Part I
It all started out when my mileage hit 100k. Wow- where was I going to go???? What adventures awaited my husband and I? What exotic place could I go to??? The wheels started turning… I stumbled upon Flyertalk.com and that was all she wrote. I got smart. I became fanatical about miles. Next thing I knew- I had 200k miles- wow, it was time to start planning! I looked at the SkyMiles map to see what exotic locations were offered… Hmmm…. Seychelles looked like a good choice- I can get as far as Mauritius and take a local plane to the Seychelles. No problem. Then I did a little research and learned that the El Nino caused coral bleaching and killed most of the coral in that area and it sucked. So, I started looking for other places. Hmm- Continental goes to the Far East and Pacific- that’s an option. We are both divers, so I wanted to go somewhere magnificent- Palau- the best in the Pacific. Could I get there- YES!!!! I called up and asked about availability. The SLC folks are really great. Although I was just on a “fishing expedition” trying to find out what the availability looked like, the smiled and gave me all the help I needed. I found out that I will need to call exactly at 331 days out, at midnight to secure two seats- Palau is a hard place to get to and Continental isn’t exactly “generous” with award seats. So, I kept saving my miles, working on my status, and started working out the preliminary land portion of the planning. I decided a live aboard dive boat would the best. I contacted a dive travel company who responded very quickly to my information requests- he gave me good ideas and names of boats, was very helpful. My newfound friend. I narrowed my choices to two boats: the Palau Aggressor, and the Ocean Hunter. We spoke a few more times about airfare options in case I couldn’t get all the way to Palau on miles, and then the conversation got into payment. Uh oh: his operation only accepted cash for deposits and payments- Flags went up for me real fast and I couldn’t hang up fast enough. But, he did give me some good info, which I used later. His loss for not taking a credit card…

So, now that I was getting close to having enough miles, I decided to go on my own for the travel itinerary. This will be interesting. I arrange trips for 80 people to Europe for my ski club (Fagowee Ski Club- you know- the drinking club with a skiing problem), I could surely set this up. I contacted the boat, asked about availability and explained my issues with the SkyMiles and how I am going to attempt to get tickets. She gave me the available dates for the boat, and I sat patiently waiting for the day to come to call up SLC for my tickets. Starting on April 15th, I called up for tickets. SLC told me to first check from Guam to Palau- that was the hardest to get to- If I could get that leg, the rest should be no problem. So, I started calling. April 15th, no luck- coach only. April 16th, no luck- no seats at all. April 17th- one seat coach, one seat business class. April 18th- getting better- two seats to Yap, but none to Palau. Cost from Yap to Palau- $889/person coach. Continental wants to rape me- Lets keep trying. April 19th- one coach seat. April 20th-April 25th - nothing. April 26th - hallelujah- I hit the jackpot. Two business seats GUA-ROR on March 22nd !!!! Book them! How about NRT-GUM? Positive hit- two business class seats on NW airlines. How about NRT- USA? Anytime between March 15th to March 20th? The agent said- “I have two business class seats from JFK-NRT non-stop on the 18th - would you like those? At this point, cube mates are freaking because I am jumping up and down holding a phone to my ear as I yell “YES!!! YES!!! Book them!!!! Book them!!!!! But, there was nothing from Washington to NYC to get me to that flight, but hold on- would you go one day early and overnight in NYC? It’s within 24 hours of the Narita flight, so it isn’t counted as a layover. I said- you bet! I will take the free stopover to graze through NYC for an evening! So, my itinerary was set:
DLT 1756 3/17/05 DCA TH 2:30pm LGA TH 3:33pm
NW 17 3/18/05 JFK F12:00pm NRT 3/19/05 S 4:05pm
NW 74 3/22/05 NRT Tu 9:30am GUM Tu 2:10pm
CO 953 3/22/05 GUM Tu 7:40pm ROR Tu 8:50pm

Now all I had to do was call back in a few weeks to get home…

May 9th. Called SLC and started working my magic. I was in luck. ROR-GUM- 1st class tickets available. GUM-NRT business class tickets available on NW! But, no tickets out of NRT late enough for the connection- but wait, if I overnight in NRT, I can make a Delta flight to Atlanta in Business class- book it!!!!! Book it all!!!! So, here was my return trip:
CO 954 4/1/04 ROR F1:15am GUM F4:45am
NW 73 4/1/04 GUM F3:10pm NRT F6:05pm
DLT 56 4/2/04 NRT S4:30pm ATL S3:25pm
DLT 1472* 4/2/04 ATL S5:30pm DCA S7:12pm

I had the perfect itinerary!!! I couldn’t believe it!!! I called the Ocean Hunter and put down my deposit! I was all set. The next thing I did was get my hotel reservations. Again, through FlyerTalk, I was able to get some great deals. I learned about certificates to use at the Century Hyatt- I got rooms that were going for $250/night for $139/night, and that included taxes! I got my reservations completed at the Century Hyatt and then got a reservation for Narita, at the Excel Tokyo as directed by the FlyerTalk members. I made my final reservations at the Belvedere in NYC for the night (close to Times Square and cheap, but very nice), and then the Carolines for the couple of extra nights in Koror. I was all set!!!! Mission accomplished. Now all I had to do was wait for 90 days out to get my seat reservations. 73AB for NW17 and seats 86AB for the NRT-GUM trips. 90.5 days out, I called up and to my surprise, got the requested seats! I couldn’t wait to tell hubby! I had pretty much kept him in the dark about the whole trip. He knew we were going somewhere, but I kept the details a secret until our 10th anniversary. We went to dinner and I gave him the itinerary- he freaked! He was speechless. He couldn’t wait!

