We bring you all the AA Europe routes, get ready for more Virgin miles, we see the biggest airplane, travel to see Nagasaki churches, the most hideous clickbait winner, it is getting HOT out there, an Orthodox Jew visits North Korea, Venezuelan inflation is tragic..and now an earthquake, how to find Delta awards better, hope the Marriott blog posts stop because I can’t take it anymore, get more points at Six Flags, how Americans are loaded with debt thanks to bloggers pushing travel rewards credit cards on them and lots more for you freeeeeee!
TBB Blog Mission: To Educate. Entertain. Inspire. In That Order!
Support TBB by applying for CREDIT CARDS, shopping with our AMAZON AFFILIATE LINK & clicking our REFERRAL LINKS
TBB Credit Card Updates: You may have noticed (this is a joke) that the Southwest Priority card 65k points offer may be ending today so I am just reminding you it is available with my links too! I also changed the SPG cards to reflect that they now earn Marriott Rewards points (75,000 for the Personal and 100,000 for the Business). If you find any errors please let me know as I can’t keep up with them. And thanks for the support of this one man band blog! Hopefully the SPG Luxury card becomes available with my links on Thursday as well #keepfingerscrossed #meetquota #barely.
And the Marriott SPG merger blogfest just keeps on coming, arrgh! Meanwhile, thoughts and prayers to the Marriott IT staff! I took a quick look in my Marriott account and had this reaction. They gave back a few bones and just want to get the accounts merged. I have decided to check next Monday, ignore all the hourly developments posted by the bloggers! And get ready for them to pump the SPG Luxcury card, supposedly coming on August 23rd. Will I get the affiliate link the same day? I doubt it but please check here, thank you!
Big route news from American Airlines, Europe is in and Asia is out! And yes I love this of course, Chicago to Athens yes!
- CLT: Daily year-round service to Munich Airport (MUC)
- DFW: Daily summer seasonal service to Dublin Airport (DUB) and to MUC
- ORD: Daily summer seasonal service to Athens International Airport (ATH) in Greece
- PHL: Daily summer seasonal service to Edinburgh Airport (EDI) in Scotland; new summer seasonal service to Berlin-Tegel Airport (TXL), Bologna Guglielmo Marconi Airport (BLQ) in Italy and Dubrovnik Airport (DBV) in Croatia
- PHX: Daily seasonal service to London Heathrow Airport (LHR)
American will suspend service between O’Hare International Airport (ORD) in Chicago and Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG) in October… American will also reduce service between ORD and Narita International Airport (NRT) in Japan from daily to three days per week, effective in December.
This is the best post on the news that (shockingly #noreally) Aimia will sell Aeroplan back to Air Canada and banks.
The OneWorld news gets even better! Finnair to fly new A350 route to Los Angeles in 2019. Get all your AA cards here so you can fly for freeeeee 🙂
The brand new Radisson Blu Resort Phu Quoc looks really nice!
If you get to Six Flags make sure you get some points ok?
The ownership structure of this is kind of weird: Virgin Flying Club splitting from the airline to create a Virgin-wide loyalty scheme.
I had no idea what a Lubavitcher was but I do now! A Lubavitcher Entered North Korea.
What a super sad story! A Couple Biking The World On A “Humans Are Kind” Adventure Killed By ISIS Militants. Not sure about Tajikistan…
We are boiling out there! Halfway to boiling: the city at 50C.
Never heard of most of them on this list. The 40 Most Important Restaurants of the Past 40 Years.
Thank the expert credit card salesmen bloggers for this: Here’s how much debt Americans have at every age.
When the next Dollar General store moves in, watch out! Where even Walmart won’t go: how Dollar General took over rural America.
As the chain opens stores at the rate of three a day across the US, often in the heart of ‘food deserts’, some see Dollar General as an admission that a town is failing [Three a day!!!!]
Bringing you the latest on this subject no other blogger dares to write about 🙂 How SexRobots Could Revolutionize Marriage—for the Better. Actually, it is a great read about the advance of technology and the institution of marriage and its future in this increasingly tech world!
I am proud of this blog, I bring you stuff that makes you happy. Or so I am told. Enjoy it while it lasts… Paul Allen built the world’s biggest plane. Does anyone need it?
Awesomeness! Australian Geographic nature photographer of the year – in pictures.
Great stuff here again: Nagasaki Churches, Christianity, & World Culture.
I always wondered about that! How Croatia Got The Coastline Away From Bosnia. And Bosnia DOES have access to the sea, all 20 kms at Neum. You need a magnifying glass to see it in the map! Fascinating history!
How much money it takes to buy this stuff in Venezuela #tragic
I was going to place this blog in the penalty box due to numerous Marriott merger related posts. But there is just not much quality miles and points related content out there. And with the increased award “sales” by Delta Skymiles, maybe this will help somebody. And I agree with blog reader Ryan it DOES feel like Delta is about to hammer us again, they tend to throw a sweet few bones before another big knife attack on us! Finding Delta awards in calendar view (Air France is not the answer).
