvoying my way to Australia. As I prepared to fly to Melbourne, I told the story of finding a great United business-class award and how I used Marriott Bonvoy points to book it. See: Outside the box – miles for hotels, hotel points for flights.
- Monday: Flying to Australia. Yesterday and today, I flew from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to Melbourne, Australia. The route wasn’t ideal, but the longest part, the 15-hour flight from Los Angeles to Sydney, was great. See: Flying Down Under.
- Tuesday: Melbourne’s Hidden bars and speakeasies. On Tuesday, I took a short flight from Sydney to Melbourne, then checked into the swanky Langham Hotel, which offers fantastic city views. Tim hadn’t yet arrived, so Nick and I spent some quiet time walking around town and enjoying Melbourne’s famous coffee culture (I fell in love with “Magic” coffee). In the evening, I organized a bar crawl, moving from one secret speakeasy to the next. Tim finally joined us at the last, and arguably best, stop of the evening. See: A magical day in Melbourne.
Maximizing Point Value
Original Plan Value
My original boring plan for this challenge was to use my 150,000 Marriott points for hotel stays, my 15,000 AA miles for a flight from Miami to Los Angeles, and my 90,000 Delta miles (supplemented with 34,000 Amex points transferred to Delta) for a Premium economy flight to Sydney, Australia.
With Marriott points, it’s sometimes possible to get great value, but for the locations and dates that I needed, most options offered terrible value, well below our Marriott Reasonable Redemption Value (RRV) of 0.73 cents per point. Nick had a similar problem (he also had Marriott points available). Despite rebooking his Melbourne stay many times to lower the point price, the best he ever achieved was close to the 0.73 RRV. So, if I had used my Marriott points for hotels, I would have been extremely lucky to have gotten the full $1,095 RRV value (150,000 points x 0.73 cents per point). Plus, I would have stayed at hotels much less interesting than the ones I enjoyed. For example, in Panama City I wanted to stay in the old town, Casco Viejo, but there weren’t any Marriott hotels there. So, to use my Marriott points, I would have settled for a less interesting hotel in a less desirable location.
Here’s the maximum value I could have achieved with my original plan:
| Points Used | Cash Value | |
|---|---|---|
| Hotels | 150,000 Marriott | $1,095 |
| Flights | 34,000 Amex, 90,000 Delta, 15,000 AA |
$1,955 |
| Total Cash Value: | $3,050 |
New Approach Value
My modified approach was to convert 30,000 Amex points to Marriott, then transfer 180,000 Marriott points into 90,000 United miles. I used those 90,000 United miles to fly from Fort Lauderdale to Sydney, with a great lie-flat business class flight from Los Angeles to Sydney. At the time, the cash price for that flight was $8,936. That’s probably not what I’d have booked if I’d paid cash, though. So, my best estimate is that it would have cost about $5,700 to book the flight to Los Angeles and from Los Angeles to Sydney separately.
Since I spent all of my Marriott points on flights, I needed to use my Delta and AA miles for hotels. This gave me only 0.7 cents per point value for my Delta miles and 1.0 cents per point value for my AA miles. With that information, you can see the value achieved with the modified approach:
| Points Used | Cash Value | |
|---|---|---|
| Hotels | 90,000 Delta, 15,000 AA |
$780 |
| Flights | 30,000 Amex, 150,000 Marriott |
$5,700 |
| Total Cash Value: | $6,480 |
The cash value achieved by using hotel points for flights and airline miles for hotels was more than double the most value I could have achieved the boring old way.
Subjective value
As the tables above show, the objective value of the flights and hotels in my new approach was more than double the original plan’s value. Even better, the subjective value increased significantly. Obviously, my United Polaris business-class flight to Sydney was a million times better than flying Delta Premium Economy on the same route, but the bigger subjective win was with hotels…
I wasn’t particularly excited about any of the Marriott hotels that I could have booked for this challenge. When I flipped the script and used my Marriott points for flights and my airline miles for hotels, I suddenly had the freedom to book the exact hotels I wanted. My Panama City hotel was perfect: great location, luxurious, and incredibly interesting. My Medellin hotel was great too: perfectly located for each tour I took, with a great balcony, and I really loved the rooftop bar/restaurant where I ate breakfast each day while enjoying views of the city’s surrounding mountains. My Fort Lauderdale hotel was excellent. And my Melbourne hotel was luxurious, had great city views, and was in a great location.
