Last month I wrote about jetBlue’s True Blue program and the limited ways to extend the expiration date of the miles in your account. In the post I also mentioned how I decided to spend the bulk of my True Blue points towards a trip to New Orleans.

I was in New Orleans years back but didn’t get to see or do much. I flew through New Orleans to get to Mississippi. I was working on a story during my previous career working in television- news. My only experiences and memories of New Orleans were checking out Bourbon Street and eating some beignets at Cafe Du Monde. I’ve been wanting to go back for some time now and am looking forward to experiencing the city with Kim and Lucas.

Trip Planning:
The Flights:

• Southwest Airlines: New York- New Orleans, cost: 9,600 points + $10 tax (for 2)
• jetBlue: New Orleans- New York, cost: 21,800 points + $5 tax (for 2)

After booking our flights not much thought went into booking a hotel for New Orleans.
The trip isn’t until May and I am also in the process of finishing up plans on a trip we are going on at the end of March. (More on that another time.) That all changed late Tuesday night.

I was skimming over Twitter and came across a tweet by Ric Garrido of the Loyalty Traveler blog. The tweet mentioned a post: Priority Club Rewards Deep Discounts which got me interested. Kim and I both have Priority Club points so I was wondering if there was a deal that could help us save some money on one of our upcoming trips.

The post on Loyalty Traveler mentioned how “Priority Club is obviously adjusting their hotel award rates. There are hotels that were 35,000 and 40,000 points per award night available right now for 15,000 points”.

Here is what I booked.

The Hotel:

•  Astor Crowne Plaza– New Orleans French Quarter

I booked 5 nights with Kim’s Priority Club points. Each night was 15,000 points, 75,000 total.
A reward night usually goes for 35,000 points so this was a huge savings.
If we wanted to pay for our stay, each night would cost $208.85 + tax, $1190.00 total.

I felt this was a great use of Kim’s points, all which were earned from getting the Chase Priority Club card.

It’s a good thing that I was checking Twitter and came across the post by Loyalty Traveler.
I’m also glad that I acted quick and booked our stay. If I waited to make a decision, I would’ve missed out on a great deal. By 10:00 AM the following morning, a reward night at the Astor
Crowne Plaza was back up to 35,000 points per night.

Now all that’s left to do is figure out how to spend our time in New Orleans!