Parks With Points

Although I've flipped podcasts and changed my blog I've been pretty consistent with Google Maps contributions and.. Top 10% park reviews

Not a lot of points options for going to the top of the Arch. We parked in the $5 lot right next to the Old Spaghetti Factory and walked the whole park. It's all free BUT going to the top and that's a pre-buy. Get the tickets before you go as it sells out. I did a  Cash Offset to pay for the tickets. https://www.archpark.org/visit/webcams Links: https://www.nps.gov/jeff/index.htm https://www.gatewayarch.com

Summary: Another no cost trip, A quick in and out for me to get my first rides this year on the 54 inch rides. Type : #PWPDayTrip - 3/24/2021 Park: Six Flags St. Louis Costs: Park -- Season Pass w/Parking Flash Pass -- Season Pass Food -- Dining Pass only Hotel -- N/A Trip Report #LogeRideApp

Cashback Let me start by saying cash back is not usually the best use of points. That said, if you're challenging yourself, like me, to get the most out of your parks you going to end up need to fund a park season pass or an upgrade in the park. If you're new and don't have points built up save them for the airfare and hotels. That said, there are a few options that are better than others and I will try to update this as I find and use them. Offset Cashback This is more like using a reward credit to pay for something that you would have paid for anyway. Some cards call it 'wiping' and some call it 'pay yourself back' but it's all the same idea. Ticket cost $50 so you look for something to offset the $50. Quick example: Using Chase Ultimate Reward I found two qualifying items that have a 25% bonus so that would be about the same as using them for travel. In this case the ticket was 50 and a food upgrade was about the two charges her so I offset the cost o

We spent 2 days at Six Flags St Louis on our opening weekend trip. The SFSL trips are always a bit repetitive but that shows how good of a deal the 'home park' plan is. Summary Type: Extended Weekend  Park(s): Six Flags St Louis Cost Park -- Season pass  Parking -- included with pass                    FlassPass addon for Saturday --  4,344 PTS to offset  the Flashpass  Food -- dining pass only Hotel -- Hilton Hampton Inn --  16,000 Hilton Points (great deal) Transportation -- gas only

When is your home parks opening weekend?  For us is next weekend. When it comes to #ParksWithPoints and trip planning it a bit cookie cutter but I like to document them just the same. Cost We have Season Passes and the Food plan so the only costs will only be gas and maybe a food upgrade Hotel We always stay at the Hilton one exit up. This trip the night was 16,000 Hilton points so at todays bonus that would be 6 nights Can't wait to get this season going already.

I know it's the weathers fault and not Six Flags... but I was still crushed to miss SFFT and SFOT. So, what do you do when you check into your flight then find out the event you are leaving for got canceled? Why, I go anyway and find something else to do. Summary: Type: Extended Weekend - Flight [#PWPExtWeekend] OnPoints: Failed Parks: Tom Foolerys - Round Rock, TX Kalahari Indoor Water Park - Round Rock, TX SeaWorld - San Antonio, TX ZDT's Amusement Park - Seguin, TX Friday Had planned to check out the Zoo possible but did a drive by of Six Flags over Texas since it was going to be closed all weekend. It was still icy from the weather so everything was pretty much closed (even the Starbucks I stopped at) so I want South to Round Rock. Tom Foolery's - Kalahari Indoor Water Park Day Rating: Better than Expected My only negative was the price, they had removed the joint after 5pm ticket so I had to pay $95 to go to both (Unlimited at Tom Foolery's was $45 - Aft

So, what do you do when when you check into your flight and then find out the event your flying for is canceled.... Well, I went again and flew anyway... My Friday (other that my SFOT drive-by) was Tom Foolery's as planned but Friday night was some re-plan setting and this morning it's all about sea world. More to come as this is a crazy trip change.

Last week to claim the year of Blinkist if you have the Hilton Aspire. I love this app to give me a quick summary of a book, think of it as audio cliff notes. This is the card that gives you Dimond status, Lounges with 2 guest, up to $250 in airline-fee credits and up to $250 in Hilton resort credits....BUT a significant $450 annual fee so make sure you would use the perks before clicking the link to support the site.

