May 11, 2011
After 3 nights in Hilton Lake Taupo, we headed back to Auckland downtown for our last night and visited another famous attraction along the route-Waitomo glowworm caves.Tickets were purchased from their website with 10% discount. Unfortunately, photo was not allowed in the cave. To be honestly, I was disappointed by the tour, so my suggestion was, if you had seen glowworm before, skip it. There were 2 other caves around same area, and a lot more active and fun, If I had enough time, I would choose the other 2 caves.
We stayed at All Season Auckland, Accor Group for our last night because I had some hotelclub reward dollar and only paid $20 out of pocket. never stayed at this brand before, but judging from the price, I did not expect too much. The location was excellent, right in the center of everything, but even I was prepared, I did not expect room to be that small AND with kitchen.
There was a interest Chinese cafe right next to the hotel” Red Guards Cafe”, waitress were dressed Chairman Mao’s Red Guards uniforms, but taste? Not very good.
Posted by Troy under 2011 Trip, Oceania |
May 10, 2011
Air Canada just released lots of seat from YVR-NRT using their A330 flat bed business class, then you can connect to pretty much any where in Asia.
Good luck!
Posted by Troy under Award redemption |
May 10, 2011
Rotorua is the most popular tourist destination in Northern New Zealand and only55 miles north of Lake Taupo, but as I mentioned, driving in New Zealand was not easy, so it took us one and half hour to get there. Lots of things to do in/around town, from exciting activities to water adventure, from Maori culture to Mud pool, accommodation also ranged from cheap hostel to luxury famous “treetop lodge”. Too many to choose from their website. Considering my wife was scared of lots things, we end up chose skyline luge, which was located on the hill with the beautiful view of Rotorua.
Sky swing
After we finished, I looked at map to pick next place and ended up at a small zoo where they advertised “Lion padding”. I like animal so much, that’s why I always want to go to Africa, but I am waiting for my wife to go with me, now we have a baby, then I want to wait my baby to go with us, so I really don’t when we will eventually be there.
We had a quick tour of the small zoo before we saw the lion
Then we saw the lion, but it grew so fast
We left park around dinner time and went to Roturoa town for food. We were so happy to see a Chinese restaurant in town since we hadn’t eaten Chinese food for more than half month already. The door did not open until 5:30pm, but soon after they opened, they put another sign “all reserved, not open to public”. We settled with Japanese food next door.
Posted by Troy under 2011 Trip, Oceania |
May 10, 2011
We decided to stay around Lake Taupo for our first day, hotel concierge suggested us to go Orakei Korako Geyserland, which they claim so amazing and unique. After we got there, it’s just a tiny version “Yellowstone park”
We stayed there for about 1 hour, then went to “Huka Falls”, a tiny version of Niagara Fall. Since all excursions were pretty much identical to Niagara Fall, we did not bother to go, instead, we went to “prawn fishing” . After three hours of hard working, we caught 1 male shrimp!
Posted by Troy under 2011 Trip, Oceania |
May 9, 2011
Another round of Mega bonus is here, log in your Marriott acct to see. Just like their identical properties on earth, their promotion is identical year by year.
Registration must be done by June 30th, for stay between June 1, 2011, and August 31, 2011.
Earn 20,000 bonus points after 15 paid nights + an extra 10,000 after 20 paid nights.
stay 20 nights 25K and then 5 more nights 15K
or stay 2 get 1 free, max 2 for cat 1-4, redeem by Dec 31st, 2011
If you don’t like what you get, you can call to change if you are Gold or Platinum.
Posted by Troy under Marriott |
May 9, 2011
Driving in New Zealand was not too easy because driver was on opposite side, I knew road was on opposite side too, but still felt the difference. It took us more than 4 hours from airport to there, the speed limit was only 65 miles, and it’s single lane road 90% of the time. Although the hotel was called Lake Taupo, it was still few miles away to the lake. Itwas originally called Terraces Hotel, built in 1889,and even now only had 100 rooms and 1 restaurant, but I did not see any heritage part beside photos.
