Bora Bora (Almost) for Free with Miles and Points

00:00:00.000 | Hello, and welcome to another episode of "All the Hacks,"

00:00:03.440 | a show about upgrading your life, money, and travel.

00:00:06.680 | I'm Chris Hutchins, and I'm excited you're

00:00:08.520 | here for a unique episode.

00:00:10.780 | And if you're watching on video, you already know why.

00:00:13.600 | It's because I'm recording from the St. Regis Bora Bora

00:00:16.880 | on an overwater bungalow.

00:00:18.560 | And if you look behind me, it's absolutely amazing.

00:00:22.140 | So many of the listener questions I get

00:00:24.320 | are about how to redeem your miles and points

00:00:26.640 | for amazing vacations.

00:00:28.280 | So I thought I would use this episode

00:00:30.240 | to break down exactly how we ended up

00:00:32.320 | booking a trip that would have cost more than $20,000

00:00:35.920 | for less than $1,500.

00:00:38.360 | I'll walk through finding the airlines,

00:00:40.760 | transferring the points, booking the hotels,

00:00:43.400 | and all the hacks you need to make a trip

00:00:45.320 | like this possible yourself.

00:00:46.440 | [MUSIC PLAYING]

00:00:50.800 | But two quick things before we get started.

00:00:53.680 | One, if you're new to travel hacking, points, and miles,

00:00:57.360 | and you want to get a good foundation first,

00:00:59.520 | I'd recommend going back and listening to episode one

00:01:02.080 | with Lee Rowan, episode three with Brad Barrett,

00:01:05.480 | or episode 27 with the points guy Brian Kelly.

00:01:09.280 | And two, if you're listening to this

00:01:11.240 | and thinking that a trip like this is out of the question,

00:01:13.840 | I'd recommend going back and listening

00:01:15.460 | to episode one with Lee Rowan, episode three with Brad Barrett,

00:01:19.080 | or episode 27 with the points guy Brian Kelly.

00:01:21.760 | And three, if you're listening to this

00:01:23.560 | and thinking that a trip like this is out of reach,

00:01:26.360 | I just want to read an amazing email I got from a listener

00:01:29.040 | a few weeks ago.

00:01:31.160 | Chris, my name is Zach.

00:01:33.080 | I'm a medical student finishing up my second year

00:01:35.400 | and have been a fan of your podcast

00:01:36.920 | since the first episode came out.

00:01:38.920 | I really like what you're doing, and I've

00:01:40.680 | been putting a lot of these hacks to good work.

00:01:43.680 | As you can imagine, money is incredibly tight

00:01:46.440 | for a medical student.

00:01:47.640 | I use almost exclusively points and miles

00:01:50.440 | to cover round-trip flights and four or five-star hotels

00:01:53.880 | for a 10-day trip to Europe to celebrate our four-year

00:01:56.720 | anniversary in a few months.

00:01:58.800 | We ended up turning 350,000 points and miles

00:02:01.920 | from credit card sign-up bonuses and other necessary purchases

00:02:05.400 | into flights and hotels that we calculated

00:02:08.200 | equals about $7,200 of value.

00:02:11.880 | I think this is proof that what you're talking about

00:02:14.920 | works for literally anyone, even a medical student who basically

00:02:18.800 | has no money.

00:02:20.180 | Thanks again for what you're doing,

00:02:21.600 | and I look forward to listening to more episodes of all

00:02:24.120 | the hacks in the future.

00:02:25.720 | Zach, I'm so excited for the trip.

00:02:27.920 | I hope it's incredible.

00:02:29.360 | And thank you so much for writing in.

00:02:31.280 | Hopefully, that helps anyone listening

00:02:33.280 | know that you can use all the hacks I'm

00:02:35.160 | talking about on this show to take an amazing trip yourself.

00:02:38.120 | All right, let's jump in.

00:02:39.760 | So first off, how did this trip even come to be?

00:02:43.320 | Well, if you've been listening, you

00:02:44.960 | might know that my wife and I are expecting our second child

00:02:48.200 | in June this year.

00:02:49.480 | So we were trying to think what kind of a vacation

00:02:51.800 | we could take before the craziness of having

00:02:53.840 | two children come.

00:02:55.220 | And my parents kindly volunteered

00:02:57.600 | to watch our daughter for one week

00:02:59.660 | and told us this week would work best.

00:03:01.800 | So we started thinking about what we could possibly

00:03:04.580 | do with one week off.

00:03:06.060 | And we had all these points, and we

00:03:07.880 | wanted to burn them on something amazing.

00:03:09.960 | And so we started looking, and we kind of identified

00:03:12.320 | we didn't want to go too crazy far just for the fact

00:03:15.920 | that we only had a week.

00:03:17.000 | So it was, where can we go on flights for less than 10 hours?

00:03:20.560 | And the options, unfortunately, from the West Coast,

00:03:24.000 | a lot of the Caribbean is really hard to get to.

00:03:26.200 | So we looked at places like Turks and Caicos.

00:03:28.160 | So we even looked at Costa Rica.

00:03:29.860 | And it just seemed like it was going

00:03:31.360 | to be a really tough trip to take multiple layovers to get

00:03:34.320 | to where you wanted to.

00:03:35.640 | And it just wasn't that convenient.

00:03:37.520 | And we'd come to Bora Bora back in 2018,

00:03:40.520 | and we stayed at the Conrad.

00:03:42.020 | And I'll talk about the differences between that

00:03:44.020 | and the St. Regis in a bit.

00:03:45.480 | But it was so amazing that we thought, well,

00:03:48.240 | we might as well just look to see if that's possible.

00:03:50.920 | So we kind of had an idea from the beginning of,

00:03:53.320 | let's just take the most amazing, relaxing vacation

00:03:55.840 | we can.

00:03:56.600 | We know Bora Bora is one nonstop flight.

00:03:59.280 | It's about eight hours from San Francisco.

00:04:02.240 | And then you take a small plane from Papiete

00:04:05.280 | to here, which you can probably hear flying above me right now.

00:04:09.640 | And that is exactly what we thought we would do.

00:04:12.940 | So that was the idea, was from the beginning,

00:04:15.420 | can we make Bora Bora possible with points, with miles?

00:04:19.100 | And so we started deciding to look in

00:04:21.260 | to see if it was going to work.

