So our March 2023 trip was our big "return to travel" vacation and was mostly funded by the refunded AM and leftover tickets from our April 2020 booking. But since the earning had dried up here, I figured once we used those ~40,000 points that we wouldn't be able to redeem for any Disney-related stuff for a long while. Maybe for our 2025 trip.
Therefore we switched to focusing on Scene+ points, as my husband works for Sobeys so we weren't going to stop spending all our money there. He got an AMEX to get points for every $ spent (sure wish base points were a thing!) and we have managed to save 130,000 points (worth $1300 in travel). No small feat, but a chunk of that was the sign-up bonus for the cc. This will hopefully pay half our hotel room.
What I'm getting at, is that I never expected to earn enough points in 2023 to be able to redeem for anything, let alone 2 things! I earned enough points through the promotions (thanks to all who mentioned them here in case I hadn't seen them on my app yet!) to get flights for 2 and 1 of the 5-day discounted tickets!
1) AM flights Hfx to WDW: Approx. $1770 on AC site = 10,378 AM + ~$555 CAD. Now I know flights aren't the best use due to the double fees situation, but that's $1200 I couldn't pass up!
2) Discounted 5-day adult ticket May 13, 2024 start date = Approx. $705 CAD direct through WDW, and $750 through AM, but used 7501 points to get it for $0.
Bonus - all the gift cards I've bought at Dollarama to get points, have been $50 WDW. So, we just bought some with Christmas money and it was enough to buy my husband's ticket directly through WDW! Yes it's cash "OOP" but I was gonna buy the gift cards to get the points anyway... so it feels like a deal/discount.
Sorry about the novel, I really am pleased as punch that this next trip will hopefully be our cheapest ever!
Happy New Year all, and here's to more points in 2024!
Kim