Diplomat Resort

Westin Diplomat Leaving Starwood Preferred Guest October 30, 2014

August 30, 2014By Edward Pizzarello4 Comments

Effective October 30, 2014, Starwood will no longer be affiliated with the Westin Diplomat in Hollywood, FL. I was majorly bummed when I read this news on One Mile at a Time. I had read about the sale of the property recently but didn’t internalize that a change like this could come so quickly. This property was always phenomenal about upgrading Starwood Platinum members to beautiful wrap-around suites in the oceanfront tower. They had tons of them (96, iirc), so upgrades were frequent. They had a VIP manager who made […]

Earn An Extra 10,000 Points When Aeroplan Launches Their US Credit Card

As Air Canada prepares to launch their new US-based credit card there’s a great opportunity to snag 10,000 extra Aeroplan points. Aeroplan, the loyalty program of Air Canada, is a program that most US residents should be aware of and many will benefit from it. Air Canada has had a lot going on over the past year. In the midst of planning a new loyalty program, they went back to a familiar name and acquired Aeroplan. Aeroplan was Air Canada’s loyalty program for decades, being sold off as a separate […]

A Weird Morning With Delta Stresses The Need For Communication

In one sense, you could chalk yesterday up to just another day as a road warrior. Travel has it’s fair share of bumps and bruises, especially when flights are as full as they are right now. As a business traveler, I’m used to things going wrong on the road. I plan my trips to avoid as much of it as I can, opting out of afternoon flights in the summertime through popular thunderstorm spots like DFW. To my knowledge, yesterday had nothing to do with COVID and plenty to do […]

A Week In Maine In A Stinking RV!

In case you haven’t been keeping up on our extended summer vacation, here’s a list of previous articles I’ve written over the past couple weeks as we’ve meandered around the Northeast in our RV: 9 Hours of Driving Gilmore The Merrier One of The Greatest Roller Coasters I’ve Ever Ridden Moving Our “House On Wheels” To New Hampshire Mount Washington Auto Road Cog Railway To The Peak of Mount Washington Hiking, Time With Friends, And A Broken RV(Of Course) Rolling To Maine For Some Lobster A Shopping Day In Freeport […]

The RV Day From Hell

I kinda missed a day 10 update. With the lack of quality sleep in a trailer and the myriad issues with the RV, suffice it to say my production has dropped a bit. 🙂 If you want to see previous updates on our trip, links below: 9 Hours of Driving Gilmore The Merrier One of The Greatest Roller Coasters I’ve Ever Ridden Moving Our “House On Wheels” To New Hampshire Mount Washington Auto Road Cog Railway To The Peak of Mount Washington Hiking, Time With Friends, And A Broken RV(Of […]

Summer Vacation Day 9: A Shopping Day In Freeport And My Pathetic Attempt At RV Repair

A quieter day and a quick recap. Here’s a look back at the rest of our trip: 9 Hours of Driving Gilmore The Merrier One of The Greatest Roller Coasters I’ve Ever Ridden Moving Our “House On Wheels” To New Hampshire Mount Washington Auto Road Cog Railway To The Peak of Mount Washington Hiking, Time With Friends, And A Broken RV(Of Course) Rolling To Maine For Some Lobster We continued our trend of meeting up with friends along the RV route. One of our daughter’s high school classmates ended up […]

I Flew Frontier, Saved $400 And Didn’t Die. My Frontier Airlines Review

Those low-cost carriers always have very appetizing fare sales. Who wouldn’t want to pay $20 to fly somewhere? But, what does $20 really buy you? I found out exactly what Frontier does (and doesn’t) offer customers on my first flight with them recently.

How To Use New Metro Silver Line To Get Between Dulles and Reagan National Airports

People talk about how bad the traffic is in places like Los Angeles with plenty of adjectives. And, it is quite bad. But, the traffic in DC is what I refer to as “stealthy bad”. It doesn’t get the same press that LA traffic does, but a trip that normally takes an hour can easily turn into a 3-hour ordeal. With visiting dignitaries, protests and construction as variables, weather can also wreak havoc on a system that consistently backs up during rush hour. For those of us that live in […]

Update: American Airlines Variable Choice Plus Pricing A Feature, Not A Bug

I have to admit, I was pretty pleased with the original announcement that American Airlines was creating bundled pricing that included change fees at a lower apparent cost. Things got a little better when American also announced they were expanding the timeframe you could request a same day change to your flight. And, then things started to get a bit screwy. It started with just one flight I couldn’t get to price right with Choice Plus as an add-on. But, then I did a bit more digging and found out […]

A Summary Of United Airlines Global Services Benefits

As travel has gotten more stressful the benefits of elite status are even more valuable. In some cases, what used to be free for everyone is now only free for those customers that fly most frequently. I value my American Airlines Executive Platinum status more highly than any status I’ve earned, including 1K service with United Airlines. However, Global Services is another matter. For those not aware, Global Services is an invitation-only status level that United bestows on their best customers. What defines a best customer? Well, United doesn’t list […]

Is Foursquare Dead?

Venture Beat doesn’t think so, and I’m not 100% sure they’re wrong. But, before I discuss the article, a little background on why someone allergic to social media like me became a Foursquare nut. A few years ago, a company called TopGuest came up with this concept where you could earn airline miles and hotel points for checking in at various places on Foursquare. I can’t say I thought it was a terribly good business model, but they convinced a bunch of hotel chains to hand out miles for this. […]