Let's Plan - North East Six Flags Loop I know, nothing but planning posts but I'm in IL and it's Feb, not a lot of options here. I'm looking for  Where do I fly in? Can I do it in 9 days? SF America - 3 hours - SF Great Adventure - 3 1/2 to 4 (have to drive by Liberty) - SF New England - 2 1/2 hours - SF Great Escape - 2 to 3 hours La Ronde (if the border opens) - another 6 to Darien Lake - only 4 1/2 hours if have to bypass La Ronde SF Darien Lake - 5 hours - Hersheypark (Break-up the longer leg) - 2 1/4 hours - SF America If we go for my Birthday a flight option would be: Fri, Aug 13 6:00 AM – 10:47 AM into DCA Mon, Aug 23 4:45 PM – 8:26 PM

Sorry, I was so busy with launching a podcast I missed my Wednesday post. So to tide you over I wanted to see if you used Google Opinion Rewards. That's how I've paid for GPS tour apps of Yellowstone and any of those reoccurring Google Play charges if you're on Android. It adds up in the surveys usually only take a minute. Get paid for answering short surveys. Download Google Opinion Rewards now: https://googleopinionrewards.page.link/share

Summary of what was redeemed: 1 overnight free stay - Hilton Points $100 Shutterfly for gifts, against which we turned in $80 in Discover Cash back (20% bonus right now) Chase Rewards - Pay yourself back to offset a season pass for Indian Beach for just me (no Rollercoaster Rylie yet) Credit Card Changes P1 New Card: Hilton American Express (the no annual fee version) Why? I have a Hilton card I want to down-grade and not have a monthly fee. I get 80,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points for signing up for the new card. Hotels Credit Card Strategy No strategy change, still on the same card paths Research for this month Gas - with this years 2021 Six Flags Extravaganza I need some other options not tied to a brand Flights - we have a frontier near us and we have the kids fly free and we are going to make a call on the den, we can use our Hilton airline credit but not sure yet Cashback Postage - Chase Ink cash back for 1.25% on the business account so will be refreshing postage

When I was younger my family used to drive to Disney. Florida was a 16 hour drive and that's if you didn't stop. Now that I'm older I like comfort a bit to much so at some point I stumbled across SUV RV and got to see an impressive sprinter van while at Yellowstone. So, here is my 10 minutes bed platform. My wife thinks I'm crazy but every once and a while it's so handy.  

Friday Feb 19 Looking for something so open to ideas, lots looks closed during the day and I need to drive sounth before Huston stuff opens. My backup plan is Tom’s Foolery & Kalahari Resorts for an after 4 tickets Saturday Feb 20 American Coaster Enthusiasts South Central @ Six Flags Fiesta Texas Sunday Feb 21 Fire and Ice Festivle @ Six Flags Over Texas

Six Flags Meal Plan add on for Season Pass -  Photo Pass  ( What's the Photo Pass? ) Bottom Line Yes , if you are are interested in photos at all and are going to the park a lot it's worth it Here is a deep analysis into what value we got in 2020. Due to the crazy 2020, Six Flags extended the passes into 2021, but still worth asking the question. Cost We paid $19.99 with our passes (Full Price: $59.99/ea) What we got in 2020 We got 5 physical 6x8 pictures - you can get one free per month. We got each of them printed for us at the main photo center. I can't figure out how many digital we got, but it has to be about 10x that; you can download them from the web, and even change the borders. Considerations If you go to different park you have to get a different pass for every park, so might not be worth it to you travel You can save your time at the Log-flume and/and American Thunder and have the pictures add to your account at the photo center if the photo booth is closed I p

Six Flags Photo add on for Season Pass - Photo Pass ( What's the Photo Pass? ) Bottom Line Yes , if you are are interested in photos at all and are going to the park a lot it's worth it Here is a deep analysis into what value we got in 2020. Due to the crazy 2020, Six Flags extended the passes into 2021, but still worth asking the question. Cost We paid $19.99 with our passes (Full Price: $59.99/ea) What we got in 2020 We got 5 physical 6x8 pictures - you can get one free per month. We got each of them printed for us at the main photo center. I can't figure out how many digital we got, but it has to be about 10x that; you can download them from the web, and even change the borders. Considerations If you go to different park you have to get a different pass for every park, so might not be worth it to you travel You can save your time at the Log-flume and/and American Thunder and have the pictures add to your account at the photo center if the photo booth is closed I put th

