Hi,
I'm planning to travel from Seattle to NYC for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I have a bit over 63K Delta miles, and it seems like now might be a good time to use some. I'm pretty new to this, so I'm not sure if I'd be getting good value though. In terms of cost, I seem to be looking at at least $750 RT for Thanksgiving and Christmas looks just as bad. Looking at award tickets, I see only 60K mile awards. Even for Christmas, where I could be a bit more flexible (say fly out Dec 19th or 20th and fly back Jan 4th or 5th) I see mostly 60K awards. I also looked on Alaska, since I understand you can use Delta miles to redeem flights on AS and I could fly into Newark, but it's pretty much the same story. Does it make sense to use that many miles on one trip? One benefit I see is that assuming I'm willing to spend 60K miles, I can have my choice of flight time, whereas if I spend money I could be looking at $100+ of a difference if I wanted a specific flight. I guess my main question is should I go ahead and use the miles or is there something else worth holding on to them for that has a better value? I've heard that they have good value for international travel, but don't plan on traveling internationally any time soon.
Another thing to consider is that with the double miles promotion out of SEA, I'd have enough miles for medallion status with one more trip. However I still need around $1500 MQDs. Even with the insane prices of these flights I don't think I could reasonably spend that much in the two trips. I suppose I could find some way to make it (take a weekend trip somewhere?) but is it even worth it? I mostly fly SEA-JFK, and read that they don't even upgrade their medallions on that route anymore. Considering that is it worth putting in the effort to qualify?
Sorry for all the questions, hope someone can help at least a bit.
I'm planning to travel from Seattle to NYC for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I have a bit over 63K Delta miles, and it seems like now might be a good time to use some. I'm pretty new to this, so I'm not sure if I'd be getting good value though. In terms of cost, I seem to be looking at at least $750 RT for Thanksgiving and Christmas looks just as bad. Looking at award tickets, I see only 60K mile awards. Even for Christmas, where I could be a bit more flexible (say fly out Dec 19th or 20th and fly back Jan 4th or 5th) I see mostly 60K awards. I also looked on Alaska, since I understand you can use Delta miles to redeem flights on AS and I could fly into Newark, but it's pretty much the same story. Does it make sense to use that many miles on one trip? One benefit I see is that assuming I'm willing to spend 60K miles, I can have my choice of flight time, whereas if I spend money I could be looking at $100+ of a difference if I wanted a specific flight. I guess my main question is should I go ahead and use the miles or is there something else worth holding on to them for that has a better value? I've heard that they have good value for international travel, but don't plan on traveling internationally any time soon.
Another thing to consider is that with the double miles promotion out of SEA, I'd have enough miles for medallion status with one more trip. However I still need around $1500 MQDs. Even with the insane prices of these flights I don't think I could reasonably spend that much in the two trips. I suppose I could find some way to make it (take a weekend trip somewhere?) but is it even worth it? I mostly fly SEA-JFK, and read that they don't even upgrade their medallions on that route anymore. Considering that is it worth putting in the effort to qualify?
Sorry for all the questions, hope someone can help at least a bit.