How I Booked a $2,544 Trip for $136

My husband and I are nerds.

Not even, like, the cool hipster kind. Just straight up, run-of-the-mill, classic nerds.

So in planning a getaway for ourselves, we decided to be the weirdos who go to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter and Disney World by themselves. Two adults. Without children.

To be fair, this was mostly my idea and my sweet husband just lets me go and rolls with the punches. And rolls his eyes.

So, here's how we did it:

A last-minute flights from Boise to Orlando would have cost us $1441 in cash. But because we both have the Alaska Airlines credit card, we each had 25,000 miles sitting in our accounts from opening them at the beginning of the year. We booked some wonky times (like leaving at 5:20 in the morning) and were able to get one-way flights for 12,500 miles each. We did have to pay fees which totaled $36.20 for each of us. For two tickets, we paid a total of 50,000 miles and $72.40 in cash.

We will be staying at a Holiday Inn & Suites for four nights which would have cost us $540. Paul and I each have an IHG MasterCard, so we each booked two nights at 25,000 points per night for a total of 100,000 points. The initial bonus when we signed up for these cards was 70,000 points each, which is why we weren't able to book the whole trip on one card. There were no fees associated with this booking, so our out-of-pocket cost was $0.

My very favorite travel hack is to use a travel agent to book theme park tickets. Granted, this CAN be a tricky business as you're not ever guaranteed that a particular site will show up on your credit card as travel. This can vary from vendor to vendor. You can always ask, which is what I do, but they won't be held responsible if it doesn't land into a travel category on your card statement.

When I erased our Disneyland tickets and got them for free, I used Get Away Today. They are super great for doing a lot of West Coast activities like Disneyland and Legoland. However, when I called to inquire about Disney World and Universal Studios tickets, I was told that they don't book those directly but go through Disney and Funjet, respectively. I wasn't worried about the Funjet reservation as that would probably still show up as a travel agent, but I really wasn't sure about Disney. Additionally, I was told that the tickets wouldn't arrive until the day after we left (which was two weeks away) unless I paid a $15 express shipping fee and I would still have to take the tickets to will-call once we got then and then make our FastPass+ reservations once we were in the park on the day of our arrival. Lame.

So I went looking. I came across Undercover Tourist and saw that they offered a few benefits. First, they were a travel agent and I could confirm that the charge would be processed through them. Second, I could opt to have the tickets immediately via email, but I would still have to go to will-call upon arrival. The third benefit (and the best) is that all tickets are guaranteed to arrive in seven days. In addition, you can opt to have the tickets scanned and emailed to you as soon as they ship so that you can have all the info you need to pre-book your FastPass+ reservations. Sold.

The tickets to Universal Studios cost $322 and the one-day Magic Kingdom tickets cost $242 (those are both prices for the two of us) for a total of $564. Using the Capital One Venture, I could erase $500 of that charge, leaving a balance of $64.

TOTAL BEFORE POINTS: $2544 TOTAL AFTER POINTS: $136

Now, these numbers don't include things like transportation costs once we're there, food, and souvenirs/miscellaneous purchases.

However, we are planning on using Uber as much as we can. Since my husband and I both have two phones and we're never used Uber (because we're podunk), we should both be able to use a $15 first-time credit, which should mostly cover the to/from airport/hotel. We chose a hotel that's within walking distance to Universal Studios and has a free shuttle to Disney World. So the travel expenses should be extremely minimal.

We're not really ones for tchotchkes, and our favorite souvenirs and photos, so we're pretty good there.

I can't tell you how to save on food. I live for dining out while we travel; it's my favorite part. That, and not having to make my bed.

Happy travels!

#adventures #basics