{"id":262,"date":"2011-05-23T17:04:29","date_gmt":"2011-05-23T17:04:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/?p=262"},"modified":"2011-05-23T17:04:29","modified_gmt":"2011-05-23T17:04:29","slug":"starwood-preferred-guest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/?p=262","title":{"rendered":"Starwood Preferred Guest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paying for hotels is always something that has been difficult for me.\u00a0 I hate the idea of paying big dollars to stay somewhere for about 9 hours.\u00a0 Therefore as a result of my cheapness I’ve stayed in some pretty gnarly hotels.\u00a0 On my recent trip to North Carolina I stayed in a Howard Johnson Express hotel.\u00a0 The $50 pricetag was the first attraction, but I should have run and hid upon arrival.<\/p>\n

The hotel had a “Night Check-in area.”\u00a0 This was\u00a0 comprised of a very small room that had a window to the night attendant at the hotel.\u00a0 The window between the attendant and I was doubtlessly bulletproof.\u00a0 I paid the $50 with a credit card because they also offered a continental breakfast (not all of these are created equally).\u00a0 The room had nice new carpet, nice granite counter tops in the sink, but the blanket on the bed was nonetheless 30+ years old.\u00a0 I was also terrified by the sight of the shower because it looked like I saw a few oysters growing on the wall of the shower. (I wore sandals)<\/p>\n

When I crawled into bed I definitely wore socks, shorts and a shirt to bed.\u00a0 Falling asleep was rather difficult as well.\u00a0 It was at this moment that I realized that I needed the Starwood Preferred Guest\u00ae Credit Card from American Express<\/a>.\u00a0 The breakfast topped it off in the morning. When I arrived I expected the normal continental breakfast found at most hotels, but it was not what I expected.\u00a0 The danishes had been there for at least a week and the cereal had not been replaced in at least a\u00a0 year.\u00a0 The only two options for cereal were Corn Flakes and Cocoa Puffs. I opted for a bowl of packaged oatmeal as I knew it should be fine.<\/p>\n

The Starwood Preferred Guest card offers 10,000 Starpoints for the first purchase.\u00a0 If you then spend an additional $15,000 on the card you will receive an additional 15,000 Starpoints as a bonus.\u00a0 This will leave you with 40,000 Starpoints in total.\u00a0 These points can be transferred to many airlines in 20,000 blocks which also include a 5,000 bonus.\u00a0 So let’s assume that you get the card, meet the 40,000 Starpoints, that could equal 50,000 miles on an airline.<\/p>\n

The hotels that pertain to the Starwood program aren’t going to have Oysters growing on the shower or bedspreads that are 30+ years old.\u00a0 I recommend the card as it is a great start to your frequent flying adventures.\u00a0 You can use the card for hotels or for airlines which makes its flexibility unmatched. You can see their hotels at their website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Don’t forget that they waive the annual fee for the first year and you can call and cancel before the second year comes around.\u00a0 You can also call and ask for a retention bonus or tell them that you\u00a0 will cancel. Find out where you would like to wanderlust by checking their hotels that fall in each of the categories. <\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paying for hotels is always something that has been difficult for me.\u00a0 I hate the idea of paying big dollars to stay somewhere for about 9 hours.\u00a0 Therefore as a result of my cheapness I’ve stayed in some pretty gnarly … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[5,18,24],"tags":[41,66,71,73,87],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1DhXV-4e","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldwanderlusting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}