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To me, one of the most fun parts of planning a nice trip is researching really awesome First Class cabins and nice resorts that we can fly on/stay in for cheap or free.
Before planning our honeymoon, I strategically signed up for 2x Chase cards a few months prior to booking that yielded me 100,000 bonus points so, those points (combined with the other points we had been patiently earning and hoarding over the last few years) came out to just enough for two round-trip tickets in First Class using United MileagePlus miles. The total points we used to book were 280,000 miles, 140k each. As a side note, United has massively devalued their currency and now the same trip would cost [...]
We’d been stockpiling United miles for months and had finally saved enough for 2x round-trip tickets in first class, a cost of 140k miles each. After some painstaking (but exciting) mapping, routing and time on the phone with United award booking representatives, our itinerary ended up looking like this:
By using United award miles, we were able to take advantage of their routing rules to have 1 free stopover, 1 free open-jaw and 2 long connections that allowed us enough time to explore the city (aka 2 more free stopovers). It looked like this:
Depart New York-JFK on Lufthansa to Frankfurt-FRA. We arrived in Frankfurt, Germany and had an appx 23 hours [...]Ok, so, admittedly, we looked forward to dinner all day long because it was a good excuse to get out of the freezing cold. We pulled up Urbanspoon and found that Le Hobbit Bistro was a good mix of everything we were looking for: good French food, a walkable location, a lively atmosphere, not too cheap and not super expensive. We made reservations but when we arrived we noticed that we probably didn’t need them.
We walked from our hotel to the restaurant. While very walkable, it was outside of the walled city and a decent ways up Saint-Jean. Although Urbanspoon qualifies it as “late night,” we noticed that it was only open until 10pm on the [...]
Basilica Cistern – Yerebatan Sarayı – “Sunken Palace”, or Yerebatan Sarnıcı – “Sunken Cistern” Address: Very close to the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque in the old city of Istanbul. Alemdar Mh., Şeftali Sk No: 6, Fatih, Turkey Price: 10 TL (~$4.50 USD) – a bargain, totally worth the admission price. Hours: Daily. April-October: 9am – 6:30pm; November-March: 9am – 5:30pm
After touring the Hagia Sophia (click for post) with the other 6 billion people that morning, we headed just across the way to the Basilica Cistern. When we saw the crowds there, too, we were so over crowds and ready to walk around the city that [...]
Nantes was our second stop on our trip to France and also the reason we were there in the first place: Jeffrey’s little sister was studying there for the semester. After spending a few days in Bordeaux (see our walking tour of Bordeaux here), we took the SNCF INTERCITÉS train up to Nantes to spend a few days exploring the city and visiting his sister.
Nantes is the region of Brittany’s largest town and another large port, with a population of half a million people. Nantes, though, felt way different than southern Bordeaux. In Bordeaux, it had been sunny and warm. Our entire stay in Nantes was filled with rainy days and the damp cold that comes with it. Maybe we [...]
Price: 25 TL (~$11.50 USD). It is also an included attraction with the “Museum Pass İstanbul” (cost of 85 TL). Hours: Closed on Mondays! Open from 9am – 7pm during summer season and 9am to 5pm in the winter.
Our very first stop in Istanbul (after eating extra-tasty Turkish food, of course) was the Hagia Sophia, a prime example of Byzantine architecture. After sleeping off jet lag, we headed to the museum/church/mosque first thing in the morning. Luckily, the line wasn’t too long because it was early, but I’d suggest planning to spend a little while in line.
The Hagia Sophia is right in [...]
308 S Hunter St, Aspen, CO Lunch, Dinner $
While staying in Snowmass, CO, we caught the free shuttle bus from the “downtown” area of Snowmass to Aspen one evening. More about the free shuttle at the end of this post.
Because our stay in Aspen was very short – only a couple of hours – and it was a freezing cold January night, we decided to do some quick research and pick a restaurant near the shuttle bus stop and one with some atmosphere. After a search on Urban Spoon, we headed just down the road to La Palapa, advertised as an authentic Mexican food joint.
Because we’re from SC, we wanted to try some Mexican food in [...]
Our journey started off in Charleston-CHS on a small United Airlines commuter flight to Washington-IAD. We couldn’t have been more thrilled that the seat-back magazine, Hemispheres, featured article that was titled, “Three Perfect Days in Istanbul”–off to a good start!
…it must be a sign
We made it to Dulles from our connecting flight with about 3 hrs to kill before takeoff. I had a few United Club passes that I wanted to use before they expired, but we wanted to stay in Terminal B. Unfortunately, you’re out of luck when it comes to United Clubs in Terminal B.