Let's brainstorm an extended (4ish day) weekend run Six Flag Great America (Chicago, IL) Little Amerricka Amusement Park (Marshall, WI) Bay Beach Amusement Park (Green Bay, WI) Mt. Olympus (Wisconsin Dells, WI) Tom Foolery (Wisconsin Dells, WI)  Nickelodeon at Mall of America (Bloomington, MN) Valleyfair (Shakopee, MN) Adventureland to catch Dragon Slayer, new in 2021 (Altoona, IA) [Added] Modern Woodmen Park (Davenport, Iowa) - small break between Adventureland and the Six Flags To get it into an extended weekend you would clearly need to drop something.  For example: Adventureland is 3h 30m South of Minneapolis - 4h 45m west of Chicago Bay Beach is 2h - 2h 30m to the Dells Could pick between Valleyfair and Nickelodon Anchor Airports: Chicago, IL (United Hub) and Minneapolis, MI (Dela Hub) Personally Delta isn't flying to my local airport right now sadly. If they open back up the regional jets I will hit that on another weekend and make Adventureland a day trip. Do you have a

Adventureland has been on my list of parks to checkout for a while. I'm hoping to figure out how to get there this year. This video pretty much pushed it up the list. I find that his reviews are pretty spot on. So, plan on seeing my rough outline soon of how I'm going to fit this into one of my weekend loops as it's pretty close to IL. According to LogRideApp they have 37 attraction - 6 Coasters and 17 flats 

Happy New Year - hope we start using more Point this year Summary of what was redeemed 1 overnight free stay - Hilton Points $100 Shutterfly for gifts, against which we turned in $80 in Discover Cash back (20% bonus right now) Chase Rewards - Pay yourself back to offset a season pass for Indian Beach Credit Card Changes P1 New Card: Hilton American Express (the no annual fee version) Why? I have a Hilton card I want to down-grade and not have a monthly fee. I get 80,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points for signing up for the new card.  [ Click hear to check it out and support the site ] More info on latest hotel thoughts at  ParksWithPoints.com/Hotels Credit Card Strategy No strategy change, still on the same card paths - You can review what Credit Cards I use for what category at  www.ParksWithPoints.com Open Thoughts Would anyone be interested in our Point balance? -- Hilton, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Discover cash back - I was moving them off excel and into a tool so once I figure that out

36th annual East Peoria Festival of Lights - Here is our POV so you can see if your interested. If you go you just tune your vehicle’s radio to 88.1 FM for holiday music to accompany your drive. Cost: $10 Festival of Lights Official Website

As we continue to document our trip we are introducing Nature Parks . As our family looks into more socially distanced options there isn't a reason people wouldn't also find the trip details interesting. We gave some thought to not listing them on the same site but when it comes down to it we feel like it works into the model of the site. In the future we will look into having a separate social pages so people can follow different trips on the socials.

 This show is getting held at multiple amusement parts around the US so check it out there  or you can watch the video of the first show here:

Well, due to the pandemic we are not going to make it to Holiday at the Park so thanks to Show Me Coasters   Rollercoaster Rylie got to do a virtual trip.  

I know..I know.. how does a trip to Disney lead to a travel blog that doesn't really cover Disney? The short story is I wanting to come back right away and that took me down the path of all the travel hacking websites dedicated to Florida theme parks and using miles and points to lower the cost.  Fast forward to my realization that we would not be coming back right away and set my sight on some new goals: Small trips and more of them Leverage passes we already have Get more experiences for the budget So, when I couldn't find a site like that I started outlining one and now I will be posting trip details on what I did and hopefully people find it helpful.

Summary of what was redeemed 1 overnight free stay - Hilton Points $100 Shutterfly for gifts, against which we turned in $80 in Discover Cash back (20% bonus right now) Credit Card Changes P1 New Card: Hilton American Express (the no annual fee version) Why? I have a Hilton card I want to down-grade and not have a monthly fee. I get 80,000 Hilton Honors Bonus Points for signing up for the new card.  [ Click hear to check it out and support the site ] More info on latest hotel thoughts at ParksWithPoints.com/Hotels Credit Card Strategy No strategy change, still on the same card paths - You can review what Credit Cards I use for what category at www.ParksWithPoints.com Open Thoughts Would anyone be interested in our Point balance? -- Hilton, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Discover cash back - I was moving them off excel and into a tool so once I figure that out I would be happy to share. Next Research Gas - with next years  2021 Rollercoaster Rylie all Six Flags Extravaganza   I need some other