How does that saying go… “Happy wife, happy life?”
I would consider my life already happy but I think it just got, exponentially, HAPPIER! <–I’ll let you know how it goes when I break the news to her tonight.
THE BREAKDOWN
Towards the end of 2018, Delta announced they would be launching daily non-stop flights between Detroit and Honolulu on June 29, 2019.
I was aware of the announcement but did not make much of it. Delta, typically, charges an exorbitant amount of miles for ANY award redemption and if you are able to find Delta award space through their partners, you should also play the lottery that day. 😉
My wife had expressed her desire to go to Hawaii and I promised that we would go. Unfortunately, that promise was also made six years ago. Ouch!
The DTW-HNL route will be served with a Boeing 767-300ER aircraft. Although, it doesn’t have Delta’s newest suites, it does have 25 fully lie-flat seats in Delta One (business class) which will be appreciated on this 10 hour flight.
You may remember that I mentioned THIS TRICK in a past blog. Well Delta, surprisingly, opened award space for this flight and I used that pro tip to score business class seats for our family to go to Hawaii.
The chart below displays how much Delta was charging (one-way) for the DTW-HNL business flight…
And this chart (below) displays how much Virgin Atlantic was charging for the same flight…
Virgin Atlantic is a Delta partner and you can use your Virgin Atlantic miles to book awards on Delta. To clarify, I am using Virgin Atlantic miles to actually fly on the plane that has “Delta” written on the side of it.
If you compare the two charts, you’ll also see that Virgin Atlantic offers award space on Delta flights even when Delta doesn’t (e.g. July 25th).
Would you rather pay 91,000 Delta Skymiles or 37,500 Virgin Atlantic miles to fly on the same plane? In this hobby, it’s extremely helpful to know where to look.
Total:
37,000 miles +5.60 (me) + 37,500 miles +5.60 (wife) + 5,000 miles +5.60 (child)
= 80,000 + $16.80
If you’re wondering how much the business class ticket costs if I had paid cash for the one-way ticket on the same dates…
FINAL STAMP
It’s exciting to see airlines incorporating more non-stop, long-haul domestic routes. It can be frustrating seeing continuous sales to Hawaii from the west coast while the east coast is not shown any love.
I’m also extremely excited to see my wife’s smile when I tell her that we are all going to Hawaii. I trust she’ll be super excited, smile and then say….”FINALLY!” 🙂
Now, let me go work on my Shaka Sign.
Anyone else book a flight to Hawaii? We will probably venture to other islands so does anyone have any recommendations for things to do/eat/see/etc. on any of the islands in Hawaii?
1TattedPassport 