Another TBB post featuring the most eclectic links around the web such as the US housing crisis, AI startups, USA camping, airport raves, financial rules of thumb, best small towns in the US, top mountain running races, a 120k travel rewards credit card is coming, going to the 2024 Morningstar Investment Conference and much more and of course always all of the most important developments in the crazy world of miles and points. See you Friday.
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This blog started way back in 2012 focusing on my crazy hobby addiction of traveling with frequent flyer miles, hotel and bank points. It has since evolved to a curated at least weekly post of the best web content along with my commentary. Here to Educate primarily, sometimes Entertain and if I get to Inspire you, well, that is a bonus.
Aiming to post on Friday this week too, we’ll see how it works out. This is a one man labor of love operation, enjoy it while it lasts.
PERSONAL FINANCE
This is a really good post on a very important and relevant subject: Why We Have a Housing Crisis. And how tough it is to fix it. And the answer is to build and keep at it.
I am attending the 2024 Morningstar Investment Conference starting tomorrow so here is an article from them: 10 Financial Rules of Thumb You Don’t Have to Follow. These rules of thumb are a great starting point. Remember, we are all different.
Some things I came across worthy to share with you:
Along with the housing crisis, we have this: Existing US home prices hit record high in May with a median price of $419K, up nearly 6% year-over-year
Also, know that these are the good times really and at some point this will change. Because it always does. And no one knows when that will happen and how long it will last. Stay diversified and focus on what you can control.
SCAMS/CRYPTO/AI
Molly White keeps us updated with all the latest in the crypto world. Of course over half of the article is about scams and a bunch of arrogant conflicted individuals, naturally: Raging in favor of the machine. What was not shocking to find out was that Do Kwon of Terraform Labs (recently settled with the SEC for only $4.5 billion lol) is still awaiting extradition hearings in Montenegro. What was shocking to find out was that the Montenegro Prime Minister had invested $75,000 in LUNA tokens and at one time his Terraform Lab holdings had reached $90 million!
Very interesting: The Number of AI Startups by Country.
ODDZ & ENDZ
Anthony Fauci is back telling us how it was in The First Three Months. What I saw inside the government’s response to COVID-19.
Amazing photography: Birds Star in Spectacular Scenes for This Year’s Audubon Photography Awards
TRAVEL
SAVE $100 FOR 2024 THE EXTRAORDINARY TRAVEL FESTIVAL
These look great and I must admit I have not heard of most of them: The 15 Best Small Towns to Visit in 2024.
This is cool…if you are into camping. The United States of Camping. From an Alabama canyon to a cave in Wyoming, 50 unique places to pitch your tent.
Very cool website: Satcat — Spaceflight Intelligence Exchange. Explore real-time satellite data, debris, and space weather with Satcat.
BUZZING
A section where I go on and on about some stuff that happens in my life and anything else that just does not fit in another section above
Looking forward to one day this year getting back to running. In the meantime, I am still attracted to content about running, like this: 12 Road-Trip Worthy Mountain Running Races.
Raves in airports is a new trend? Cool with me. Next one is at Frankfurt airport: For One of Europe’s Hottest New Raves, Head to the Airport.
All of Italy exhaled with that goal with mere seconds on the clock way deep in injury time against Croatia knocking them out and barely advancing, another day in the office for Euro 2024. If you don’t want to catch all the highlights, forward to 7.36 and watch magic happen. Elimination games are starting soon, grab your popcorn and heart medication too!
And a great start by the US men’s national soccer team in Copa America beating Bolivia.
This blog started with a focus on miles and points and travel. It has evolved since then. Everything below deals with the hobby of collecting frequent flyer miles and points and maximizing your travel experiences. If you are not interested, you can stop here, thank you.
MILES & POINTS NEWS/PROMOS/MY ACTION
It was another week with nothing earth shattering. I think many of us are waiting for that 120k credit card offer to come out, see Credit Card Corner for details below.
GENERAL NEWS/PROMOS/NEWBIES/ETC.
The basics laid out well here: Airline Alliances, Codeshares, and Interline Agreements: What Are They and How do They Work. I had never heard of the Vanilla, U-Fly and Value Alliance before!
Better hurry if you have and want to use American Airlines miles: American Airlines AAdvantage Award Sale For Fall Travel (Book By July 2).
It has been most interesting seeing the expansion of the Avios currency in recent years. And here are some answers from its CEO where the program is going: Avios CEO on expanding the currency to more airlines and even hotels ….. and a devaluation. Sounded good until that dreaded “d” word smh.
After the disastrous rollout by Hyatt of the Mr & Mrs Smith acquisition they must have realized they screwed it up. And trying to make amends for it. I guess this helps a little but not enough to shake off the feeling that this whole move got bungled and Hilton has pounced on it. Common Sense Prevails: Mr & Mrs Smith Properties Now Earn Bonus Points.
More lounges available with your Priority Pass lounge membership, hooray! You do have a travel rewards credit card that gives you access to them, right? Take a look at the still fantastic 75k offer for the Capital One Venture X card below! 10 Escape Lounges Being Added To Priority Pass (BDL, CMH, CVG, GSP, MSP, OAK, PHX, PVD, SMF).
CREDIT CARD CORNER
Please help the small independent blogs like mine continue to exist by supporting them with your credit card clicks below, thank you!