We were upgraded to a Suite, first time as Hilton Diamond. The living room and bedroom size was ok, but bathroom was the smallest I have even seen for a Suite. 2 people standing, I could barely turn. I don’t have much to comment on the hotel because I spent most time outside during the day, but what I can tell was people were very friendly there, so did entire New Zealand. Breakfast was served until 11:00am with buffet style fruit+ cook to order eggs. I had to say, this was one of the best western style breakfast I have ever eaten in my life.
The only negative comment for this hotel was their internet connection speed, it was hard for me to believe a nice hotel in an industrial country could have such unstable slow internet. I don’t know if I will ever back to Lake Taupo area again in the future, but if I do, I will definitely stay here.
Posted by Troy under 2011 Trip, Hilton, Oceania |
May 8, 2011
The best part of these deals is they don’t require airport rental. airline programs in US for rental car miles require airport rental, I know sometimes you get miles for non airport rental, but that’s lucky, I won’t count on it.
1 Europcar for BMI miles, one day rental can get you 1700 BMI miles, you can directly book on flybmi.com, the price is not bad at all.
2 Avis and Lufthansa, they had this promotion last year and now just extend the offer to 12/31/2011
As a base member of Miles & More, Avis will reward you with:
- 1.000 Miles for your second rental
- 1.500 Miles for your third rental
- 2.000 Miles for your 4th to 6th rental
- 2.500 Miles for your 7th to 10th rental
- 3.000 Miles starting with your 11th rental
You can book on any avis website using AWD code mentioned in promotion.
3 Avis and Virgin Atlantic, 1000 miles per rental for most AWD code, I know this is not a best promotion, but if you really have no place to put your miles or short on VS, this is best option.
Posted by Troy under Other Airline Reward Programs, Rental Cars |
May 8, 2011
We woke up 4 am in the morning to catch 6 am ferry to Tahiti to connect our flight to Auckland around 9：00 am. The ferry was a big one because it used to transport both passengers and cars. There were many locals on this ferry, I am assuming most of them were for one day trip in town. They ferry had two sections, dining section and regular seating, but only bread was served at breakfast. The most funny part on this ship was its restroom. I couldn’t tell which one is male or female, so had to wait until someone entered.
Many taxis were waiting at Tahiti dock and the price to PPT airport was 1500 XPF, adding ferry fare for non resident 1365 XPF, moneywise, ferry is the way to go to Moorea. It only took us less than 15 minutes to arrive airport from ferry dock. Besiedes flight to Auckland on Air Tahiti, there was an Air France flight to Los Angeles around same time, so check in area was packed with people. Air Tahiti only opened 4 counters(2 of them for business) for check in, that made check in process even longer, glad I was in Business class. We stayed in their small loungue for sometime and spent our last XPF to buy some “rip off” souvenir. it’s time to say “Goodbye”
Flight time to Auckland was around 5 hours, but these 5 hours made big difference because you crossed international date lane, so one day was gone. New Zealand had the most strict custom on earth, many things can resulted in fine including eggs, fruits, medicine made by animal organ and dirty golf shoes. There were signs to remind you to do get rid off all these things every few steps. Immigration query was long, but lane was moving very quick because visitor didn’t need to do figure print and not many questions were asked. Custom lane was long and slow, every single bag had to go through X ray, it took us more than 1 hour since our arrival to step out the door. We picked up our rental car from Europcar and headed to Lake Taupo.
Posted by Troy under 2011 Trip, Oceania |
May 7, 2011
AA is working hard to promote their Los Angeles/San Francisco hub, in addition to current DEQM promotion btw LAX/SFO-DFW, AA is now offering DEQM + Double Redeemable miles for flight btw LAX/SFO -ORD, registration is required and reservation must be booked after May 6th.
Offer valid for member with address in CA or IL only and only round trip or multi segments trip involves LAX/SFO-ORD will be counted, but unlike LAX/SFO-DFW promotion, flight with LAX-ORD-SFO open jaw will be counted too,
Posted by Troy under American Airlines |
May 6, 2011
You can try to register from here, if you are eligible, you will get rewarding return bonus for just 1 stay including:
2,000 bonus Starpoints
$25 Amazon gift card
or 25% off cat 1-5 redemption valid until 5/31/2012
Posted by Troy under Starwood Hotels |