00:04:22.780 | And so let me jump in to some screen sharing here.

00:04:25.700 | Obviously, if you have questions,

00:04:27.160 | you can follow up on the video or follow up by email.

00:04:29.980 | I'm always chris@allthathacks.com.

00:04:31.980 | Before we get into everything, I just

00:04:33.580 | want to paint a picture of how amazing this place is.

00:04:37.100 | My wife and I have been on a lot of trips.

00:04:39.060 | And we always say, next time, we're

00:04:40.460 | going to go somewhere new.

00:04:41.700 | But Bora Bora and Japan are two places that we always say,

00:04:45.620 | you know what?

00:04:46.340 | Let's just go back there again, because it's so incredible.

00:04:49.540 | The water is the clearest thing you could possibly imagine.

00:04:54.100 | Resorts have hammocks that just sit out in the ocean,

00:04:56.820 | so you can just lie, relax, and enjoy just

00:05:00.180 | the most beautiful views.

00:05:02.500 | There's something super special about having a bungalow that

00:05:06.180 | sits over the water, where you can jump off your balcony

00:05:08.740 | straight into the water.

00:05:11.300 | You get bikes, and you can ride them all around.

00:05:13.620 | It's the most relaxing, manicured place to just--

00:05:16.740 | everyone is so friendly.

00:05:18.320 | It's hard to be more excited about a place you

00:05:21.180 | can go on vacation than here.

00:05:23.540 | And one of the things I really love

00:05:25.100 | is that I've been to a few resorts,

00:05:27.580 | whether sometimes in Mexico or in the Caribbean,

00:05:29.740 | where it just feels like you took

00:05:31.340 | a bunch of American culture, and you just plopped it down

00:05:34.100 | in the middle of a nice beach.

00:05:35.820 | And this is totally different than that.

00:05:38.180 | French Polynesia has a very distinct culture.

00:05:41.020 | And most of the resorts here try to infuse that culture

00:05:45.060 | into the resort.

00:05:45.980 | So you really get a feel for it, whether it's activities,

00:05:49.220 | excursions, doing a Polynesian night, different types of food

00:05:54.100 | that you can try.

00:05:55.340 | A lot of the staff--

00:05:56.420 | the staff at most of these resorts

00:05:57.900 | is the most friendly people ever.

00:05:59.540 | And you can spend time talking to them about their culture

00:06:01.960 | and understand it.

00:06:02.740 | And so I think that's another part of travel

00:06:05.140 | that's really important to us that you get to do here.

00:06:07.460 | I think that's it.

00:06:08.600 | I just wanted to paint a picture of what

00:06:10.300 | it's really an amazing, magical experience a trip like this

00:06:14.180 | can be.

00:06:15.140 | I know a lot of people say it's once in a lifetime.

00:06:17.300 | But the reason I love points, the reason I love miles,

00:06:19.520 | the reason I love all the hacks is because there's

00:06:21.860 | a way to make it possible way more frequently than once

00:06:24.420 | in a lifetime without having to spend the money it would

00:06:26.900 | otherwise cost.

00:06:27.860 | So now that we know where we're going,

00:06:29.700 | I want to start looking at how we can get there.

00:06:32.200 | And then I'll look at where to stay.

00:06:33.980 | So we want to go to Papeete, which

00:06:36.480 | is the main international airport in French Polynesia.

00:06:39.500 | So I like to start all of these searches

00:06:41.380 | by going to flightconnections.com.

00:06:43.620 | And I do that because they show you all the routes

00:06:46.460 | that you can get to a certain airport from.

00:06:49.300 | So for Papeete, you can see that in the US, the only routes

00:06:53.020 | are from San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Honolulu.

00:06:56.180 | Now, for us trying to take a week trip, which

00:06:58.380 | is going to be a short trip, flying from San Francisco

00:07:01.300 | to Honolulu and then down to Papeete,

00:07:03.220 | it's just not in the cards.

00:07:05.100 | So we're really looking at SFO and LAX flights.

00:07:08.440 | So now that I know what the routes are,

00:07:10.660 | I first like to go see how much are the flights.

00:07:13.340 | And the way I typically do that is not

00:07:15.140 | looking for my home destination, but just

00:07:17.060 | looking at the specific nonstop flights

00:07:19.660 | because you get a sense of what the international prices are

00:07:22.620 | going to be.

00:07:23.580 | So I'm going to go to Google Flights.

00:07:26.860 | And I'm going to search for San Francisco or LAX.

00:07:30.460 | And so you can search multiple froms and multiple

00:07:32.700 | tos at Google Flights.

00:07:34.020 | And so you type SFO.

00:07:36.300 | And then the easiest way to do it is once you hit comma,

00:07:39.780 | Google Flights saves that.

00:07:41.100 | And so you could type SFO comma, LAX comma,

00:07:43.940 | and then you search Papeete.

00:07:45.540 | Now, unfortunately, Google Flights

00:07:47.660 | will not let you search for nonstop flights

00:07:50.900 | from the get-go.

00:07:51.820 | So you have to click into a search

00:07:53.180 | and then filter to nonstop.

00:07:54.860 | So now that I've filtered to nonstop,

00:07:56.700 | I'm going to look at round-trip flights from SFO or LAX

00:08:00.020 | to Papeete.

00:08:01.180 | I'm going to go in and search.

00:08:03.060 | By clicking on the date field, you can actually

00:08:05.400 | in the bottom left say, show me five-day trips.

00:08:07.760 | And you can actually look at how much

00:08:09.340 | these tickets are going to cost.

00:08:10.900 | And what I'm seeing is that on most days for the rest of March

00:08:15.180 | and a lot of days in April, the round-trip tickets

00:08:18.660 | are $550 to $600, $700, which is pretty

00:08:22.700 | reasonable for a long-distance international flight.

00:08:26.540 | So out the gate, I'm thinking, wow,

00:08:29.540 | I don't even know if I want to use miles.

00:08:31.780 | But it's a short trip.

00:08:34.220 | A lot of the flights are overnight.

00:08:35.820 | I've got a lot of miles.

00:08:37.540 | What about business?

00:08:39.100 | Every now and then, I look at business internationally,

00:08:41.500 | and it's really not that much more.

