Category Archives: Trip Reports

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PSA: Southwest Airlines Schedule Changes, No Alert to Passengers

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Good morning everyone.  Like clockwork, Southwest Airlines sends out emails every Tuesday morning with details of their latest fare sale.  And every Tuesday morning, I check all my upcoming previously booked Southwest Airlines flights to see if any of the flight prices have gone down.  If they have, I follow the advice in this post: PSA: Check Existing Southwest Airlines Flights for Price Drops, then Rebook.  Depending on the flight, you might save $5-$10 and sometimes you might save $40-$50, it just depends, but the only way to know for sure is to check all your upcoming previously booked Southwest AIrlines flights.

During my usual pass, I noticed that one of my upcoming Southwest Airlines flights was not showing up online.  I booked a late night flight from SFO to SNA for Fourth of July weekend, but when I looked on the Southwest Airlines website, I could not find this flight (time or flight number) anywhere.

7-1-16 SFO-SNA SWA

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Spring Training Major League Baseball Games – Advice for a Rookie

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Good morning everyone.  I am heading to Phoenix this weekend with my dad and brother to watch some Spring Training baseball games.  For those of you who are not diehard sports fans, Spring Training baseball games are preseason practice games / tryouts for new players.  If the new players perform well in Spring Training, they will (hopefully) get called up to the majors and play in a Major League Baseball game.  On the other hand, Spring training games for the players who have already made the team is all about getting back into shape, hanging out with friends/players from other teams, and enjoying the warm weather in Arizona and Florida.  Even though preseason games don’t count, I always enjoy hanging out with my dad and brother while we watch the game; eat peanuts, pretzels, cotton candy or any other junk food I can get my hands on; and talk about life/travel plans.

My dad and brother are flying into Phoenix from Orange County and I am flying in from Oakland.  According to the schedule, we should all arrive around the same time and then we will head to the Sheraton Phoenix Airport Hotel Tempe.  It is not the most luxurious hotels in the world Arizona Tempe, but it is ideally located “one block away from Tempe Diablo Stadium (spring training home of the Angels)” and offers “guests complimentary transportation to Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport – we’re located just three miles away from the airport.”  This hotel was a total bargain for 3 nights using SPG points.

SPG Tempe

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Bad use of AS $99 Companion Ticket & Codeshare AA / AS Booking with Citi Thank You Points

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Good morning from rainy San Francisco.  I hope you all had a great (sunny) weekend.  Since I was stuck inside most of the weekend, I did some travel planning (I do that anyway even if the weather is great).  I booked a quick weekend trip to Portland in mid May and I even found Alaska Airlines saver award space for the return flight from PDX to SFO at a convenient time (not 6 or 7am).  After calling British Airways several times and finally getting through after hearing the busy dial tone 5+ times, I booked the return flight using British Airways Avios.  It was not the greatest redemption ever, but I had British Airways Avios to burn.

For the outbound flight from SFO to PDX, I searched on Google Flights and found a few decent flight times and prices.  Since I am traveling with my roommate, I needed to get 2 tickets.  I have access to a few Alaska Airlines $99 companion ticket codes (the codes are transferrable and can be booked by anyone).  Here is the standard price for 2 one way tickets:

SFO-PDX AS No Companion Ticket

And here is the price with the $99 Alaska Airlines companion ticket.  As you can see, the price with the companion ticket is 43 cents higher than booking the flights without the companion ticket.  I decided to save the companion ticket for a future flight and researched other flight options.

SFO-PDX AS Companion Ticket Continue reading →

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Hyatt Launches the Unbound Collection Featuring the Driskill Hotel (Austin) & Hôtel du Louvre (Paris)

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Good morning everyone, I just received an email from Hyatt’s PR team about their latest announcement: HYATT LAUNCHES NEW BRAND: THE UNBOUND COLLECTION BY HYATT.  Here is the intro to the press release:

CHICAGO (March 2, 2016) – Hyatt Hotels Corporation (NYSE: H) today announced the launch of The Unbound Collection by Hyatt, a global collection of unique and independent stay experiences. The Unbound Collection by Hyatt will include a portfolio of new and existing upper-upscale and luxury properties that will maintain a distinct character while providing guests and owners Hyatt’s award-winning customer loyalty program, robust operational and marketing resources and trusted, quality brand.

The properties within The Unbound Collection by Hyatt – which will include historic urban gems, contemporary trend-setters, boutique hotels, resorts, and more – will have their own individual brand identities, free from constraint or convention. At the same time, the brand will provide guests the freedom from worry by giving them the high-quality that comes with the Hyatt brand.

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Reminder: OC Travel Hacker Meetup – Tustin District In-N-Out Burger – Saturday, February 27 12-2pm

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Good morning everyone, happy Friday!  This is a friendly reminder that my OC Meetup is tomorrow afternoon (Saturday 2/27).  I’m looking forward to seeing a few familiar faces and meeting some new readers in Orange County.  No need to RSVP, just show up if you are interested.

  • Where: In-N-Out Burger, 2895 Park Ave, Tustin, CA 92782 (Google Maps)
  • When: Saturday, February 27 from 12-2pm

In-N-Out Tustin District Map

If you have any questions, please leave a comment below.  Have a great weekend everyone!