I was all ready to tell you about how I tackled Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventures: a roller coaster I was terrified to ride. It seemed simple at first. Wait on line for four hours or maybe seven hour or even 10 hours. Do that in the sun, the rain and the humidity, indoors and out, with little to eat beyond one meh hot dog. Yesterday I stuck it out in line for 11 hours at Universal Orlando....
Sign up for our daily newsletterEmail addressSign upI would like to subscribe to The Points Guy newsletters and special email promotions. The Points Guy will not share or sell your email. See privacy policy.For a brief window of time in April, US passengers arriving at Japan’s Narita (NRT) airport may not have to be re-screened to catch their connections, according to Aviation Wire Japan.Select travelers from the US who arrive at Narita between April 3 and April 12 will not be required to pass through security at the airport in order to board their connecting flights....
Travel warnings and a surge in coronavirus cases proved no match for pandemic-weary Americans fatigued of lockdowns and quarantines.The number of travelers at U.S. airports hit pandemic-era highs around Thanksgiving as passengers took to the skies despite pleas from the Centers for Disease Control and other U.S. leaders to limit holiday gatherings.Nearly 1.18 million people were screened Sunday at Transportation Security Administration checkpoints, the highest total since travel cratered in March at the outset of the pandemic....
KiwiRail’s Great Journeys of New Zealand, a train operator known to transport tourists through some of the country’s most scenic locations, stated in April that it would be nixing all outdoor viewing carriages due to passengers’ safety concerns.CNN reports that this is specifically tied to some dangerous “near misses” caused by overzealous selfie-takers.“A review carried out over recent months revealed an increasing number of passengers putting themselves and others in danger by leaning out of the carriage to take photographs,” Katie McMahon, KiwiRail’s “Director of Zero Harm,” told CNN in a statement....
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Every few months, Hilton runs a buy miles promotion, offering up to 100% bonus points when buying Hilton points. While the standard rate for buying Hilton points is 1.0 cents per point – significantly more than TPG’s valuation of 0.6 cents per point – offers like these allow members to stock up on Hilton points for just 0....
Southwest is a favorite of travelers who are tired of being inundated with fees. It has a history of zigging when every other airline is zagging and has maintained a policy of two free checked bags per passenger and no cancellation/change fees. Meanwhile, other airlines are charging over $30 each way to check a bag on domestic flights and have change fees that can top $200 per ticket.Even in the middle of this global pandemic Southwest continues to go a step further and not charge for price increases on flight changes....
Consider this your reminder to book those flights you’ve been eying for your summer trips.It’s the first Tuesday in June – the day that, according to metasearch site Hipmunk, is the most popular day of the year to book summer air travel.It is also one of the cheapest, too.According to Hipmunk’s analysis, more than a third of flights are 15% cheaper on the first Tuesday in June than the median booking price for summer travel as a whole....
Sign up for our daily newsletterEmail addressSign upI would like to subscribe to The Points Guy newsletters and special email promotions. The Points Guy will not share or sell your email. See privacy policy.Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Back in January, we kicked off the year by highlighting some of our readers’ travel goals for 2018, with the intention of keeping tabs on their progress....
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.American Express has rolled out a targeted promotion allowing select cardholders to earn up to 30% in bonus miles. The promotion allows those targeted with this offer to transfer American Express Membership Rewards points to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles and receive bonus miles. Not every cardholder is targeted for this offer and bonus mileage varies.The minimum bonus is 10% additional miles earned....
Update June 2: Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club is back up and running. After more than a week of the site’s functionality being down, members can now log in to their account once again.As promised by Virgin Atlantic, there appear to be no changes to accounts. Members are seeing their status and miles appear untouched.Original story, published on 28 May:Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club website has been down since May 24. For members looking to redeem Flying Club miles on award bookings, it’s been impossible....
Sometimes a hotel is just a place to lay your head at night between adventures and sometimes the hotel resort is the destination all by itself. When you are looking to piece together a fun-filled family vacation fueled by points it can be very handy when the resort you are staying at has an amazing water complex that can keep everyone busy and happy for hours, if not days, especially since you typically don’t have to pay to play in the water as a hotel guest....
