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The Card
To gain this trip, we signed up for the Chase Ink Preferred Card. This card had a 100,000 point sign up bonus.
This card is not a wallet staple for us, but the large sign up bonus made it a winner. We will likely downgrade this card once we hit the 12 month mark.
The one bonus that this card holds is, unlike many other Chase Cards, this card can transfer to transfer partners. The only other card that can do this is the Chase Sapphire Preferred or Reserve. Having one of these three cards in your wallet allows you to take points from any of your Chase cards and transfer to travel partners like Southwest, United, Hyatt, etc.
The Trip
For this trip to San Diego we wanted to fly into San Diego, and then stay somewhere in between Carlsbad and San Diego proper.
Flights – We booked these flights very early, and paid for 4 tickets, plus used a companion pass for our 5th person. The key here is booking those flights early. Southwest will refund you if a lower price comes later, so if you have the points, book early!
Hotel – Our stay in San Diego will be 5 nights. We could have stayed at the Hyatt Regency La Jolla, which is probably an overall fancier hotel, but, traveling as two families of 5, we wanted the free breakfast more than the high-end amenities. We decided to stay at the Hyatt House Sorrento Mesa. This is a great midpoint between Carlsbad and San Diego. And, as we had been before, I knew they had a PHENOMENAL breakfast spread.
Car rental – With our Capital One Venture X card we get a $300 travel credit each year. This is our favorite rental car hack. We use this credit to cover rental cars. Other options for good deals on rental cars would be Costco or AutoSlash.
Flights –
$87236,872 points + $56Hotels –
$102463,000 pointsCar Rental –
$265$0Savings of $2,161
But what about the other stuff?
Theme Park Tickets– We planned three days of theme park tickets. 2 Days at Legoland and 1 Day at Sea World.
Legoland – Legoland was running a deal of buy one adult ticket, get 3 kid tickets for $25 a piece. I have never seen a deal this great for Legoland, so we were thrilled to take advantage of it. A consistent Legoland deal to look for is their “Pay for one adult, one kid goes free.” The cost quoted below includes one day of their photo pass and parking.
Expected Legoland Cost: $635
Actual Cost: $477 – turns into $0 after Bank Bonus
Sea World– Sea World has some good deals with their guest passes on Annual Passes if you plan it at the right time. We got the Gold Annual Pass, which came with 2 guest passes during our trip. This means for the price of one Gold pass, we got 3 tickets, free parking, free photo pass, and merchandise and food discounts. We bought the other two tickets at face value for the one day.
Expected Sea World Cost: $440
Actual Cost: $378
Multi-Park Options – If you are looking at several days of San Diego theme parks, it may be worth it to check out one of the multi-park passes like GoCity. As always, do the math and decide for yourself, but we have seen them offer several great discounts.
Bank Bonuses – We had worked earlier this year on 2 bank bonuses, totaling $480. This wiped out the Legoland cost for us.
Food – Food is a cost we budget with cash. If we have everything else covered, it is easy to cover this expense for our family. If you do not have a budget to cover food, I would recommend pursuing bank bonuses.
Travel Credit – If you wanted to cover your theme park tickets completely, you could use your Capital One Venture or Venture X card to cover a purchase of tickets through a third party like Undercover Tourist. Capital One gives you the ability to erase travel purchases, and thankfully Undercover Tourist is a site that will code through Capital One as a travel expense whereas many of the theme parks will not.
Wrap-Up
All in, this vacation would have cost us $3,236 before adding food and other activities. However thanks to Travel Hacking and scouring for deals, our cost is $431. THAT is a Vacation I can get behind! Family travel doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg to have a great time!
Looking for other fun trips with kids? Check out the Gaylord or our adventure to Dinosaur National Monument.
