Planning for Europe

In planning for our upcoming trip to Europe, I've been focused on transportation, then accommodation, then events and experiences, in that order.

Transportation has loomed largest from the first days of planning. After all, the entire trip depends on a start date and an end date, meaning airline tickets. The goal was to redeem Delta SkyMiles for round-trip business class travel for both of us. I had a lot of miles piled up, but Delta has been steadily devaluing miles over the years, so I knew my banked miles would not be enough.

To attack this problem, I got a Delta credit card from American Express. Between the healthy sign-up bonus and all the spending we were able to do on the card, the SkyMiles balance quickly rose to the point where I THOUGHT I would have enough miles.

As it turned out, I barely made it. The absolute LOWEST round-trip fare for travel to Europe in business class (on Delta, at least) is 140,000 miles. I had over 300,000 miles (but not much over) so I had a little cushion which, fortunately, I didn't need. With taxes and fees of just over $50 per ticket, we were booked for our air travel, which established the bookends for the trip.

Just for fun, I ran a search on Delta's web site to price the same flights using cash instead of miles. Our two round-trip tickets were priced at over $19,000. At almost 7 cents per mile, I think we got a great deal.