00:08:43.220 | In this case, I'm going to look, and I already

00:08:45.100 | know what I'm going to see.

00:08:46.380 | It's going to be almost $5,000 or more, which for me,

00:08:49.540 | just makes it completely off the table.

00:08:51.680 | So at this point, I've kind of said, all right,

00:08:53.940 | I'm going to fly economy, or I'm going

00:08:56.420 | to see if there's miles available for business.

00:08:58.520 | Obviously, if the miles are available for business

00:09:00.560 | and it's a good deal, that's what I would prefer to do.

00:09:03.100 | So now that I know the flight routes there are,

00:09:05.940 | you can click through Google Flights,

00:09:07.480 | and you can see, OK, well, United has a flight.

00:09:09.580 | Air Tahiti Nui has a flight.

00:09:11.420 | Air France has a flight.

00:09:13.100 | Keep in mind that for a lot of international destinations,

00:09:15.820 | the day you fly on might actually

00:09:17.740 | change what airlines have flights.

00:09:19.420 | They might not all have flights the same day.

00:09:21.580 | So if you're clicking through days,

00:09:23.040 | you'll actually see that on some days,

00:09:25.580 | an airline called French Bee actually

00:09:27.880 | flies from San Francisco.

00:09:29.640 | It's the airline we flew down to French Polynesia

00:09:32.640 | the last time we came.

00:09:34.000 | And I thought it was a great experience.

00:09:36.640 | So definitely click around to make sure you know

00:09:39.400 | what airlines are looking for.

00:09:41.300 | Now, I can tell you in advance that French Bee doesn't

00:09:43.600 | have a mileage program that lets you book award tickets.

00:09:46.480 | So I'm going to start looking first on United.

00:09:48.880 | Now, if you search SFO to PPT, and you search a date,

00:09:52.920 | you click Award Travel, you're going

00:09:55.720 | to get a list of flights for that day.

00:09:58.360 | But you're also going to get an award calendar at the top.

00:10:00.820 | And if you click under that, you'll

00:10:02.320 | see View 30-Day Calendar.

00:10:03.920 | And you can actually see all the different award prices.

00:10:06.520 | So you'll see that on every Sunday and really Tuesday,

00:10:09.880 | almost all the flights United flies for the rest of March

00:10:13.280 | and into April.

00:10:15.200 | Almost every week, you can find a flight for 35,000 or 37,000

00:10:19.960 | miles, but knowing that the flights are only 600 round trip,

00:10:24.720 | and if you dig into the one-way prices,

00:10:26.400 | you'll learn they're about 380 going down, maybe 280 or 300

00:10:30.920 | coming back.

00:10:32.480 | I'm not sure I'd rather use 35,000 miles for the ticket.

00:10:36.120 | But if I look in business, you'll

00:10:39.120 | see that 70,000 points going down,

00:10:41.680 | United has availability on the next four Sundays.

00:10:45.480 | And you can go search round trip,

00:10:47.200 | see when it's available on the way coming back.

00:10:49.200 | So now all of a sudden, I've said, OK, that's low inventory.

00:10:51.920 | I know that that's one of the lowest prices you'll see.

00:10:54.160 | United even highlights it in green

00:10:55.680 | if it's the lowest price in the month.

00:10:58.280 | So now we're like, OK, so United has some tickets coming down.

00:11:00.880 | You can also check the other airlines.

00:11:02.480 | So I said French B doesn't have anything,

00:11:04.240 | but there's also Air France, and there's Air Tahiti Nui.

00:11:07.640 | So you can go through the Air France website

00:11:09.660 | and do it for Air Tahiti Nui.

00:11:11.720 | While I'm sure you don't have Air Tahiti Nui in miles,

00:11:14.160 | you probably maybe have or have access from a transfer partner

00:11:17.020 | to American who are partners, so you could book for American.

00:11:19.740 | So you can actually search those flights on their websites.

00:11:22.820 | I have a subscription to a website called Expert Flyer,

00:11:25.980 | and that site lets you search award inventory

00:11:28.740 | for a lot of flights.

00:11:29.740 | So I can actually go there and just say,

00:11:32.320 | I'm looking for LAX to PPT, and do a search.

00:11:36.620 | One of the great features they have

00:11:38.140 | is that you can search three days before and three days

00:11:40.260 | after.

00:11:40.780 | So you can search seven days at a time.

00:11:42.820 | And I can go in and search Air Tahiti Nui,

00:11:45.460 | and I can say I'm looking for a business award.

00:11:47.740 | And it'll come back and show you, here's what we found.

00:11:50.740 | Now, I can tell you that it's hard to find

00:11:54.180 | award availability far out in advance.

00:11:56.480 | A lot of airlines don't release all their inventory.

00:11:58.860 | But when you're trying to book something somewhat last minute,

00:12:01.820 | sometimes you get really, really lucky.

00:12:03.420 | So in the case of United, you saw

00:12:04.940 | that we got award availability on business class seats

00:12:08.260 | four days in a row on Air Tahiti Nui.

00:12:11.340 | It looks like I'm currently looking,

00:12:13.580 | and there's nothing to get down.

00:12:15.380 | But coming back, if you want to leave on the 30th of March,

00:12:19.660 | there's five seats back to LA.

00:12:21.460 | So maybe that's an option.

00:12:22.620 | And the availability changes all the time.

00:12:25.040 | Expert Flyer actually lets you set alerts to say, hey,

00:12:27.340 | if something pops up, let me know.

00:12:29.260 | I'll save you the looking.

00:12:30.340 | Air France had no availability, so I'll just skip over it.

00:12:33.620 | But if you really wanted to book that Air Tahiti Nui flight,

00:12:36.300 | you can actually go on American Airlines' website,

00:12:39.820 | and you can just search PPT LAX.

00:12:43.280 | You can say book with miles, and it'll show up.

00:12:45.520 | I happen to know that it's going to be 80,000 miles to book

00:12:49.080 | that flight.

00:12:49.900 | And so from my perspective, I'd rather just

00:12:52.220 | use the 72,000 United miles.

00:12:54.300 | However, one of the things to know

00:12:56.420 | is that when there's availability on an airline,

00:12:58.540 | that means that you can book it from any of their partners.

00:13:01.420 | So that's where a search like point.me really

00:13:04.020 | comes in to benefit you.

