Success Story: Utilizing Miles & Factors to Bookend a Group Tour with Aspirational Flights

Ever since my safari and gorilla trekking journey to Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda in 2023, I’d been itching to go on one other unique trip.

Sri Lanka had been on my radar since COVID instances – whereas being caught at residence, I went down the YouTube rabbit gap watching hours of journey movies and Sri Lanka stood out as a hidden gem. Near India but providing its personal distinctive character, Sri Lanka captured my curiosity with its pure landscapes, peaceable Buddhist heritage, numerous nationwide parks, and exquisite seashores.

Having been within the Miles & Factors house for a number of years now, The Maldives has adorned my journey imaginative and prescient board for fairly a while. With its brief proximity to Sri Lanka – a mere 90 minute flight away – I believed it could be a missed alternative if I didn’t reap the benefits of exploring it whereas I used to be so shut by.

Right here’s a breakdown of how I leveraged factors to e-book a visit to Sri Lanka and The Maldives for a fraction of the price.

Reserving My Journey & Attending to Sri Lanka

Whereas my companion and I typically discover the world collectively, our journey thresholds differ.

My journey into small group journey started in 2019 with G Adventures. These small group excursions have allowed me to go to extra unique locations with different like-minded journey companions and the consolation of a neighborhood information.

I discover that they supply a superb stability of journey and comfort, with all of the logistics taken care of, which lets me fulfill my adventurous facet even when not touring with my companion.

Having beforehand completed 9 excursions with this firm, naturally, I checked out their journey catalogue and shortly booked this 14-day Sri Lanka and Maldives itinerary, which included eight days in Sri Lanka and 6 on their Maldives Dhoni Cruise boat.

With my residence base in Vancouver, I knew that one in all my finest choices could be to fly from Seattle on Singapore Airways. I took a brief Air Canada flight from Vancouver to Seattle and stayed in a single day at Marriott’s newly acquired Skybridge Seattle Airport Lodge.

I selected this lodge based mostly on its proximity to Seattle Airport– I might simply stroll immediately there. Whereas this lodge is present process renovations, it didn’t have an effect on me as I arrived round 10:30pm and left the subsequent morning round 5:30am for my morning flight to Singapore.

I began by flying from Seattle to Colombo by way of Singapore on Singapore Airways enterprise class for 110,000 Aeroplan factors and $87 in taxes and costs, for a money worth equal of roughly $8,000.

I took benefit of the E-book the Cook dinner service and pre-ordered the salmon filet, which was scrumptious.

Shortly after I arrange my mattress, a flight attendant who was passing a drink over me to position it on the desk near the window unintentionally spilled the remaining drinks on her tray throughout me and my bedding.

She and the Cabin Service Director have been extraordinarily apologetic, and after I modified my garments they usually modified my bedding for me, they provided me a $75 (SGD) present card to Singapore Airways’s onboard store. It was a really good gesture, and didn’t have an effect on my opinion of the flight in any respect and I appreciated their concern.

Coincidentally, I had the identical factor occur to me on an Air Canada flight final yr, so now I all the time have a change of garments shut by after I journey.

Group Tour in Sri Lanka

After a four-hour layover in Singapore Changi Airport, I slept a lot of the method on my second leg flight to Colombo and arrived in Negombo, simply north of the capital metropolis of Colombo, a couple of days earlier than the tour began.

For the reason that historical lion fortress rock of Sigiriya was not included in my itinerary, and I had seen numerous YouTube movies that confirmed me that this was not-to-be missed, I organized for a neighborhood information to select me up at my lodge and take me to Sigiriya a few three-hours’ drive away.

After this, I returned again to Negombo to satisfy my group. There have been 14 of us in whole, consisting largely of Canadian, British, Australian vacationers.

There have been a couple of {couples}, nonetheless like lots of my earlier journeys with this firm, there have been many solo girls vacationers of their 30s, 40s and 50s. We gelled instantly and shortly grew to become like a touring household as we toured Sri Lanka collectively.

Highlights included the Instagram-famous mountain city of Ella and seeing child elephants in Udawalawe Nationwide Park. I knew that it was going to be good, however Sri Lanka fully surpassed my expectations as one of many cleanest and safest-feeling nations that I’ve ever been to.

Yacht Tour in The Maldives

After this portion of the tour ended, three of us carried on to The Maldives portion of the tour with the flight organized by the journey firm on Sri Lankan Airways.

We have been picked up by a young boat on the Malé airport and transported to our yacht, the place 9 new vacationers joined us. Our group of 12 was accompanied by six crew members.

I had my very own spacious air-conditioned cabin with an hooked up rest room, which I discovered to be very comfy.

We spent the week crusing between the atolls and reefs, with two every day snorkeling excursions and different actions, comparable to exploring inhabited and uninhabited islands, seashore picnics and sunbathing on sandbars.

Probably the most stunning a part of my remark of The Maldives was how far aside all the pieces is– we’d oftentimes sail for 3 or 4 hours and never see one other boat, island, or sandbar.

Lots of the resorts that we did see, together with a few of the well-known luxurious resorts, have been fairly tiny and constructed over a really distant sandbar with nothing else in sight.

I’m actually glad that I selected to see The Maldives by way of boat, as I consider that I noticed a lot greater than most individuals would have seen. Regardless of the fantastic thing about the resorts, I do know that I might be bored and really feel fairly remoted after a day or two.

Flying Again House with Qatar Airways

On the way in which residence, I flew from Malé to Seattle by way of Doha on Qatar Airways.

I had an eight-hour in a single day layover in Doha, and took benefit of the quiet rooms within the new Al Mourjan Backyard Enterprise Lounge, the place I used to be given a personal room to relaxation for a most of six hours.

The chair within the room was fairly uncomfortable, which is one thing I used to be anticipating from studying earlier critiques, in order I used to be being led to my non-public room by the attendant, I made a psychological observe of the place they stored the additional blankets so I might return and seize some if I wanted to sleep on the ground– which I ended up doing.

After a couple of hours of sleep, I made my method to the departure gate and bought to expertise the notorious Qatar Airways QSuites – well known as the very best enterprise class product on this planet.

I used 85,000 Avios and paid $484 in taxes and costs for this whole journey residence from Malé, price a whopping money worth equal of $10,000+.

Right here’s a breakdown of how I booked the flights:

As soon as I landed in Seattle, I had a fast two-hour layover and hopped on my brief flight again to Vancouver with Air Canada, which I paid with money.

Though I didn’t spend an exorbitant amount of cash, I used to be capable of acknowledge unimaginable worth by leveraging the ability of Miles & Factors, offering me with the money equal of $18,000+ in flights for this journey alone.

Conclusion

Wanting again, this journey stands amongst my most memorable journey experiences.

The flights have been distinctive, Sri Lanka captivated me fully, and exploring the Maldives by yacht proved to be a sensible selection to enrich my journey preferences.

What started as a tour with strangers developed into significant friendships, and I’m wanting ahead to planning my subsequent journey with G Adventures to a different a part of the world.