2009 travel year in review

By: Ben Schlappig

Updated: June 17, 2021
Published: December 12, 2009

13 comments

I’m finishing up my travels pretty early this year. Unless something comes up last minute, I doubt I’ll be flying anywhere till January. Nonetheless it has been one heck of a year. In terms of travel it has been my busiest yet. If my math is right I flew around 256,000 “butt in seat” miles and about 220 segments this year. With flying, credit cards, and promotions, I earned upwards of a million miles this year, which is by far the most yet. This was the first year where I really branched out beyond flying to earn miles and pursued credit/debit card sign-up bonuses, taking advantage of every promotion, etc.

I really don’t want to know how many redeyes I took this year (I’ll let the circles under my eyes speak for themselves), but I hated every last one of ’em, as “profitable” and time saving as they were. Every year I tell myself “there’s no way I’ll top last year’s total,” but every year I’m on the road more and more.

Anyway, there’s no better time to reflect on some of the travel highlights of 2009. If you’re a long time reader you probably remember many of them, but I figured I’d provide some links for those that are interested.

First the major trips with lengthy trip reports:

And some of my other travels with twists and turns:

“But my friend is a Premier” (fine, that was last year but it’s still too good to leave out)
20+ FlyerTalkers on the same regional jet can only mean trouble….
And the flight attendant of the year award goes to….
And the passenger of the year award goes to….
My stay at the Holiday Inn JFK
Oh, and how could I forget? Bump, bump, and bump, (just a few of them, of course)

So, what’s in the books for next year? Well, unfortunately nothing yet. Other than the normal mileage runs on United, it’s too early for me to plan too much as quite a bit is still up in the air (no pun intended). Realistically I’m hoping to visit Dubai, Buenos Aires, and Dublin next year (totally random, I know), and hopefully explore a bit more of Australia beyond Sydney. My schedule for next year should firm up a bit within the next few weeks so that I can start planning travel. I’m all for earning and burning, and I’ve just been doing lots more earning than burning lately!

Would love to hear about your travel and mileage year. Good thanks to all the promotions? Bad due to the economy and cutbacks at work?

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lucky New Member

December 14, 2009, 11:47 pm

Nice to read all the stories! Have exams right now, but I promise to try and research my total spend along with a breakdown of mileage earning activities (although it might be vague) towards the end of the week.

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HunterSFO Guest

December 14, 2009, 6:52 pm

well thanks to your blog getting me started I went from 0 (in May) to just over 254,000 EQM so far on United. I still have one more trip home before the end of the year for another 2,000 EQM. I also have some EQM on CO and took 1 round trip on WN. I earned HHonors Gold via fast-track and stayed enough to also have earned it "the hard way" before abandoning HHonors for Hyatt where I status matched to Diamond in October. Since the status match I have stayed enough at Hyatt to earn it outright. I've now got about 4 Chase checking accounts, 1 key bank, and a mileage plus visa credit card. My immediate family has only been flying in F since the summer. I did my first award redemption (p.s. first over thanksgiving) and had my first visit to the IFL. I also booked an INTL F trip on LH for April 2010 and did not encounter any starnet blocking! All in all a fun year. I have two work trips and 3 MR scheduled for January. I picked the double RDM in Sept 2010 as an elite choice option so I will fly the heck out of that month to maximize that benefit. Still debating whether or not to bother with CO plat this year as the relationship between UA and CO has changed. It's been fun and I wish everyone happy holidays and a great new year!

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Bschaff1 Guest

December 14, 2009, 10:28 am

Ben, I would had flown a lot more than 300k this year. My year in summary was 184k flown with easily re-qualifying for 1k and DL Platinum and earning about 600k miles in the process. I also branched into the hotel programs and got Hyatt Diamond and will have SPG Platinum after 1 more stay and earned 12free nights in the process. For 2010 I have 77k EQMs booked on United, however if we see DEQM again I'll be at 123k EQM. I also have 34k carrying over on Delta and am planning 12 night Hyatt mattress run in January. With so much already paid for if AA decides to do DEQM, I just may have to shoot for EXP.

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Fern Guest

December 13, 2009, 2:45 pm

What was your (or your parents) spend?

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CP@YOW Member

December 12, 2009, 10:42 pm

I had an incredible travel year. I've been CO Silver for a couple years, but this year stuck with Mileage Plus and went from 0 to 1K (as of yesterday!!), roughly 45,000 on AC, 3,000 on BD, 25,000 on UA and 25,000 from double EQM, all on leisure travel. The highlights were Hong Kong and Moscow. A year ago, my target was to just make my usual 25,000 miles. I never, ever thought I could make it to 1K. The worst part is that I now have to admit the true extent of my addiction, as opposed to rationalizing based on the cost/benefit (i.e. it's worth spending money to get to 1P because of mileage bonuses and *G lounge access and it's worth spending money to get to 1K because of the upgrades). There's not much more I can achieve this month, but I still really, really want/need to go to the airport and get on a plane and go somewhere. It's hard because flying from Canada sucks as the fares are generally way too high to justify mileage running. I requalified for SPG Plat and HH Gold, but I've also discovered Hyatt thanks to this blog and had my first few stays in the past month. Hyatt's UA bonuses are insanely good, not to mention the easy free nights. A heartfelt thanks, lucky, for all your effort in maintaining One Mile at a Time.

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