00:13:05.700 | So I'm going to go do this search on point.me,

00:13:08.060 | and I already did it, but I have it pulled up in front of me.

00:13:10.940 | And what happens is they say, yep,

00:13:12.380 | we found the availability on United.

00:13:14.320 | This was for March 20th.

00:13:16.380 | And when you look at the options to book it, they say, yeah,

00:13:19.260 | you can book it with United with 72,800 miles,

00:13:22.500 | but you can also book it with Air Canada for 55,000 miles.

00:13:26.580 | And Air Canada happens to be a transfer partner of Amex,

00:13:30.020 | Capital One, and Chase.

00:13:31.900 | And let me tell you, I love Air Canada as a mileage program.

00:13:35.340 | The aeroplane program has some really great spots

00:13:38.020 | of redemption just like this.

00:13:39.700 | So now I'm thinking, OK, whether you have Amex points,

00:13:42.140 | Capital One points, Chase points,

00:13:43.700 | or you happen to be someone with Air Canada points,

00:13:46.380 | that's 55,000 miles down.

00:13:48.740 | You can find the return, 55,000 back.

00:13:51.260 | That's 110,000 miles for your trip.

00:13:54.140 | So what is 110,000 miles worth?

00:13:57.220 | Well, if you know that the business class flight would

00:13:59.460 | have been about $5,700, then that's $0.05 a mile.

00:14:02.940 | To put that in perspective, if you

00:14:04.380 | were using a card that earns you three points per dollar

00:14:07.220 | on travel expenses, and you can get $0.05 per mile,

00:14:10.500 | that's like getting 15% cash back.

00:14:13.020 | So I think that's an amazing deal.

00:14:14.660 | And in fact, that is exactly what we did to come down here.

00:14:17.260 | We got Air Canada miles, and we used

00:14:19.540 | them to book United business class seats for 110,000 miles

00:14:22.780 | each.

00:14:23.460 | And the taxes, as you could see, were $36.

00:14:26.700 | And it's really easy.

00:14:27.620 | You can create an account on Air Canada's website.

00:14:30.060 | You can go search for the flights.

00:14:31.780 | And once you find the availability,

00:14:33.740 | you can go to Chase or Cap One and do the transfer.

00:14:37.020 | Usually, you just log out, log back in, and boom.

00:14:40.140 | They show up right there.

00:14:41.740 | Make it really easy to book.

00:14:44.140 | So that's how we got here.

00:14:45.220 | We booked it through on United, in business,

00:14:47.700 | with Air Canada miles.

00:14:49.100 | It ended up being $36 each way per person,

00:14:52.420 | whereas the two business class tickets would

00:14:54.300 | have been over $11,000.

00:14:58.020 | So that's flights.

00:14:59.420 | That is how I typically do all of this searching.

00:15:01.580 | Point.me is a great place.

00:15:03.460 | You could even start there if you want.

00:15:05.460 | It's pretty great at searching across lots

00:15:07.540 | of different travel sites.

00:15:09.180 | The challenge is they don't have any flexible date search.

00:15:11.980 | So when you go to United's website,

00:15:13.580 | you can look at a 30-day calendar

00:15:15.180 | and get a sense of whether there's something great one day.

00:15:17.740 | With Point.me, you've got to go search a day,

00:15:20.060 | and then the next day, and then the next day.

00:15:22.300 | So when there's only a few options of flights,

00:15:25.060 | sometimes-- and you're flexible on dates.

00:15:27.420 | I like to start searching on the airline's websites.

00:15:29.900 | But if you're pretty strict on dates

00:15:31.460 | and you're going somewhere with lots of options,

00:15:33.580 | like the US to Europe, it could definitely

00:15:35.500 | be easier to search on Point.me.

00:15:37.740 | But keep in mind, sometimes there's

00:15:40.180 | strange things that happen, where

00:15:42.220 | it might be availability from San Francisco to Paris,

00:15:47.460 | but not from Paris to, let's say, Nice, France.

00:15:51.020 | And it might be a really cheap flight.

00:15:52.860 | So definitely make sure that when

00:15:54.300 | you're looking for award flights,

00:15:56.100 | you're not just looking at the whole trip.

00:15:58.860 | You might be looking at the major leg that you really want.

00:16:01.860 | And you could maybe buy a cheap $50, $100 ticket

00:16:04.660 | on either end to make it all the way to your destination.

00:16:08.260 | So now let's talk about hotels.

00:16:09.980 | Once I figured out we could get flights

00:16:11.700 | and I knew that there were a lot of different days--

00:16:13.860 | and actually, I'm speaking in Bora Bora right now.

00:16:16.740 | So when I was looking at this, United

00:16:18.320 | had a business class three different days

00:16:20.980 | in a single week.

00:16:21.900 | So I kind of knew I had a little bit of flexibility.

00:16:24.100 | We probably had 12 days and we wanted to go for six.

00:16:27.300 | So I kind of had a little bit of wiggle room.

00:16:29.140 | So I said, great, now I know that the flights are there.

00:16:31.440 | Let's pause and let's look at hotels.

00:16:33.540 | And I think one of the first things

00:16:35.700 | to do when you're looking at hotels

00:16:37.180 | is just to get a sense of what are the rates.

00:16:39.380 | Because sometimes, miles and points for hotels

00:16:42.920 | don't make a lot of sense.

00:16:44.100 | Sometimes I like Google for hotels.

00:16:46.700 | Their hotel search is pretty good.

00:16:48.500 | Lots of websites to look for hotels.

00:16:50.660 | Whichever one has the right filters you like, go for it.

00:16:53.420 | You could use TripAdvisor.

00:16:54.700 | You could use Kayak.

00:16:55.980 | It really just matters what you like.

00:16:57.580 | Right now, we're not trying to book a hotel.

00:16:59.660 | We're just trying to search.

00:17:01.220 | So if I go on and search Bora Bora on Google Hotels,

00:17:05.540 | you'll see that there are a lot of hotels that come up.

00:17:08.360 | Fortunately for Bora Bora, there aren't an unlimited number.

00:17:10.820 | There's like eight or nine hotels

00:17:12.780 | that are kind of high-end, go take a luxury vacation.

00:17:16.060 | And so I can look at them and say, OK, well, look.