The time proceeded to slow down like sands in an hourglass… tick…. Tick…. Tick… Finally, we got to the last week and we started packing. With all the scuba gear we had to pack, then having to dress for cold in Tokyo and Narita and NY, plus having to dress for hot tropics, our bags were bulging. We finally got everything packed (god help the screeners if they opened our bags- they would never get it all back in!) and we were set to go. I didn’t get much sleep before the big day, although I had to be at work early to put in a ½ day, so I was up way before the alarm. Got to work, but as far as everyone else was concerned, I was already gone. I finalized some last minute details, drudged through my last meetings, and then it came- the call that my “driver” was outside waiting for me. I logged off, locked my desk, put my “touch you die” sign on my computer and off I went. We got to the Washington Reagan Airport and went inside with all our bags. Being Gold (very proud of that- not platinum like some of you guys, but it is better than being a “plebe”), I got to use the “special line” which was much shorter than the commoner’s line. We got our tickets and off we went. I knew that because we were flying the Delta Shuttle, we weren’t “entitled” to the Crown Room, but I decided to try getting in anyway, since our itinerary was International Business. The woman kind of looked at me, I smiled, and was all giddy sharing with her the fact that it was my husbands first time and we were taking a big trip for our 10th anniversary. It worked- she gave us the “we will call your flight at boarding- make yourselves comfortable”. Hubby was instantly spoiled. We sat down for a few drinks (bloody mary for me, Jack and coke for him), and then after the third one, we get the call for the flight. We sundered over to the gate and away we went. The flight was pretty much empty, so we had the row to ourselves. A snack was offered, but since we just ate, we didn’t grab one. I know there was an apple involved, since I looked around and I saw a bunch of them. We got our water and settled in for the 40-minute flight. We got to the airport and our luggage was waiting for us in the terminal- apparently, they were on an earlier flight and beat us to NY. Not comforting that our bags with 2k worth of scuba gear were just sitting there unattended, but they were there…

We grabbed the cab and we headed to the Belvedere. 40 minutes later and $35, we were at the hotel. Traffic was actually bad because several cross town streets were closed due to the St. Patrick’s Day parade. Being it was March 17th, St. Patrick’s Day, we did expect a little more partying going on, but it was rather subdued… We headed off to Girabaldi’s for the best Pizza in town, and then headed over to Little Italy to Ferrera’s for desert and cookies for our journey. We then went over to a German restaurant for a beer, then back to Mid Town for a quick green beer at an Irish pub to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. Back to the Belvedere hotel we went to rest for our long flight. Although the room was small, it was clean, the bed comfy, and it was two blocks from Times Square, and it was only $130/night after taxes, which I think is quite the deal for mid-town.

The next morning, we grabbed a hotel Town Car and got over to JFK. It took us about 50 minutes and was $45 for the service. We used 180k Delta Sky Miles for business class (we got tickets last year, so it was before they changed it to 240k for business class- lucky break for us) and we booked exactly 331 days out to ensure we got seats for a tough destination that has very limited availability for using miles. We got to JFK and proceeded to the NW Crown Room- what a treat- the vacation was officially started with a bloody mary and some fruit. We boarded NW17 on time and got to the upper deck when we settled in and received our pre-flight champagne. Very tasty. We took off on time and the flight was pretty uneventful. I must say, the new world-class seat is very very comfy and much improved from the old seats. You also had on-demand video and music, and the individual screens were pretty darn good. The meals were excellent (for airline food), and the service in the upper deck was amazing. We got to know the FA’s and they were extremely pleasant and helpful. They even whipped up some mid-flight pizzas that were pretty tasty. We arrived a little ahead of time, and got into Narita to go through customs. The line was long, as we had arrived the same time as 8 kazillion other 747s from other countries were arriving around the same time. After 1.5 hours in line, we got our luggage and headed to the airport limo bus at platform 14 to go to our hotel. They are quite efficient, and got us loaded and off we went. Unfortunately, there was a traffic jam and it took us 3.5 hours to get to our hotel in Shinjuku. It sucked. We were tired and just wanted to eat and go to bed.

We finally got to the Century Park Hyatt and decided we were too tired to eat, so we just went to bed. They thankfully upgraded us to the Executive floor, so the rooms were a little bit bigger and more amenities. The next morning, we got up, found Starbucks and went off to find the Kimuro Shiatsu Institute for a massage. The massage was a little lame- nothing spectacular, but I got to cross it off my list of “things to do before I die”. Mission accomplished. We then just tooled around Tokyo for the day, ate strange foods, shopped, drank Sake, and hung out. I like the plastic food, but you still can’t figure out what it is… The next day, we went to the Tokyo station and picked up a quick ride to Mt. Fuji- we checked ahead of time about the visibility and it was excellent, so we splurged on the bullet train at $240 r/t for both of us in non-reserved seating. The train was pretty empty, so it wasn’t an issue. The trip was really cool- that thing goes FAST! We got to the station and we got pictures, then had a quick hotdog and beer (which was EXCELLENT- I love Japanese beer- very surprisingly good) and picked up the next return train. Not much to do around the station, so we did the tourist pictures and ate. The ride back was just as cool and we were back at the Tokyo station about 3 hours after we left. We then went to electric city where all the electronics are, and decided that everyone sold the same thing for the same inflated price, and bought nothing but a Coke from a vending machine- it was pretty amazing what they have there though- way cool electronics and phones. That night, we met up with TokyoRich for a drink at the British Pub- We had to vacate after some japanese woman started barfing right onto the floor next to us- we were inches from it... After the walk back to the hotel and some enlightening conversation about Japanese Culture, we said our goodbyes and parted ways- it was my first FlyerTalk meeting and he was a really great guy! The next day, it was up early to go to the airport for a 9:40 flight to Guam.