Maybe I have too much time on my hands, OR maybe I wanted to see if I could do this. I imagine it’s a combination of both. My goal was to find enough miles to make my way all the way around the world. I think I made it work. I want to do it with as little in first year fees as possible and as little minimum spend required as I can. I also wanted to use only one card from each card issuer so I could earn it all in one fell swoop. Here’s my plan:
The USA to Europe between January 15th and February 28th involves a off peak roundtrip US Airways award at 35,000 miles in coach. The return portion of the ticket will probably go unused but we got the first leg done with no first year fee no minimum purchase and we have used a card issued by Barclays.
The next leg is with the United MileagePlus® Explorer from Chase and involves a one way Star Alliance award of 55,000 miles from Europe to Oceania (probably Tahiti in January or February. This particular link offers 50,000 miles on first use and 5K more for adding an authorized user within the first two months of having the card. BTW, No First Year Fee.
And our next leg and card applications from Oceania (probably Tahiti or Samoa) are on Hawaiian Airlines using a credit card issued by Bank of America and one issued by the Bank of Hawaii. We can use 27,500 miles to Hawaii and take a rest stop or go without the stopover back to the mainland for 47,500 miles. Each of the two cards mentioned above gives you 20,000 miles on first purchase and 15K more if you spend $1,000 on your card in the first 120 days. Each card also has a $79 annual fee, not waived. Once both of your Hawaiian Airlines credit cards are open, and you have met the minimum $1,000 spend on one of them then merge your points together in one Hawaiian miles account and you have enough miles for your Oceania to USA mainland leg.
Our Results:
We applied for:
Bank of America 35K $79 annual fee — $1,000 minimum spend
Bank of Hawaii 20K $79 annual fee
USA to Europe > Europe to Oceania >Oceania to Hawaii and Hawaii to Mainland USA.
Try your hand at it as well. See if you can make more stops, have less in annual fees, less restrictive travel dates or a smaller minimum spend.
See the World at Prices You Can Afford