00:17:18.980 | The Conrad, $722 a night.

00:17:21.940 | St. Regis, $1,200 a night.

00:17:23.660 | And I'm here looking March 21st to 26th.

00:17:27.340 | Once you find a hotel, one of the nice things

00:17:29.980 | that Google will let you do-- and it doesn't work

00:17:32.100 | until you pick the hotel.

00:17:33.740 | But in this example, if you go and click View Prices

00:17:36.580 | on a Google Hotels listing, now you can actually

00:17:39.860 | go to the dates and they'll say, best prices for one night stay.

00:17:43.700 | And they'll show you all the prices.

00:17:45.660 | And so you can actually look out and say, wow,

00:17:48.580 | there are some days that are ridiculously expensive.

00:17:51.220 | I'm looking right now, April 4th.

00:17:53.340 | The average rate for a night at the St. Regis in Bora Bora

00:17:56.140 | is $3,500 to $3,000 a night, which

00:17:59.500 | means a five-night stay is going to cost you almost $20,000.

00:18:03.060 | When I actually booked this trip, the rate per night

00:18:05.740 | was about $2,100.

00:18:08.060 | For me, I was like, wow, there's no world

00:18:10.300 | where I could get comfortable spending $10,000 on a vacation.

00:18:13.380 | So it's time to look at points.

00:18:15.500 | And fortunately, in Bora Bora, there's

00:18:17.800 | two intercontinental hotels.

00:18:19.660 | There's a Conrad.

00:18:20.820 | There's a St. Regis.

00:18:21.900 | All you different Hilton, Marriott, or IHG points,

00:18:25.340 | all which have transfer partners.

00:18:27.060 | So when I'm trying to find the award hotels where

00:18:29.340 | I might get the best deal, I love this site, awardmapper.com.

00:18:32.180 | If you're watching the video, you'll

00:18:34.260 | see that I actually have it pulled up in Paris

00:18:36.180 | because there's a bit of a bug on the site

00:18:38.220 | right now when it comes to Bora Bora.

00:18:39.580 | But I just want to show a little bit how it works.

00:18:41.660 | So you can go to anywhere in the world,

00:18:43.460 | and you can click different filters for hotel programs,

00:18:46.580 | whether it's Hilton, or Marriott, or Intercon,

00:18:48.700 | and see all the hotels in that region that

00:18:51.420 | participate in that program.

00:18:52.940 | So unfortunately, if you go to Bora Bora on AwardMapper,

00:18:55.980 | you will only see three hotels.

00:18:57.380 | You won't see all of them.

00:18:58.500 | Unfortunately, I had done enough research

00:19:00.220 | to know what they were.

00:19:01.940 | So I looked at Intercon.

00:19:03.740 | I looked at St. Regis.

00:19:04.780 | I looked at the Conrad.

00:19:05.980 | And basically, the way I do those searches

00:19:07.980 | is on their websites.

00:19:09.200 | So if you go to the Marriott website, and you say,

00:19:11.700 | I want to look at the St. Regis Bora Bora,

00:19:13.860 | you can say flexible dates, which I love doing.

00:19:16.380 | And I like to search for just one night

00:19:18.140 | so you get a sense of all the availability.

00:19:20.580 | Click Use Points, and click View Rates.

00:19:23.220 | And what you'll get is a calendar

00:19:24.900 | of 30 days of availability.

00:19:27.220 | And you can see which nights have availability.

00:19:29.420 | Right now, you can see that there

00:19:31.580 | are six nights for the rest of March, which it's the 18th.

00:19:35.180 | So 50% of the days left in March still have availability.

00:19:38.580 | And in April, there's 13 nights.

00:19:41.020 | So a little bit less than half of April.

00:19:43.540 | It's not perfect.

00:19:44.380 | It's not like you could stay for 10 days in a row.

00:19:46.420 | But I will say, when you search this availability,

00:19:48.540 | it changes a lot.

00:19:49.820 | I remember right before we booked it,

00:19:51.700 | one of the days we wanted to stay was gone.

00:19:53.700 | I waited six hours.

00:19:54.700 | It came back.

00:19:55.420 | And I'll actually pull up.

00:19:56.180 | So this is what the chart looked like.

00:19:57.820 | If you're watching the video, you'll see it.

00:19:59.620 | But when I was booking, the chart for March--

00:20:01.540 | the 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 10th, 12th, 15th,

00:20:06.100 | all the way to the 22nd were all available.

00:20:08.740 | And then the next day, the 13th and the 14th

00:20:11.020 | opened up, which is when we ended up actually coming down

00:20:13.140 | here.

00:20:13.740 | So already, I was looking at 70,000 to 85,000 points

00:20:17.380 | a night thinking, this is probably

00:20:19.260 | going to be the way we're going to do this trip.

00:20:21.300 | But we stayed at the Conrad a few years ago.

00:20:24.220 | And it was fantastic.

00:20:25.460 | And while I don't have a lot of Hilton points,

00:20:27.700 | they often have transfer bonuses from Amex.

00:20:30.380 | So I thought it'd be worth looking.

00:20:32.020 | So I looked at the Conrad.

00:20:33.300 | You check use points.

00:20:34.540 | You can hit View Available Dates.

00:20:36.380 | And sometimes, it's crazy.

00:20:38.460 | So I'm looking right now.

00:20:39.900 | And if you want to make a last-minute trip

00:20:41.620 | for the next four days, it's 120,000 points per night,

00:20:45.180 | which is a pretty good deal.

00:20:46.460 | If you want to go beyond that, it's

00:20:48.180 | 1.3 million points per night, which

00:20:50.780 | is a terrible, terrible use of Hilton points.

00:20:53.100 | So you might find some great deals with Hilton

00:20:55.900 | if you're looking.

00:20:56.740 | But like I said, those rooms sometimes

00:20:59.300 | can be as low as $700, $800 a night, which, look,

00:21:03.060 | that is a really expensive hotel room.

00:21:05.300 | But this is also a really, really expensive place

00:21:07.540 | to be that can cost $2,000 or $3,000 a night.

00:21:10.820 | So if you find a deal with dollars,

00:21:12.860 | it might be worth doing that.

00:21:14.020 | For us, we ended up able to take advantage of the Marriott

00:21:17.380 | deal, where you book four nights, get the fifth free.

