How We Honeymooned on Points & Miles
Salobre Hotel Resort & Serenity, Gran Canaria, Spain
We were able to have over a $25,000 honeymoon for less than $2,000 in cash and everything else in points & miles.
There are so many ways to honeymoon, but we really wanted to prioritize food, wine, and a bit of luxury. Once we decided on Spain and France, I knew we needed to earn a majority of Chase and AMEX points. The Chase points would allow us to book some incredible Hyatt hotels in Paris and allow us to fly home on United Polaris Business class. The AMEX points would allow us access to some boutique and unique hotels that aren’t part of the major hotel brands. I really wanted to visit specific restaurants and spas, which were at some of these fairly exclusive hotels. But thanks to AMEX’s Fine Hotels and Resorts program, we were able to book them without having to spend a dime. This is a feature of their portal that allows you the option to pay with your AMEX points instead of cash, and it one of my favorite features. Aside from giving you access to some of the best hotels in the world, it also includes free breakfast for two, complimentary room upgrade, and a $100 credit to be used at the hotel. You also get a annual $200 FHR credit with the AMEX Platinum card. For example, I booked two nights a boutique hotel that was $450 a night. At checkout in the portal, I put 70,000 AMEX points toward the cost, which brought it down to $200. I then charged my Platinum card that remaining balance, which was then credited back to my on my card thanks to the FHR credit.
I break down each stop of our honeymoon in detail in my other blogs (Canary Islands, Madrid, San Sebastian, and Paris), but we really did take a $25,000 honeymoon. We ended up paying about $500 in taxes and fees on our flights, $1500 on a few hotel nights, and certainly some $$$ on food and drinks, but everything else was completely paid for with points and miles.
The cards we utilized to get us our points and get us our luxury honeymoon:
AMEX Platinum: Highly recommend for access to the high sign up bonus and access to the Platinum portal and the FHR, as well as numneroud other travel benefits.
Chase Sapphire Preferred: Great sign up bonus easily used for booking Hyatt hotels and United flights.
Citi Premier: Transfer to Flying Blue Air France that gives you access to Star Alliance.
Cobranded Hotel Cards (World of Hyatt, Marriott): Perfect for getting points needed specifically for hotel stays.
Abadia Retuerta Le Domaine Hotel, Spa, & Winery, Valladolid, Spain
During our engagement, we also used some of these points to take a trip to Greece. Check out my detailed post of how we did Greece including my itinerary of the trip, here.