My Points Trip for 2022(Part B)
My wife and I enjoy the beach, but we would get bored just swimming and sunbathing for too long. With this in mind we are spending 3 days in the Maldives at the Conrad Rangali Island in a Sunrise Water Villa for 95K points per night. This is typically the rate for a standard beach room, but if you keep searching you can find the Water Villa's for 95K they do go up as much as 195K points per night.
The Maldives to Dubai. I have wanted to fly Emirates business class for a long time, but have not found the opportunity. Going to the Maldives provided the opportunity. Since Emirates is a 1:1 transfer partner with Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards this allowed me to use those points for Emirates business travel. I had 2 legs I needed to account for on the return from the Maldives. MLE to DXB and then DXB to the United States. Dubai to the United States in Business class was going to be the most expensive and in-demand flight to find award availability.
I did some searching keeping in mind where they are flying the A380 and found DXB to JFK to have the most award availability. For two people would be 200k Emirates Sky Miles. I had the 200K points from my Chase Ultimate Points and made the transfer to Emirates. The transfer from Chase took 24 hours to complete and I received an email from Chase notifying me that the transfer was successful. I then logged into my Emirates Skymiles account and verified the miles and booked the Dubai to JFK in business class. This flight would cost $7500 for two giving me a .37 center per mile redemption. Not as great as AA, but still pretty good.
I then looked for availability for the flight from the Maldives to Dubai. There were 2 flights with business class availability for 54K Skymiles for 2 people or 105K Skymiles for two people in First Class. Cashing in the miles for first was very tempting, but I determined the 4 hours flight time was not worth the additional 50K points and remained in business class. I transferred 54K points from my American Express Membership Rewards account to Emirates. American Express to Emirates transfer took less than 10 minutes to show up in my account. The cash price for this is $3700 for 2 people. This gave me a redemption of over .06 cents per mile which is back in the great category.
Now for where to stay in Dubai. There are so many options in Dubai and hotel costs are relatively inexpensive there. Being a Hilton Diamond member. I determined I would stand the best chance at upgrades and added benefits if I chose a Hilton Brand. I still had some points remaining after the Maldives redemption, but not enough to make a huge difference. I wanted luxury and still have the option for the ocean. Part of me wanted to throw all sensibility to the wind and book the Burj Al Arab, but I just couldn't justify the cost. I went with the Waldorf Astoria Palm Jumeirah. I know not much of a sacrifice. I booked a King Delux Room with Palm Sea View for $358 a night. I cashed in an additional 100K Hilton Honors points to offset the room cost by a little over $300. Being a Diamond member I will receive free breakfast and $50 a day for food or hotel services during my stay.
This trip would have cost over $40k to happen, but using points and miles and having some flexibility I will be doing it for a mere fraction of that. Let's work together and book your dream vacation. Let's Points Travel can make it happen.