Conclusion
The cash value achieved by using hotel points for flights and airline miles for hotels ($6,480) was more than double the most value I could have achieved the boring old way ($3,050). If I had calculated this based on United’s cash price for the flights I actually took ($8,936), the result would have been close to triple the value of the original plan.
More importantly, the modified plan resulted in a much better trip! I booked six nights in awesome hotels rather than mediocre hotels I would have been forced into with Marriott points. The only Marriott I actually stayed in was The Dalmar in Fort Lauderdale, which I booked with my AA mile budget. If I had used Marriott points, I wouldn’t have booked it, since it cost 48,000 points that night. That one night would have used a third of my Marriott budget: a non-starter. I would have ended up in a much cheaper Marriott hotel instead. Ironically, paying with AA miles unlocked a better Marriott experience.
And, of course, my lie-flat business-class flight to Sydney was far more luxurious than Delta Premium Economy. I got a good night’s sleep on the flight and was ready to go once I arrived in Australia.
Trip Accounting
| Item | Rewards Spent | Cash Spent | Rewards Earned |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tue 9/22 Fly to Panama | |||
| Business class Detroit to Panama | 35K Amex points transferred to Aeroplan | $60 | N/A |
| Wed 9/23 Panama City | |||
| Uber to hotel | $28 | ||
| Lunch | $10 | ||
| Panama Canal Tour | $68 | $18.36 Capital One Shopping rewards + $3.40 cash (card-linked offer) | |
| Dinner | $27 | ||
| Tips & Misc | $40 | ||
| Wed-Thu 9/24 Panama City Hotel | |||
| Hotel Plaza Herrera (2 nights) | 40,520 Delta Miles, $150 Delta Stay credit | $0 | |
| Thu-Fri 9/25 Activities in Colombia | |||
| Uber to Panama City airport | $24 | ||
| Business Class Panama City to Medellin (then onward to Miami later) | 30,000 | $200 | |
| Uber from Medellin airport to hotel | $34 | ||
| Medellin Food Tour | $35 | $12.25 Capital One Shopping rewards + $1.75 cash (card-linked offer) | |
| Guatapé Tour | $44 | $15.55 Capital One Shopping rewards + $2.22 cash (card-linked offer) | |
| Tips & Misc | $35 | ||
| Sat 9/26 Colombia to FLL | |||
| Golden Valley Hotel (2 nights) | 26,537 Delta Miles | $0 | |
| Uber from hotel to Medellín airport | $47 | ||
| Tri-Rail from MIA to Fort Lauderdale | $5 | ||
| Uber from Tri-Rail | $13 – $10 = $3 | ||
| Resy Dinner | $52 – $50 = $2 | ||
| Sun 9/27 Departing FLL | |||
| The Dalmar (1 night) |
14,700 AA miles | $95 ($50 AA Hotels, $40 resort fee, $5 breakfast tip) | |
| United flight to SYD | 150K Bonvoy + 30K Amex points | $43 | |
| Lyft to airport | $10 | ||
| Sun/Mon 9/27, 9/28 flying to Melbourne | |||
| Economy flight SYD-MEL | $188 | ||
| Tues 9/29 Melbourne fun | |||
| The Langham Hotel | 22,943 Delta miles | $96 | |
| Magic coffee | $4 | ||
| Hidden bar crawl | $175 ($200 – $25 dining credit) | ||
| Breakfast | $35 AUD hotel credit | $14 | |
| Total Cash Spent & Rewards Earned To Date: | $1,287 – $250 statement credits = $1,037 | $46.16 Capital One Shopping rewards + $7.37 cash | |
| Amex Gold Card | Bonvoy Brilliant | Delta Gold Business | AA MileUp | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starting Amount | 100K Points, $50 Resy, $10 Dining, $10 Uber | 150K Points, $250 Cash, $25 Dining | 90K Points, $150 Delta Stays | 15K Points |
| Spent To-Date | 95K Points, $10 Uber, $50 Resy | 150,000, $250, $25 Dining | 90K Points, $150 Credit | 14,700 |
| Amount Remaining | 5K Points, $10 Dining | None | None | 300 Points |
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