00:21:20.300 | And it was about $85,000 a night.

00:21:22.980 | So we paid about-- actually, I know exactly.

00:21:25.980 | We paid 340,000 points.

00:21:27.940 | And I'll pull up my confirmation right here,

00:21:30.260 | which shows it was 340,000 points for the whole stay.

00:21:34.100 | And it was 2,000 French Polynesian dollars,

00:21:37.860 | which is about $20.

00:21:39.700 | So all in now, our flights were about $188 of taxes.

00:21:44.300 | And our hotel was about $20 in fees.

00:21:46.700 | We're at about $200.

00:21:48.340 | And our rooms, otherwise, were over $2,000 a night,

00:21:51.580 | so $10,000.

00:21:52.420 | Our flights were over $11,000.

00:21:53.700 | So this is a $20,000 vacation that we just

00:21:57.140 | booked last minute for less than $200,

00:22:00.980 | and about 340,000 Marriott points,

00:22:04.100 | and about 220,000 Chase points.

00:22:06.020 | I think we used Chase points, or you could use Capital One or Amex.

00:22:08.820 | One thing to share, if you're going

00:22:10.780 | to book, whether it's with points or dollars,

00:22:13.580 | one of the things a lot of people want to know,

00:22:15.620 | if you're coming to a place like Bora Bora,

00:22:17.620 | is how do you get that upgrade?

00:22:19.820 | And the way I recommend thinking about that

00:22:22.400 | is, there's a website called Flyer Talk.

00:22:25.220 | And for almost every hotel you can book with miles,

00:22:28.100 | there's a thread.

00:22:28.900 | And you can go way down the rabbit hole,

00:22:30.580 | and I wouldn't recommend that.

00:22:31.860 | But I would find the thread on the hotel

00:22:33.780 | you're trying to book at, and just read a little bit.

00:22:36.620 | Jump all the way to the end.

00:22:37.780 | See the recent reports of what people have found.

00:22:40.300 | A lot of these hotels, you can book a basic room,

00:22:43.280 | email them, and upgrade it with dollars.

00:22:45.700 | You might even get a better deal than sometimes

00:22:47.660 | the online price to upgrade your hotel.

00:22:50.220 | And then you can also just take your chances,

00:22:52.100 | if you have status.

00:22:53.020 | Or if you book it through a program, or a travel agent,

00:22:55.580 | or something like that, you might

00:22:56.540 | be able to be waitlisted for an upgrade if it's available.

00:22:59.440 | I'm actually working on an experiment

00:23:01.540 | right now with a travel company that

00:23:04.020 | would allow all listeners of this show

00:23:06.840 | to be able to book luxury properties around the world

00:23:09.980 | and get those kind of amenities.

00:23:11.700 | So if you're listening right now and you're

00:23:13.980 | looking at booking with dollars at a higher end property

00:23:16.660 | anywhere in the world, and you want things

00:23:18.700 | like free breakfast, or upgrades, or late checkout,

00:23:21.420 | and stuff like that, shoot me an email

00:23:23.460 | and we can do a little beta test here

00:23:24.980 | and see if we can get you hooked up on your next trip.

00:23:27.180 | Wouldn't cost you anything extra.

00:23:28.660 | So that's what I would recommend doing,

00:23:30.180 | is definitely do some research to see if there's

00:23:31.820 | a way you can get that upgrade.

00:23:33.460 | I know in a place like Bora Bora,

00:23:35.300 | some hotels, the cheap room that you book with points,

00:23:38.220 | and in our case, was not an overwater bungalow,

00:23:41.060 | but it was a villa on the beach.

00:23:43.100 | It's funny, if you talk to people who've been here a lot,

00:23:45.580 | some people say, you know what?

00:23:46.540 | Once the allure of the overwater bungalow wears off,

00:23:49.220 | the beach villa where you kind of have your own hammock

00:23:51.380 | and your own plunge pool and all that stuff,

00:23:52.980 | it's actually nicer.

00:23:54.620 | Hasn't worn off for me yet.

00:23:55.860 | I'm really enjoying jumping in the water from the balcony,

00:23:58.500 | so one day maybe I'll get there,

00:24:00.460 | but certainly not there today.

00:24:02.020 | So that covers flights to French Polynesia,

00:24:05.380 | that covers your hotel in Bora Bora,

00:24:07.180 | but there's one important thing I forgot to mention,

00:24:09.580 | and that's that Bora Bora is not located on the same island

00:24:13.860 | as Papiete, where all the international flights come in.

00:24:17.020 | So you need to get there,

00:24:18.900 | and the only way to really get there

00:24:20.780 | is to fly on Air Tahiti,

00:24:22.920 | and the fares are relatively the same.

00:24:25.580 | You book on their website.

00:24:27.220 | They're not the cheapest, but they're not crazy expensive.

00:24:29.900 | I think if you book really last minute,

00:24:31.580 | it might be about $400 round trip,

00:24:34.340 | but that's really your only option,

00:24:36.100 | so there's no hacks, there's no tricks,

00:24:38.420 | but what is interesting to know

00:24:40.500 | is a lot of the flights that come down here during the day

00:24:43.180 | and leave as a red-eye going back home or vice versa

00:24:46.380 | mean that you're either gonna land late at night

00:24:49.060 | or you're gonna take off really early in the morning,

00:24:51.300 | and one hack, if you're able to swing it,

00:24:53.780 | is to book on an airline or even split

00:24:56.220 | and book on two airlines

00:24:57.620 | so you have an overnight flight each way.

00:25:00.160 | Otherwise, if you have a super early morning flight

00:25:03.580 | going out or you land really late at night,

00:25:06.300 | there are no flights to get to an island

00:25:08.620 | that leave after or leave early enough

00:25:11.040 | to make your connection.

00:25:12.420 | So for us, we ended up getting in around 8 p.m.,

00:25:15.740 | and we spent one night at the Intercontinental in Tahiti.

00:25:19.140 | It was actually fantastic.

00:25:20.740 | We actually spent almost the whole next day

00:25:23.180 | and took an afternoon flight out.

00:25:25.000 | The pool was amazing, the snorkeling was great.

00:25:27.820 | Overall, I had a great experience.

00:25:30.200 | There's also a Hilton near the airport.