Most hideous clickbait headline of the past few days was:
British Airways flight attendant suspended after peeling off her tights and sniffing them – Secret Flying
If you clicked it…please leave my blog NOW!
Emily at MMS now blogs about her favorite thrift shops she flies to (guess how…lol and smh).
What a crazy day in the news yesterday with both Cohen and Manafort going down…Drain the swamp LOL!
Bloggers killed the 3x Plastiq method via Ink Business Preferred. They have the audacity to make a post that it does not work anymore and how all deals die. Well yeah…maybe if you stopped blogging about it, you know, just maybe, it may not have died? I am sure you sold enough Ink Business Preferred credit cards this way though, congrats you successful blogger!
Speaking about successful bloggers, we were doing so well here, but been stuck at just 6 conversions this month. When they take away my links this baby evolves to a once a week rant so we can all move on…approaching year 6 here #mindboggling
And I leave you with this…
TBB
travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com
Follow TBB on Twitter @FlyerTalkerinA2 and now on Instagram.
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Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
Just say NO to clickbait and nasty bloggers! And NO MORE Marriott threads for a bit… ugh!
You can read other blogs but Titan will still post what makes them $$$
Good morning!
The business news is really interesting. The Air Canada deal suggested the liability that is sitting our there. Delta is there in the Virgin move.
You and Ryan might be right but at the moment Delta sale covers Virgin upper class.
We shall see!
Now that you mention it…I would not be surprised at all if Delta pulls a shocker. Like selling Skymiles or something, they do things like that..and this unloading of miles to lower the liability may have something to do with it. You heard it here first 🙂
I found Virgin Upper Class the most uncomfortable seat/ride in my career, sad! Best part about it was the ground service, as in the lounges in JFK and LHR 🙂
Oh … the Delta One seats are so nice and I was thinking this would be better yet. I hope you aren’t right here!
Instead of a sale,perhaps we might think about what’s going with SkyMiles is a revaluation albeit temporary. Even MileNerd was surprised with the 55k to Australia. Twenty-five years ago it was 70k.
Suppose Delta is going to sell SkyMiles then their revaluation policy makes a lot of sense. People might think they should hold more SkyMiles so signing up for the Delta AEx cards for miles becomes more sensible.
We living in interesting times.
Excellent lineup today!!
Nice to see AA expanding a bit in Europe!
In my small rural hometown they have a Wal-Mart, a Dollar General, and a Family Dollar! I don’t care for Wal-Mart in general, prefer Target but Dollar General is hard to beat when you want some basic, very cheap stuff on occasion.
Man that plane is huge – looks really cool, too!
If you get ____ credit card from me here you can fly that plane for freeeeee.
Or something like that…
I think I have been to a Dollar Store once. My daughter needed something for school. I avoid stores. I do not miss the WalMarts 🙂
did you stop altogether? how do u avoid the Walmart “the greatest store ever” ?
Just heard about two of the 40 “most important” restaurant. Only been to Shake Shack. Didn’t live up to its reputation. I rather go to Five Guys.
Haven’t had a burger in a while…until I consumed several at the Fairmont Miramar and a “few” trips to In-n-Out in Cali 🙂
Shake Shack recently opened here and I do not understand the hype. It’s not bad, but it’s not hypeworthy either.
I feel the same about Shake Shack.
I was not into In-n-Out but then I figured out why…it was the buns I did not like! With lettuce they are great. Fries still suck though.
I can’t believe TBB fell for the PR spin on AA’s “expansion” in Europe! They cut 6 Europe flights (5 seasonal and 1 year round) and added 8 seasonal and 1 year-round. And while the 6 they were all daily, only 6 of the new ones are. So basically a net addition of 11 flights a week in the summer. Ho hum.
What? These guys must have been trained at the Delta spin school! Totally missed the Europe cuts, my bad. But still, we have a net addition of 11 flights a week which gives some hope that maybe, just maybe, we can score some award flights to Europe. Better than nothing!
Interesting to plot the AA cuts/adds to the routes cut/added from the GSA City pair program…
Even if it’s not that much of a net gain, personally I like the ATH nonstop from ORD and the nonstop PHL-DBV (though a shame it’s on the 767).
What!? No HT?
https://travelbloggerbuzz.com/spg-luxury-card-mapstr-ride-sharing-etiquette-underwater-hotels-tajikistan/#comment-410688
Ooops, forgot about that one. I think because the article today focused on the couple and their angle about kindness and stuff like that.
I added you to the list of people I am going to make it up to when my site gets bought. You’ll be fine 🙂
P.S. Please do not make any life plans counting on this okay lol.
