In Part I of this post I went over the process I use and recommend for planning out an year of earning and maximizing Airline Miles. (The very same process can be applied for Hotel Points too). In that post I showed how I came upon my ‘gap’ – miles that I had to work for; those that were not in my planned travel or covered by my usual travel run rate. This is where the work is and requires creative efforts to get to your goals.
As I maintained before, …

As I have stated time and again, Priority Club Pointsbreak is probably the best hotel promotion out there. The list of hotels has been updated again for stays until November 30. To see the whole list, go to thisLINK and log in.
There are a few bargains on the list: just 5000 points for an Intercontinental (IC) that normally costs atleast 30K points!
US
INTERCONTINENTAL DALLAS
Middle East
INTERCONTINENTAL BAHRAIN
Asia
INTERCONTINENTAL CHONGQING, China
Dominican Republic
INTERCONTINENTAL V CENTENARIO SANTO DOMINGO
Malta
INTERCONTINENTAL MALTA
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Also, I would like to break the news about the new fitness and recreational amenities for our guests: We are offering a P90X class every Wednesday at 6:00pm. … In addition, we have partnered with The Lakes at El Segundo , a local golf course close to the hotel, that will offer a complimentary medium bucket of balls for the driving range to our guests.

Author’s note: TopGuest has brought to my attention that ‘drive-by’ check-ins to their program can result in people being barred from TopGuest. My intention was never to promote anything that would be against their Terms and Conditions. This was supposed to poke fun at people who ‘drive-by’ for points. I encourage everyone to read my clarification post.
Who would not like to get Hotel Points for just driving by a hotel? No need to check-in. Heck, don’t even bother to park. Just drive by… and wear your seatbelt and obey the …

Takes less than a minute. Enter for the one million bonus point sweepstakes. LINK. Well, Hilton advertizes a lot of benefits but to me, the million points are more important.
The prize also includes

A trip for two to Beverly Hills, California
Four-day, three-night stay at the Beverly Hilton
First-class round-trip airfare
Tickets for two to the Universal Studios HollywoodSM VIP Experience
Tickets for two to an upcoming red carpet premiere of a Universal Pictures movie, including limo service to and from the event

You can get one entry by clicking on “Enter Now” and one entry …

Priority club Pointsbreak is probably the best hotel promotion out there. One can stay at various properties including the top class Intercontinentals for a measly 5000 Priority Club points per night.
The list is now updated for stays until September 30. The list includes four Intercontinentals (IC):
USA
INTERCONTINENTAL SUITES HOTEL CLEVELAND
Middle East
INTERCONTINENTAL AL JUBAIL
INTERCONTINENTAL AL KHOBAR
Asia
INTERCONTINENTAL JAKARTA MIDPLAZA
However the ICs do not last very long. So hurry, if you want to book any of these ICs.
 
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Priority Club Pointsbreak is arguably one of the best hotel award promotions. One can redeem reward nights at various Priority Club (PC) properties throughout the world for just 5000 PC points ( worth ~$30).
The Pointsbreak list is normally updated every 2 months or so and is valid for the next 2 months. The last time the list was updated, was on Feb 28, 2011. However the new list is has been published today and it is valid only till May 15!
Incidentally, PC announced significant changes to their program last month. …

I wrote earlier that Hyatt Points are valued at least 1.3cents/pt. Discover America is back with its annual getaway and present a chance to buy Hyatt points at less than 1cent/pt.
 

The Hyatt point purchase deals on April 15 are as follows
24,000 Hyatt points for $250, ~1 cent/pt
30,000 Hyatt points for $333. ~1.1 cent/pt
36,000 Hyatt points for $415, ~1.1cent/pt
69,000 Hyatt points for $778, ~1.1 cent/pt

The deal becomes sweeter if you have an Amex card as purchases with Amex card are given a 10% discount on the aforestated price.
Note …

Hilton has announced their promotionfor 2011-Q2: from April 1 to Jun 30, 2011. Registering for the promotion basically gives you 1000 bonus points per night. It is nothing to be really excited about. Hilton’s lowest category hotel redemption starts at 7500 points per night. So even a category 1 redemption would require at least 8 nights. And a top notch Hilton hotel for 50K points would require 50 nights! Valuing HHonors points at $6 per 1000 points, this promotion is essentially worth $6 per night.

Of the other hotel chains only …

Booking complex award itineraries, made up of multiple cities and multiple connecting flights can be very painful. I just booked such a trip myself. When I started out I had no idea how cumbersome and time consuming it would be. I really thought I had it easy. After all, I had enough miles on all three Airline Alliances to redeem for the award trip. So I thought I would have multiple options to choose from. Instead it turned out to be a major time drain and resulted in a complex …