00:25:32.700 | Both looked great.

00:25:33.780 | So if you don't get in early enough to make a connection

00:25:37.780 | or if you're flying out early in the morning

00:25:39.940 | and you need to stay a night before,

00:25:41.660 | I could recommend both those places.

00:25:44.220 | I won't go into it in this podcast,

00:25:45.940 | but there's also a ton of great hotels

00:25:48.100 | on the island of Morea,

00:25:49.540 | which is really close to the main island of Tahiti.

00:25:53.100 | So if you wanna split your trip up, check that out.

00:25:56.020 | There's a lot of other islands here worth checking out.

00:25:59.100 | But I just figured I'd focus on the trip we just planned

00:26:01.900 | and walk you through it all.

00:26:03.060 | So that's how to book flights.

00:26:04.420 | That's how to book hotels.

00:26:06.000 | And once you've done that,

00:26:07.780 | there's really not that much more to do.

00:26:09.980 | I wanted to share two things.

00:26:11.420 | One, I have a bunch of hacks that I've learned

00:26:13.420 | from two trips here.

00:26:14.380 | And two, I just wanna kinda compare and contrast

00:26:17.940 | the two places I've stayed

00:26:20.140 | in case you happen to be listening to this and thinking,

00:26:22.820 | should I stay at the St. Regis?

00:26:23.900 | Should I stay at the Conrad?

00:26:25.660 | First off, it doesn't matter which one you pick.

00:26:27.560 | They're both gonna be absolutely amazing.

00:26:29.460 | But I figure, should you have the question,

00:26:31.980 | it might be worth sharing.

00:26:33.360 | So first off, if you're thinking of booking this,

00:26:35.900 | one hack that I've heard a lot of people we've met

00:26:38.240 | at the resort have told us

00:26:40.020 | is that they actually booked their trip on Costco.

00:26:42.820 | Now, I've never used Costco's travel program.

00:26:45.320 | And when I tried to look online before recording this,

00:26:48.180 | it looks like you have to call for availability.

00:26:50.500 | But we talked to at least three couples

00:26:52.360 | that said they looked around

00:26:53.940 | and the best possible deal they found

00:26:55.860 | was booking through Costco.

00:26:57.340 | And it included their flight from LA.

00:26:58.980 | And all they had to do was get to LA.

00:27:00.900 | So I'll definitely say, try that out

00:27:04.180 | if you're looking at coming here

00:27:05.580 | and taking an amazing vacation.

00:27:07.420 | Some people actually booked packages

00:27:09.940 | that included their dinner.

00:27:11.980 | In a lot of places in the world,

00:27:13.740 | I would never want to make

00:27:14.900 | that kind of a commitment in advance

00:27:17.160 | to eat at the hotel every single night.

00:27:19.740 | But if you're coming somewhere like Bora Bora,

00:27:22.460 | like the Maldives,

00:27:24.220 | where the options outside of your resort are almost nothing.

00:27:28.080 | In fact, I don't think we will eat outside of the resort

00:27:30.640 | the entire time we're here

00:27:31.660 | because there's nowhere to walk to.

00:27:34.180 | Yes, you could take a boat,

00:27:35.620 | but then you'd need to charter a boat to come back.

00:27:37.620 | It just seems like a lot of work.

00:27:39.320 | So we've been eating at the resort

00:27:40.680 | and it's been fantastic.

00:27:42.300 | So if that's the circumstance

00:27:44.020 | and there's a deal to book your dinner

00:27:45.740 | and that dinner is reasonably priced,

00:27:48.540 | and let me remind you that all food here is expensive.

00:27:51.780 | So I will say that while we've saved a ton of money

00:27:54.420 | booking the flights with points

00:27:55.500 | and a ton of money booking the hotel with points,

00:27:57.640 | there is no deal to get affordable food.

00:27:59.840 | There are some hacks to save a little bit of money,

00:28:02.060 | but at the end of the day,

00:28:03.500 | if you're coming to a place like this,

00:28:05.860 | you're just gonna have to bite the bullet

00:28:07.500 | and spend money on food

00:28:08.580 | because it's the only way to do it

00:28:09.820 | and really enjoy yourself.

00:28:11.180 | So I wanna share a few of the differences

00:28:12.900 | between the two hotels I've stayed at here.

00:28:15.620 | I'll go through it quickly

00:28:16.600 | because most of you are probably not looking

00:28:18.540 | to plan a trip to Bora Bora in the near future

00:28:20.900 | and pick between these exact two hotels,

00:28:23.220 | but maybe comparing them will help you guys think about

00:28:26.380 | ways to compare other hotels in the future.

00:28:28.600 | So when I think about the two,

00:28:31.060 | what was obvious in advance was that the Conrad was newer.

00:28:34.500 | It had only been open for a few years when we went in 2018

00:28:38.380 | and the St. Regis has been open a lot longer.

00:28:41.580 | That doesn't mean a lot in terms of quality

00:28:43.800 | because the St. Regis is absolutely incredible,

00:28:46.820 | but it does mean that you have a little bit

00:28:48.380 | of a different vibe.

00:28:49.340 | The Conrad vibe was a little bit more modern

00:28:51.340 | and perfectly manicured

00:28:52.660 | and there's Bluetooth speakers in the room

00:28:54.500 | that you can pair your phone with

00:28:55.820 | and the St. Regis was just as luxurious,

00:28:58.840 | but maybe a little less modern.

00:29:01.180 | A couple other fun quick hits,

00:29:03.100 | the St. Regis has this beautiful lagoon with fish

00:29:06.820 | that you can snorkel in,

00:29:08.220 | but around all the villas,

00:29:10.380 | the water is just beautiful, clear water.

00:29:12.820 | You can see it behind me if you're watching the video.

00:29:15.460 | Whereas the Conrad didn't have any special place to snorkel

00:29:18.340 | but the entire villas were surrounded by coral reefs.

00:29:21.460 | So the snorkeling right off of your balcony

00:29:23.660 | or your patio was incredible.

00:29:25.260 | When it comes to upgrades,

00:29:28.100 | the Conrad has about 30, I think, rooms that aren't over water

00:29:32.940 | and I think the St. Regis has closer to 10.

00:29:35.300 | So the likelihood that there will be an extra room

00:29:39.140 | because there's just more of the St. Regis rooms

00:29:41.520 | are over water bungalows.