I will indicate with NEW every new section as the rest is the same from the previous blog post and will finally roll off those parts as offers expire, thank you.
NEW: It is tough to avoid Marriott due to its huge footprint. Kind of like Delta. Then again, not pursuing both of these companies makes for a life a lot more focused on companies that can still reward you in a lot more ways than these two, just saying. Anyway, Which Marriott Bonvoy Card is Best?
We had a flurry of new credit card offers thrown at us in the last week. Let’s recap:
NEW: Very interested in a new 120k Chase Ink Preferred card offer that is now available in branch and usually these branch offers become available online later. As I need to replenish some of the over 1 million miles/points I burned in less than six months this year.
Decent United offers but nothing earth shattering: United Credit Card Reviews: We Look At Four United Personal Cards.
The TOP offer NOW is the 75k Capital One Venture X card. It is amazing what you get for free with this card actually. See more below.
MY ACTION
I revived the dormant TravelBloggerBuzz Instagram account and giving it another go, follow me there please. Pics from Chicago will be posted the next few days, see below.
As you read this I am on my way to check in to the Hyatt Regency in Chicago to attend the 2024 Morningstar Investment conference. Here for two nights, love staying in conference hotels with my hotel points #winning And then moving to the Chicago Hyatt Centric for one night before heading home on Amtrak. Looking forward to a Chicago Boat Architecture tour.
So, after this week I will be at 27 Hyatt night credits and looking forward to hit 30, 40, 50 and 60 and choose from these goodies: 20 to 60 Nights Milestone Reward Choices.
I think I am going to take out visiting the Hilton Pattaya and Andaz Jomtien Beach in Thailand in November/December and just settle in adding only Hua Hin for four full days, three at the Hua Hin Hyatt Regency (with confirmed suite upgrade cert) and one night at the Hua Hin Hilton. Have points will stay for free lol.
ADVANCED
As I did this in my last trip to/from Greece as well, I must say I am becoming more comfortable with it: How I found awesome awards for our last minute travel challenge.
If I was younger I would jump on this right away: Easy Year of “I Prefer” Titanium Status. Because I would then try to match this status to others. But I am not sure I have seen this one being “match able”. Of course if you plan a stay with them go right ahead if the benefits are worth it to you. I am assuming it is still going, let me know if not and I will delete it and not waste your time.
Marriott Bonvoy LOL.
MILES & POINTS
HOT CREDIT CARD OFFERS: 75k CHASE Ink Business Cash, 75k CHASE Ink Business Unlimited, 75k CAPITAL ONE Venture X, 100k CHASE Ink Business Preferred, 75K CHASE Sapphire Reserve, 75k CHASE United Business, 75k CAPITAL ONE Venture Rewards, 150k AMEX Business Platinum, 80k CHASE Southwest Performance Business, $1,000 Cash Back CHASE Ink Business Premier, 75k Citi Strata Premier, 15k AMEX Blue Business Plus and many more!
This section is about my hobby addiction of collecting frequent flyer miles and hotel points since the early 1990’s! SKIP if you are not into it!
As of today, I have burned 1,109,513 miles/points year to date (1,148,286 in 2023) and have 4,131,359 miles/points in the bank. Some do drugs, I do miles lol!
Thanks to US banks, very lucrative travel rewards credit card offers come and go all the time. This section will act as a reference point on the best CURRENT offers. I will designate new material preceded by NEW.
Remember, you are NOT allowed to ever carry a credit card balance!
Let me leave you with this:
Some of the links are behind a paywall. You can try to read them using Archive.is.
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Feel free to contact me anytime at travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com and tell me what you like and don’t like about my blog and, more importantly, what you would like to see changed and/or what you would add or delete. All feedback is very appreciated.
George
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The Tuesday post is back!
Re the small towns, I haven’t been to Beaufort SC in many years but it was nice and I keep telling myself I need to get back there. Note that it’s pronounced “byew-fort” while the NC beach town with the exact same name is “bow-fort”. And as for Hot Springs SD: we didn’t explore the town but the mammoth museum was pretty cool.
Nick is right! Yeah!
The small towns piece was just terrific. I’ve been to exactly none. I have a made
a note!
2
Chicago Boat Architecture tour – This is a wonderful tour. Go on it anytime I’m in Chicago. Enjoy!
+1
Yeah, it was fantastic, highly recommended. Weather cooperated, super relaxing and educational.
Best thing about it it was free, along with one drink #winning
Check my Instagram, should post more today.
Hey, the post feels shorter but is still chock-full of good stuff so job well done, George! Especially I like that 25 small town thing. Kinda itchy for a road trip one day relatively soon and those might play into it, well, some of them any how!
Thanks as always for the good reading and entertainment!
Hi from the huge and really nicely renovated Chicago Hyatt Regency. No suite upgrade but a really nice room, 2,000 rooms sold out, what recession lol.
I am really surprised which article will hit a nerve. This time it was the small towns article and I almost did not include it.
Looking forward to the architecture boat tour…I think it is tonight but it may be tomorrow night and I may have double booked me with something else. Will confirm shortly.
Hopefully I get to to the Friday post and see how this works out and reevaluate the Tue/Fri vs bigly Fri post.
What bioluminescence looks like in the rain: https://twitter.com/schuld_eth/status/1805619118764441678