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Southwest Road Trip 2021: Trip costs and points we used
In July 2021, we set out on a month long road trip from our home in the Chicago suburbs to California and back. Check out my Google map below to see our route, our favorite attractions, and how much we paid at each stop! Click the brackets in the top right corner of the map to see it larger.
Total lodging and transportation costs
On this trip, we used a total of:
59,000 Hyatt points
18,000 IHG Points
2 IHG Free Night Certificates
8,000 Choice points
17,500 Marriott points
We paid:
$884 for 5 nights at an Airbnb
$15 resort fee at one hotel
$90 total for 5 nights of camping
That brings our totals to 102,500 points, 2 free night certificates and $989 for a month-long trip. We also stayed with family for 3 nights.
We paid $664 for gas for the trip.
Hyatt Place gave us the best value across the US. We loved that the rooms had 2 queen beds and a sofa bed, as well as a decent breakfast included. Interested in earning Hyatt points? You can earn a big chunk by opening a Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card, which allows you to transfer points to Hyatt.
Enjoy benefits such as 5x on travel purchased through Chase Travel℠, 3x on dining, select streaming services and online groceries, 2x on all other travel purchases, 1x on all other purchases, and $50 annual Hotel Credit, plus more.
Great transfer options to Hyatt, United, Southwest, and more
Get complimentary access to DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees and lower service fees for a minimum of one year when you activate by December 31, 2027. Plus $10/month for non-restaurant orders. More here.
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is THE top beginner card I recommend for miles & points. The travel protections it provides is top tier, too. Get this card early in your travel points journey, it’s a keeper. It’s the first card in my Three Year Plan.
The points you’ll earn are easy to redeem and it’s also easy to keep earning them. Our favorite use is to transfer them to Hyatt for hotel stays but you can use them for cash back, for any travel expense, or for airlines. See more inspiration here and here.
It has a fun extra benefit through December 31, 2027: $10 a month for non-restaurant purchases at DoorDash. Read here how to use this benefit.
If you want to learn more about it, check out Season 1 of my podcast — I dive into the benefits and how to use the points.
The standard bonus is 60,000 points. An offer for 60,000 points + $300 credit towards Chase Travel in the first year ran from September – early November 2024.
An offer for 75,000 points ran from early May – mid June 2024.
A publicly available online offer for 80,000 points ran from March 2023-May 2023.
An 80,000 point bonus ended in Fall 2022. An offer for 100,000 points ended in Fall 2021.
Another option for earning Hyatt points is the Hyatt credit card.
This is the first new offer we’ve seen on this card since 2019. I love keeping this card for the annual hotel night certificate. This is a great offer if you are planning to stay at a Category 1-4 Hyatt in the next year! Standard pricing for Category 4 hotels is 15,000 points per night!
But a few things to note:
The free nights can not be combined with Club Access Awards, so this won’t work to use these nights and also trying to upgrade those nights to Club Lounge Access (unless you already have Globalist status). You also can’t use a Suite Upgrade award with these.
These free nights will expire a year after you earn them.
We consider this card a long term keeping. You’ll get a Free Night Award every year on your account anniversary (for a Category 1-4 hotel) and instant Discoverist status (which is helpful for guaranteeing breakfast at Hyatt Places not that it’s not a guarantee).For anyone trying to earn Globalist or trying to earn 20 Elite Night credits to get Club Lounge Access, this card is a also must! You’ll get 5 elite night credits added to your tracker just for holding the card.
This card is a great way to earn some IHG free nights! You will get a Trusted Traveler program benefit (use for TSA Precheck, Global Entry, or NEXUS), Platinum Elite status (which can give you room upgrades), and 4th night free when you book with points.
IHG has a large footprint and it’s useful to have a stash of IHG points for lots of kinds of trips! IGH has a large number of hotels in Europe that sleep 4 (which is rare!). You can also check out my map of Holiday Inn Vacation Clubs — they have villas with kitchens and some sleep 6. We often use IHG points everywhere from Holiday Inn Express, avid, or Staybridge Suites on road trips. And for a little upgraded stay, we love the Kimpton brand.
This card is a keeper for the annual free night certificate you’ll get on your cardmember anniversary each year. We often redeem ours for a staycation in Chicago!
140,000 points is the standard offer. A 175,000 point offer ended in Spring 2023. A 165,000 point offer ended on April 3, 2024. An offer for 5 free nights (up to 60k per night) ended in September 2024.
After paying our cleaners and other monthly expenses (mortgage, property taxes, utilities), we were left with a profit of $2,200.
After subtracting our gas + lodging costs, that still left us with $547 to spend on food and activities!
We had other expenses throughout the month as well, like our health insurance and life insurance premiums which total about $820 per month.
Drop any questions about our trip (and how we got the points for it) below!
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[…] our road trip to California and back, we stayed at 10 different Hyatt Place properties and came to love them! They typically sleep 6 (2 queen beds + sofa bed) and have a great free […]
Thanks for sharing your family with us. I noticed that you had Four Corners on the map, but your route didn’t go there. Just curious. Is this on your To Do list? Or did the route need to be adjusted? Thanks!
Oh you’re right! So we went though Tuba City up to 4 corners and then to Albuquerque. The route was created just using the places we slept and missed a side trips we took.
[…] our road trip to California and back, we stayed at 10 different Hyatt Place properties and came to love them! They typically sleep 6 (2 queen beds + sofa bed) and have a great free […]
Thanks for sharing your family with us. I noticed that you had Four Corners on the map, but your route didn’t go there. Just curious. Is this on your To Do list? Or did the route need to be adjusted? Thanks!
Oh you’re right! So we went though Tuba City up to 4 corners and then to Albuquerque. The route was created just using the places we slept and missed a side trips we took.