Online Travel Review

The past few years have seen sky-high summer airfares to Europe, as airlines have removed capacity from TransAtlantic routes. For most of the 2000s, East Coast fares to Europe during the summer hovered in the $800-$900 range. Last summer, we were looking at $1400 consistently. This was especially ridiculous considering most airlines were offering ~$2000 business class fares during the summer.

This summer looks to be similar. If you were hoping for a summer airfare sale, don’t hold your breath.

Well, that’s not exactly true. SAS is promoting a Summer Sale to Oslo and Copenhagen. The fares? A mere $1100 round trip. Quite a sale.

It was discussed widely a month ago, but I thought I’d just add a reminder that the free Hilton Hhonors Gold promo through Visa is still live. If you haven’t yet gotten your free Gold status through May 2013 (free Internet and breakfast), here’s how:

- Visit this page
- Change your HHonors account to have an Australian address (easy enough to Google an Australian address to put in there)
- Enter 442394 as the first 6 digits of your Visa Infinite Card
- Fill out the rest of the brief form
- Enjoy your Gold status
- Change your address back

(Thanks to Milepoint for the friendly reminder that this is still live)

You were likely not wondering what compensation the cruise company was going to offer the poor folks who were on that Costa Cruise that went down in Italy (unless you were me, in case you were very much wondering that). If you’re a nutcase like me, I have the answer for you:

- They will refund the full price of the cruise.
- They will reimburse travel both to AND from Italy.
- Any charges made onboard will be refunded.
- They’ll pay for any medical expenses.
- They are searching for stuff left in the safe in the cabins and are trying to return those. If they are not found, they are making arrangements for compensation.

Apparently some media outlets were reporting they were only offering a 30% coupon off a future cruise. Those reports were untrue.

(Thanks, Travelweekly!)

Is this whole credit card thing overwhelming to you? Are you starting to feel like you’ll never earn enough miles to take that dream trip? I get it – it used to be overwhelming to me too (everyone starts off confused when it comes to credit cards).

I’ve got some good news for you: I can help, and it won’t cost you a dime.

Here’s how it works: fill out the form below and tell me what trip you’re hoping to take. A week in Hawaii? That long put-off trip to Paris? Wherever you’ve dreamed about. I’ll work with you to create a Custom Credit Card Plan to help you get those miles by opening credit cards.

The cost? Free. Yes, free. Just as a travel agent earns commissions for booking your travel, I earn commissions from some credit card companies. I’ll fully disclose where I’m earning a commission – but let’s be honest, I’ve been doing this for 8 years. I’m not going to jeopardize the reputation that’s earned me a place in the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, CBS News and other media outlets.

The only caveats: you should have a credit score above 725 and should not be planning to buy a home in the next 18-24 months. Your credit is too important to risk a slight drop before you’re making a big purchase.

If you do have good credit, though, we can create a credit card plan that’ll get you that dream trip for free. We’ll tell you what cards to open, how much spend you’ll need, what cards to open next, and when you’ll have enough miles for that trip. Just fill out the form here, and we’ll have you on that plane in no time.

I know it’s not travel, but it is a good use of Membership Rewards so I thought I’d post: You can get a $25 Gap gift card for only 1,250 Membership Rewards points. You can buy multiple cards at a time, but only $25 cards are half-off.

Theoretically, you could buy $2500 worth of Gap gift cards for 125,000 Membership Rewards points, then turn that into $2,178 via PlasticJungle.com. YMMV on that.