TBB: you may have a theory in your name now..
http://saverocity.com/pfdigest/done-blogging-for-now/
Thought about replying to that post but I’ll do it here instead—more views
He’s right that greed will always try to fill a void, he misses peer pressure. I mean, that’s why (most) people don’t screw
There’s not enough *good* public peer pressure in the world anymore.
That TBB provides good public peer pressure warrants support from the community. Think about that. Before Aug 31!
Without your support TBB may turn to pledge drives.
Nobody enjoys pledge drives.
I started wondering if there were other TBB theories out there. I wound up discovering this helpful guide to TBB acronyms:
https://acronyms.thefreedictionary.com/TBB
We are going to miss you Nick..
And Mile Nerd.
The good guys are giving up.
Will I join them? Certainly leaning that way, nobody has clicked/paid on the darn cards since Aug14!
Thanks Anonymous, the part about “screw” had me laughing a lot, good one!
I agree with you. And this blog will not have pledge drives, it will not turn into an NPR outfit woohoo!
Emily MMS: “Ever since I was a child, I’ve wanted to visit the San Diego Zoo. I’ve heard it’s one of the best zoos in the world”
Hey TBB, you need to start writing at first grade level to get bought out and become successful.
Okay, okay, I won’t go there again, I promise
Ok, I stop I stop…
“Capital One Savor Is the Girl Next Door I’ve Been Overlooking”
These folks over at MMS will say anything for a conversion. Not going to make any comments about selling babies now I promise 🙂
You are killing me!
People who humanize ISIS and say they aren’t really a threat and then get killed by ISIS is not a sad story for me. Sorry. Same with those who humanized Stalin, Hitler, and Castro and Hugo Chavez in our country. Or Hamas. If they want to coddle terrorists and hang out with them and the terrorists turn on them, I don’t shed a tear.
I clearly doubt these guys ever thought they would encounter any ISIS assholes in Tajikistan.
Still a tragedy. Speaking strictly in humanitarian terms.
G eorge of TravelBloggerBuzz announced earlier today that “This is the final blog post of TBB as you have come to know it.” Although TravelBloggerBuzz is not completely folding and will still exist in an abbreviated form, George has decided to concentrate on other priorities in his life — including ones which promise financial rewards in return for his investment of time and effort.
Good for you, George. I wish the best of luck to you in your future endeavors.
TravelBloggerBuzz has had its share of followers and detractors; but to his credit, George — he does not like when I use his last name publicly — has attempted to review the greater than 600 weblogs whose topics are miles, points and travel; and rate which ones he believed were the best…
…as well as which ones to avoid.
George was rather controversial about his opinions and thoughts; in fact, he was outright blatant much of the time. Some of his critics have expressed that there is indeed a market for reviews and critiques of weblogs; but that he had gone about it the wrong way. Supporters were appreciative of the work he had done over the past couple of years.
I enjoyed reading TravelBloggerBuzz, which — despite what critics and supporters both believe — adhered to the mission statement of To Entertain, Educate and Inspire, in my opinion.
“Blogging consumes you.” That is an understatement, George. I have no idea how you had time to wade through the massive amount of content which is posted out there on the Internet every day and still write an article every day or two.
“I am ready to give the baton to the next miles/points blog critic”, George wrote. “But there will never be another TBB lol. What a ride!”
…and what a ride it was. Thank you, George.
Do you believe that weblogs whose topics deal with miles, points or travel — or a combination of those topics — could use a critic? If so, how do you believe the work should be criticized; and what do you believe would be the most effective ways of doing so?
Disclaimer: I have received no special compensation or dispensation of any sort where The Gate was either recommended or disparaged by TravelBloggerBuzz. In fact, I still have not met George in person; but perhaps someday I will.
As an homage to TravelBloggerBuzz, I have posted below a parody I wrote in good fun which had originally been posted in the past at What’s Your Point? — which was hosted by First2Board but is now defunct — to which George had commented “I am honored! Brilliant! Guest post material if you ask me. So many need to laugh at my expense…I am still laughing!”
We all need to laugh, George; and I am thankful that you have such a good sense of humor.
George did post the parody as a guest post at TravelBloggerBuzz shortly thereafter.
Enjoy!
I remember that one Brian.
May have to update it soon as I am probably joining Nick at PFD, sad!
Me, Nick and Mile Nerd
maybe one day decades later we go on tour like the Eagles lol
The three titans!
You could take Ingy along too, and use the title the Eagles did for their reunion tour.
“When Hell Freezes Over”.
Just read the many comments over at DOC from brain dead people who were just approved for the new $450 SPG card worth 100k Marriot points (5k Amex spend req.).
They are acting like they just won the Lottery. WTF am I missing here, or is this the sad state of our “hobby”. I miss the good old days, when men were men and travel hacking was like “shootin fish in a barrel”.
Abra, Kadabra, and Alakazam