On the other hand, the 25,000 mile standard means that you should be able to get a domestic cross country roundtrip in coach for 25,000 miles. That’s still worth something, even if you can go cross country for $300 round trip routinely now. When a mainstream airline deviates from that, then airline miles programs have jumped the shark.
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That’s the line they don’t seem to want to cross. Although they’ve done a stealth devaluation by restricting availability.
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Next year, Marriott rewards will have peak and off-peak rates (similar to surge pricing). I guess it’s time to seriously consider AirBnB.
Great news if you have Marriott/Starwood points and prefer Off-peak travel times (decrease). I think we may have yet to determine if they’re changing their Off-peak schedule though.
I like how they try to sell their adjusted pricing as “good news” though.
Recently, I booked a Courtyard (category 5) for 25K points/night during Christmas time. If I had waited until August, it would cost 35K points/night. Next year, the same hotel will be a category 4 but require 30K points/night. Also, Marriott’s website used to let you pay for a stay in points and the remaining nights in dollars but now you have to call them.
I’m going to put on a mask and say, this is really not the golden age of travel.
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It sort of is the golden age if you have immunity or don’t give a fuck about getting Covid. Wide open business and first awards, even on unicorn routes. Sub $3000 business class tickets for virtually every city pair, sometimes substantially so. Generous elite status rules.
Low hotel rates. Significantly lower elite qualifying levels, especially Hyatt.
Hopefully we can take advantage of some of this as the world adapts to post-Covid slowly. Too bad I’m not in an early group for vaccinations. I have been doing some speculative bookings toward the end of schedule. With change/redeposit fees waived, there’s little penalty in doing so, and multiple rounds of schedule changes will likely allow easy improvement of routing without regard to award availability.
Yeah, kind of hard when a US passport isn’t accepted anywhere except Brazil.
I haven’t looked at real hotel rates in a few years, but I was pretty surprised that a Holiday Inn Express in a college town could get get $100/night. With the college being “remote only”, I figured they couldn’t give rooms away. Maybe that is a discount from their pre-covid rates, but it seemed like that would have been their in-season (highest) rate instead of a discounted one.
OTOH, maybe I’m just getting old … payphones should still cost a nickel … and six bits for a fast shine. 
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Hotels aren’t lowering prices much because it might invite the local youths to rent room to throw parties. Better to keep them empty than drop to $20 a night and have a dozen teens trash a room.
If you can and talk to manager you might get a better deal when they see you’re an adult and professional.
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I don’t give a fuck about getting covid, but I do give a fuck about sitting on an airplane for 5 hours in a mask and not being able to do anything when I land because the dirt I travel to has everything closed.
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In my limited amount of travel, the “gas station breakfast included with all rooms” motels frequently have higher rates than mid-range hotels. That’s why I place a fair cash value on status that gives breakfast benefits.
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Because we all know it’s the most important meal of the day. 
I wonder if now will be the The Golden Age of Reward Travel redemption avail. As My wife and I are going to be vaccinated soon, I’m looking for redemption deals. Have over 600K in AA miles I haven’t been able to redeem over the years.
No vaccine is 100% effective and it takes time to build up immunity after a vaccination, typically at least a few weeks. Immunity can also wane over time, so protective measures should continue to be taken.
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I understand that and will continue to follow all precautions, just feel better about traveling with some protection.
Also, we’re in the sweet spot as relatively healthy, young, health care providers (who have not traveled in almost a year) I bet the hordes will resume over this summer if Xmas/new years was any indication. We didn’t since we were so close to being vaccinated and didn’t want to add to the surge.
I wonder how AA award avail. is. FT might be a better forum for the q
As far as I’m concerned, until April 30 (at least) it will have been the Golden Age of Reward Redemption for FOOD!
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Crap you’re reminding me I think i let my redemption period expire on cashing out some chase purchases 
LOL. Gotta be on top of it like a hawk. CSR and Venture.