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Here at TPG we find that it’s helpful to share reader mistake stories. From arriving too early, to arriving too late, to letting valuable perks expire without being used, we’ve all made our fair share of unforced errors that have cost us time or money instead of making our lives easier. We hope that by sharing these stories, we can all learn a little something and prevent others from making these same mistakes in the future....
The best way to end the year in a fabulous locale is by doing it for free — save the spending for the parties and cash in those points and miles you’ve been holding on to all year. Here’s a nifty round-the-world tour of some of 2016’s hottest New Year’s Eve destinations with a few tricks and tips to keep you living large on the last day of the year.1. Paris, FranceLa Réveillon de la Saint Sylvestre, or New Year’s Eve, is one of the City of Light’s largest celebrations of the year, on par with Bastille Day....
On March 13, the Federal Aviation Administration grounded all Boeing 737 MAX aircraft in US airspace. That included 72 aircraft operated by three US airlines: Southwest, American Airlines and United. Combined, those 72 aircraft were scheduled to fly over 350,000 seats per week, leaving a noticeable gap in airline schedules.Now two weeks into the grounding with no firm end in sight, Southwest has ferried its 34 Boeing 737 MAX into the desert for storage....
There’s still no timeline for when Boeing’s troubled 737 MAX might be cleared to resume flying. But, whenever that occurs, airlines that fly the plane may have a challenge in allaying travelers’ concerns about the aircraft’s safety.In the US, three airlines — American, Southwest and United — currently have 737 MAX jets in their fleets.This week, the CEOs of two of those airlines have made some of their most direct comments yet about what they’ll have to do to win over customers when MAX flights begin again....
The top story on TPG yesterday was, overwhelmingly, the announcement that American AAdvantage would leave a surprise gift in member accounts on Wednesday morning.It was the frequent flyer equivalent of waiting for Christmas.I was so intrigued, I left the American Airlines homepage up on my desktop so I’d see it first thing this morning, and bounded down the stairs too immediately check my account and my immediate family’s accounts – not unlike peeking into stockings that were hung by the chimney with care....
Boeing has completed the development of a software update for its imperiled 737 MAX jets, the plane manufacturer said in a release Thursday afternoon.Updating the 737 MAX’s software is a key step to the controversial plane returning to the skies following two deadly crashes.The software in question controls the MAX’s Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), which automatically pushes down the aircraft nose if it senses it is tipping too high, risking an aerodynamic stall....
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Want to see the latest flight deals as soon as they’re published? Follow The Points Guy on Facebook and Twitter, and subscribe to text message alerts from our deals feed, @tpg_alerts.Airfare deals are typically only available on limited dates. We recommend that you use Google Flights to find dates to fly, then book through an online travel agency, such as Orbitz or Expedia, which allows you to cancel flights without penalty by 11pm Eastern Time within one day of booking....
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.Want to see the latest flight deals as soon as they’re published? Follow The Points Guy on Facebook and Twitter, and subscribe to text message alerts from our deals feed, @tpg_alerts.Airfare deals are typically only available on limited dates. We recommend that you use Google Flights to find dates to fly, then book through an online travel agency, such as Orbitz, which allows you to cancel flights without penalty by 11pm Eastern Time within one day of booking....
Delta passengers on a flight from Beijing (PEK) to Seattle (SEA) had a wrench thrown into their Christmas Eve travel when a suspected mechanical problem forced their plane off course on Monday.Delta flight DL128 made an unexpected stop on the remote island of Shemya in the Aleutian Islands on Christmas Eve. The diversion was caused by what is being reported as “potential engine issue.“Some on Twitter were quick to note it’s not the best place in the world to have to divert:Others had more global concerns:Delta Air Lines quickly — well as could be expected for such a remote location — dispatched another plane to the remote island to retrieve its stranded passengers....
