Traveling budget trips & Timeshare Tour info

[chris1gill]

Well, we are back!!! This trip was to Maui, but all of the budget tips we learned can be used for Orlando!!!

First, we took advantage of discounted activities for doing one timeshare tour... we chose to do the tour at the Embassy Suites... They were VERY low key & they knew that we would not buy that day, even if we decided to buy... The guy we had just moved to Maui a few months ago & prior to this, he worked at the Embassy Vacation Club in Lake Buena Vista, so I would take this to mean the Embassy Vacation Club in Lake Buena Vista would be low key as well... If you are doing a tour, I'd highly recommend the Embassy... there was no pressure...

Second, we took our George Foreman grill as had been recommended here on the boards before... I've got to say it worked out GREAT!! We brought an extension cord with us & used the grill on our Lanai, otherwise I'd use it in the bathroom... The chicken & hot dogs were just GREAT... We grilled bread for toast (we had no toaster, only a mini-fridge & coffee maker)... we also grilled potatoes, those were REALLY excellent... There were plenty of other things we could have grilled, but DH did the shopping, and he's not too creative LOL... We also made our own salads & that worked out great.... We saved so much money on food... we did cereal & milk in the room, along with our own coffee... We went out for one breakfast & dropped 50.00, the food wasn't even that good!! Then we ate out one dinner & after a 35% discount dropped 57.00... The food there was even worse!! The best place we found was on our last day at lunch... we only dropped 25.00 & the food was awesome... too bad we hadn't found that place first!!! Those were about the only meals we ate out over the 6 days & thank god, we'd have been broke otherwise!!! Eating breakfasts & dinners in saves us so much money, we always do it at WDW & I'm glad we continued that for this trip....

We stayed free at the Sheraton 5 of our 6 nights, I'm a Starwood Preferred member & we have their AMEX card... for every dollar spent we get a starwood point... it took 40,000 points, but we charge EVERYTHING... and I do mean everything,including my MIL's new car LOL... That was half the points right there!!!

We had also watched airfares forever & got a rate of 310.00 per person from Boston... What I do, is subscribe to the Bestfares.com email & when they come out with these killer airfare prices, I check Travelocity & see what it shows.... A lot of the time Bestfares discounts slightly whatever prices you find on Travelocity or the SWA website... They take a lot of their sale prices straight from SWA... They do discount some fares, but I've never found their discount to be good enough for us to join & keep the membership, I joined once, but found what I already said earlier to be the case with their discounts...

Maui was great & for anyone who wants a more detailed description of the trip itself, just ask!! Thanks to everyone here for the info on the Grill & eating in.... usually we have a full kitchen, so it's never a problem eating in, but this time was obviously a little more work!!

Oh, I almost forgot, when we did the timeshare tour of the Embassy, the suites themselves do not offer a stove or oven, so the sales agent told me they offered crock pots & electric fry pans on request... I just thought that was odd!!

 

[travelbug]

I'm glad you had a wonderful time. You had some good budget tips to share too. We
are going over to the Big Island in 4 weeks, and are VERY jealous of the $310 airfare you found. That is a fantastic rate!

Just a question about what you mentioned regarding Best Fares.com

Do you mean that it is possible to subscribe to BestFares e-mail without actually paying for a Best Fares membership? I've also hesitated to pay to join Best Fares, because I'm not sure if it would ultimately be worth the money. But if they have free information by way of e-mail, I'd love that! (Don't you just LOVE that word "free"? )

Thanks for any info you can give!

 

[travelbug]

I'm glad you had a wonderful time. You had some good budget tips to share too. We
are going over to the Big Island in 4 weeks, and are VERY jealous of the $310 airfare you found. That is a fantastic rate!

Just a question about what you mentioned regarding Best Fares.com

Do you mean that it is possible to subscribe to BestFares e-mail without actually paying for a Best Fares membership? I've also hesitated to pay to join Best Fares, because I'm not sure if it would ultimately be worth the money. But if they have free information by way of e-mail, I'd love that! (Don't you just LOVE that word "free"? )

Thanks for any info you can give!

 

[chris1gill]

Hi Travelbug!
We're DVC'ers too, where are you staying on points?

If you go to www.bestfares.com there is a place to the right of the "feature story" where you enter in your email address & zip code... This is the only way I knew that the airfares were on sale... I think Bestfares listed Hawaii at 340.00, I went to Travelocity, it was also 340, then I went to the airlines website itself where it was listed at 310.00!!! Can you believe that??? But like I said, if you see an airfare in the continental US, then also try the SWA website.... Having said all that, they claim that currently they have fares to Hawaii from the East Coast at 550.00 where all the airlines are going for about 900.00, so if indeed they do have that fare, it would be worth it... Oh I forgot to mention our 310 rate was from the North East!!

Another thing I learned quickly about Hawaii & the islands, you can take an Aloha Airlines flight from one island to another for about 57.00, so if you can't get a good deal to one island, try another one...

Hope this helps, have fun!!

 

[travelbug]

Thanks for the info, chris1gill! It is very helpful. I think I'll have to watch bestfares.com a little closer, even though I don't think I'll subscribe just yet.

We are staying at the Mauna Lani Bay, which is part of the Concierge Collection. They had a deal going where we got a free night (free as in NO POINTS) for every 4 that we were staying. So I'm using 7 nights worth of points, but we're staying for 8 nights.

We're getting pretty excited. Only 26 days to go!

 

[chris1gill]

All I can say Travelbug, is have a GOOD TIME!!! I know you will, it's beautiful over there!!! We're missing it already, but happy that we had the chance to go!

 

[SNOWBOARDER]

Way to go!!!!