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| Sedona, Arizona |
By around February or March every year I start to get very tired of winter in Michigan. I am always looking at flight prices from the mid-west to anywhere warm. I always have a stock pile of miles on various credit cards too, in case I need a last minute get away! One of my favorites airlines for points is Southwest. Right now there is a 50,000 mile bonus if you sign up for a Chase credit card.
During one of my flight searches I stumbled upon a round trip, nonstop flight from Chicago Midway to Phoenix, Arizona for 12,356 miles. Yup, you read that right. Since I had signed up for the Southwest Chase credit card previously, I had 50,000 Rapid Reward miles already banked in my Southwest account - so I immediately grabbed 4 tickets. For $44.80 ($11.20 fee per ticket), I had 4 flights to Phoenix, leaving - the next day! Ya - sometimes you have to be spontaneous!
My kids got home from school and I told them to pack their bags, because we were going on a mystery trip!
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| Me and my boys upon arriving at our resort! |
After booking the flights (and making sure my hubby was OK with me and the kids leaving town), I started my lodging search. I started by looking at the Hilton, Marriott, SPG/Westin and IHG/Holiday Inn websites, to see if there were any good point deals. I made sure to choose "flexible dates" when I searched, to see what days were the lowest points (and possibly stay at 2 different places, depending on points needed). I lastly tried hotwire, to see if there were any places that were just plain dirt cheap. I always use the website Hotwire Revealed, when looking for lodging on hotwire, to determine what hotel I would end up with if I had booked through hotwire.
Through my searching I found the Point Hilton Squaw Peak Resort for 24,900 Hilton Honors points per night. I loved the resort because it had mountain views and several pools, including one with a lazy river, water slide and waterfall, along with a kitchen, including a full sized refrigerator and microwave. I had enough Hilton Honor points already banked, so I booked the resort with points and $0 in fees! (Hilton often times has 75,000 bonus point credit card offers and sometimes even as much as 100,000 bonus point offers). Because I try to stay at Hilton's whenever I can, we are Gold Members at Hilton, so upon arrival at the resort we were upgraded to a 2 room suite, with a beautiful, large balcony overlooking the mountains and within a short walk to the Hole-in-the-Wall River Ranch. Another great perk that we got to use!
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| Hole-in-the-Wall River Ranch at our Resort |
My last step was to find a car to rent. I generally find the best rental car prices right on the rental car websites (Avis, Hertz, Budget, National, etc). I was able to find a mid-sized car for around $100 for the length of our stay.
After we arrived at the resort, I found a grocery store and planned out meals and snacks for our stay, to try to keep spending down.
We did splurge on a few activities while in Arizona, including a day trip to Sedona to do some hiking and a horse back ride through the desert. Both absolutely amazing along with a great inexpensive get-away that was a much needed break from the blizzard that was going on in Michigan!
