Author Archives: Grant

About Grant

Grant is an expert in frequent flyer miles, hotel loyalty points, credit card rewards, and cash back deals. He also has a pretty cool travel blog. Find him on Twitter @travelwithgrant.

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Malta Trip Report Part 2: Kayak to Comino’s Blue Lagoon & ATV / Quad Tour Around Gozo

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Good morning everyone.  I hope you enjoyed my post from yesterday, Malta Trip Report Part 1: Walking Through Valletta and Attending Feast of St. Peter & St. Paul.  In today’s post, I will share some photos of my Kayak Gozo tour from Gozo to Comino to see the Blue Lagoon and from the Gozo Pride ATV tour around the island.  Kayak Gozo offers 3 different tours (half day morning, half day afternoon, and full day).  We decided to do the half day morning, called the “Rise and Shine” tour, and the cost was 38 Euros per person.  Laura and I had a double kayak, she was in the front and I was in the back.  After getting the handle of paddling, we went inside a little cove and then made the journey across the channel to the Blue Lagoon, near Comino.

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Malta Trip Report Part 1: Walking Through Valletta and Attending Feast of St. Peter & St. Paul

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Good morning everyone.  After spending a few days in Athens (post 1 and post 2) and a few days in Crete (post 1 and post 2), we headed to Malta for a week.  My girlfriend has relatives in Malta, so her family showed us around and treated us to several dinners and an amazing feast.  All of the things I will show you are available to the public and accessible via public transportation.  If you are in Malta for a few days, I highly recommend getting a 7 day bus pass for 21 Euros.  If you pay as you ride, each ride is 1.5 to 3 Euros, so if you make a few round trip bus rides, the 7 day pass pays for itself very quickly.  The bus network goes all over the country and runs relatively on time.

The first stop in Malta was to Valletta, the fortified city near the coast.  Valletta had lots of shops, restaurant, and history.

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Crete Trip Report Part 2: Crete Safari ATV Tour to Milatos Cave, Feed Monkeys, Taste Olives & Visit Churches

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Good morning everyone, I hope you enjoyed reading yesterday’s post, Crete Trip Report Part 1: Radisson Blu Beach Resort & Nearby Milatos Fishing Village.  In today’s post, I am going to share a lot of photos from Crete Safari, a guided ATV tour around the Milatos / Sissi area of Crete.  I did a little research on Trip Advisor and the ATV tour was highly rated.  During the 5-6 hour guided tour, we went inside the Milatos Cave, fed monkeys in a zoo, tasted various olives at an olive oil factory, had lunch, and visited a few churches.  I believe the tour cost 150 Euros total for the two of us.  We shared an ATV and I drove the entire time.  On the back of the ATV was a lock box, so we left our backpacks and valuables locked inside – which was a really nice ATV feature.  Spoiler alert, the ATV tour was awesome and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who enjoys ATV tours :)

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Buy Miles & Points Promos Expiring Soon: United Airlines, Alaska Airlines, Radisson Rewards & SPG

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Good morning everyone, I hope you had a great weekend.  I recently went through all the links on my buy miles / points page and noticed that a few promos are ending in the next week or two.  I don’t recommend buying miles and points unless you have an award ticket or award night stay in mind, but if you do need some extra miles / points, it’s better to buy them when they are at a discount or offering a bonus.  Without further ado, here are the 4 promos ending in the next few days.

United Airlines: Get up to 85% Bonus on Miles (Expires July 11, 2018)

United Airlines seems to run buy miles promos often.  A 100% bonus was the highest I’ve seen recently, so an 85% bonus is almost as good.  This is a tiered bonus, so your price per mile (PPM) will depend on how many miles you purchase.

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Crete Trip Report Part 1: Radisson Blu Beach Resort & Nearby Milatos Fishing Village

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Good morning everyone, I hope you had a great weekend.  After a short stay in Athens (post 1 and post 2), we had the pleasure of visiting Crete.  It is the largest of Greece’s islands, but doesn’t get as much love (or tourists) as Santorini or Mykonos.  I didn’t know anything about Crete, but I knew I wanted to visit.  I looked up chain hotels on Crete and only found the Radisson Blu Beach Resort in Milatos, Crete.  I booked 3 nights using a bunch of Radisson Rewards Points.  The property is an all-inclusive, but there are different tiers of “all-inclusiveness.”  As a Radisson Rewards Gold Elite Member (thanks to having a few US Bank Radisson Rewards credit cards), we received complimentary breakfast every day.

Even though the beach resort is beautiful, with a nice beach cove and several crystal clear hotel pools, there is a great little fishing village just around the corner.  Laura and I walked over to the fishing village twice during our stay.  There are several restaurants and a small market in town.  We had a delicious lunch, grabbed some snacks at the local market, had a fish dinner (during our second visit) and walked back to our hotel.  In this post, I will show you the beautiful Radisson Blu Beach Resort and share some photos from the small fishing village. In tomorrow’s post, I will share some photos of my amazing ATV tour around Crete… stay tuned!

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Image source: https://www.radissonblu.com/en/resort-milatos

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