00:29:43.180 | I think you might have a higher likelihood

00:29:44.660 | of getting that upgrade at the St. Regis.

00:29:47.140 | Conrad did have this amazingly hard mini golf course.

00:29:52.140 | Maybe the hardest mini golf course you could ever imagine

00:29:55.100 | that isn't mechanical or anything,

00:29:57.020 | just really difficult holes, but it was a lot of fun.

00:30:00.220 | And at the St. Regis and the Conrad,

00:30:03.740 | they both had what I wish every hotel had,

00:30:06.460 | which was all the activities at the beach were free.

00:30:09.560 | You wanna borrow a standup paddleboard.

00:30:11.340 | You wanna borrow a HobieCat and go sailing.

00:30:13.400 | You wanna borrow one of those weird bikes

00:30:15.900 | that has like six foot tall inflatable wheels, free.

00:30:19.420 | You want snorkel equipment, free.

00:30:21.740 | You even want sunscreen, it's free.

00:30:23.460 | So one of the nicest things

00:30:25.060 | about some of these higher end resorts

00:30:26.620 | is that you do, after paying for the expensive room,

00:30:31.020 | get a lot of the amenities on the property

00:30:33.740 | without having to pay extra.

00:30:35.300 | Even at the St. Regis,

00:30:36.300 | you can use all of the amenities of the spa,

00:30:38.820 | the steam room, the sauna, everything for free

00:30:43.420 | just by calling and reserving it.

00:30:45.220 | Other than that, I think they both have amazing food.

00:30:48.380 | It is expensive.

00:30:49.300 | I'll just flag that for anyone listening.

00:30:52.300 | Just be prepared.

00:30:53.580 | But yeah, it's hard to go wrong.

00:30:56.820 | I think the last point that I think a lot of people

00:30:59.960 | come to Bora Bora for this beautiful view of the mountain

00:31:03.440 | and the kind of volcanic looking structure

00:31:05.780 | in the middle of the island,

00:31:07.380 | that isn't visible from the Conrad.

00:31:09.260 | So if your dream is that like classic Bora Bora picture,

00:31:13.100 | looking out your balcony to that view,

00:31:15.300 | you won't get that at the Conrad.

00:31:16.580 | What you will get is a view of this beautiful,

00:31:19.020 | endless ocean that you, yeah, it's unbelievable.

00:31:22.920 | I mean, I can't, you could king pick any resort here

00:31:25.540 | and I'm sure it'd be totally fine.

00:31:27.220 | So those were a few of the differences.

00:31:30.800 | I hope that was helpful.

00:31:32.300 | Finally, some quick hacks and tips for a trip to Bora Bora.

00:31:35.920 | Some of these are applicable anywhere you go.

00:31:38.400 | So one, definitely do an excursion to go out

00:31:41.780 | and swim with the sharks and the stingrays.

00:31:43.820 | It's one of the coolest things you can ever do.

00:31:46.000 | I thought it was amazing.

00:31:47.980 | Also, don't pack as much sunscreen as you think you need.

00:31:51.000 | Almost every resort, at least the two we've stayed at,

00:31:53.380 | have unlimited free sunscreen.

00:31:56.140 | Bring floats.

00:31:57.380 | So if you want to just sit out in the ocean off your patio,

00:32:00.940 | there's some really cool, cheap, small packable floats.

00:32:04.100 | I'll put a link in the show notes.

00:32:05.660 | We bought two of them.

00:32:07.140 | Or just make friends because a lot of people bring floats

00:32:10.260 | and don't want to carry them back.

00:32:11.900 | So shout out to Sam and Gabe who travel around the States

00:32:15.980 | in a van and bought an amazing pink flamingo

00:32:18.860 | and left it for us.

00:32:20.760 | My wife got a ton of great use out of it,

00:32:23.040 | so I really appreciate that.

00:32:25.780 | If you can, for a place like this,

00:32:28.140 | do your overnight flights so that you don't have to spend

00:32:30.860 | an extra day on lodging.

00:32:31.940 | If you're staying at a place where there's not a lot

00:32:33.940 | of stuff walkable or accessible,

00:32:36.220 | I always like to stop at the store somewhere,

00:32:38.840 | whether it's on your layover or on the cab ride over,

00:32:41.980 | even sometimes at the airport,

00:32:43.540 | and just pick up a handful of snacks, maybe some drinks,

00:32:46.500 | especially if it's a place like this

00:32:48.180 | and you want some alcohol.

00:32:49.620 | It could be really expensive at a resort.

00:32:51.660 | Pick up a few things.

00:32:53.140 | I don't expect it to be all the food you'll need,

00:32:55.180 | all the drink you'll need, et cetera,

00:32:56.580 | but it does feel good sometimes to be like,

00:32:59.220 | ah, finally, I got a $3 beer

00:33:01.360 | instead of the $8 resort beer.

00:33:03.380 | And maybe that's just a small part of me

00:33:05.580 | that feels like I want a couple wins on a trip

00:33:08.220 | because I know it's really expensive.

00:33:09.980 | But that's a tip I have because a lot of times also,

00:33:14.580 | there aren't some great snacks.

00:33:16.660 | Room service, you might be able to get French fries

00:33:19.040 | as a side dish, but there aren't always just a bag of chips

00:33:22.700 | or some granola or something small like that.

00:33:25.140 | So that's all the hacks I have for a trip like this,

00:33:28.020 | and hopefully this episode gives you some ideas

00:33:30.040 | to help you book your next trip.

00:33:31.880 | But if you have any follow-up questions or feedback,

00:33:34.180 | please don't hesitate to reach out.

00:33:36.180 | I'm Chris at allthehacks.com.

00:33:38.660 | In fact, I'll also be doing an episode soon

00:33:41.100 | with Julia from GeoBreeze Travel,

00:33:43.140 | who's an expert in all things credit card points and miles.

00:33:46.860 | So if you have questions that you want us to tackle

00:33:48.780 | on that episode, please send them my way

00:33:51.020 | as soon as you can, and we'll do our best.

00:33:53.700 | Thank you so much for joining me.

00:33:55.420 | See you next week.

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Bora Bora (Almost) for Free with Miles and Points | All The Hacks #49

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