A Trip Out To Colorado Springs for BAcon
BAcon
A few months ago, I got an email from Randy Petersen inviting me out to Colorado Springs for the first annual Boarding Area Conference (aka BAcon).
Although I am not a Boarding Area blogger, myself and a few other non-Boarding Area bloggers like The Points Guy, Million Mile Secrets, etc will be attending.
From the schedule posted, Randy has a whole host of activities and speakers set up for us and I am sure I will learn a ton which I can use make this site better. In addition, I am sure the “after-hours” activities with all the other bloggers should be quite fun!
If you don’t already follow me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, I highly encourage you to do so as I will be sharing pictures from BAcon the entire weekend.
Getting To Colorado Springs
Since Randy and Boarding Area are based out of Colorado Springs, BAcon is also being held there.
Outside of Denver and Boulder, I have never been anywhere else in Colorado so I am excited to visit Colorado Springs.
Although United does offer a non-stop flight to Colorado Springs Airport, since it isn’t a major airport, the tickets are fairly expensive. Most of us are just flying into Denver and then driving the 80 miles to Colorado Springs.
Since I have a substantial amount of miles, as usual I opted to burn some to get out to Denver.
I am fully aware that I talk about Southwest way too much but it is really one of the BEST programs for domestic redemptions for 2 reasons.
1) It’s Really Easy To Earn Southwest Points
Southwest always runs 50,000 Point Sign Up Bonuses for their Credit Cards and you can also sign up for a Southwest Business Card to get an additional 50,000 Points.
Additionally, Southwest is an Ultimate Rewards Transfer Partner so you can easily transfer your UR Points from your Chase Sapphire Preferred or Chase INK Cards!
2) The Award Redemption Options Are SO Cheap
As I have talked about many times before here and here, Southwest Awards are variably priced and based on the price of the actual ticket. Unlike United and American, whose Awards start at a fixed 25,000 Miles, Southwest’s Awards can be as low as 8,000 Points ROUNDTRIP!
Southwest To The Rescue
I booked my BAcon ticket to Denver in early February. The earlier you book your flights on Southwest, the cheaper.
The great thing is that since Southwest Flights can be changed for free, if there is a cheaper price later on, you can always rebook it for free and save even more money!
I forgot to take a screenshot when I was booking, but below is my confirmation for my flights to Denver.
My roundtrip flight on Southwest to Denver only cost 13,860 Points + $5!
To put that in perspective, if I had booked this flight on United or American, it would have been 25,000 Miles or basically 2x more expensive!
Although people have their allegiances to various Airlines, it is hard to beat getting an Award Ticket for 1/2 the cost of the Legacy Carriers.
Recap
I am really excited for BAcon and I am sure it is going to be a great time and extremely informative.
Thanks to Southwest, I was able to snag a non-stop flight to Denver for only 13,860 Points + $5! I literally cannot make up how low some of the prices are for my Southwest Tickets!
From various promotions and Credit Card sign ups, at my peak I had around 130,000 Southwest Points. Thanks to Southwest Awards being so cheap, there is a legitimate possibility that I might get 8 – 10 roundtrip flights out of those 130,000 Points! I don’t know any other Airline that you can get that many trips out of 130,000 Points!
-Parag
Don’t ever miss another FFU Update or Travel Deal!
Agree about the Southwest option whenever the cities aren't too far apart. Flying to Disneyland on Southwest later today. Should be the last Southwest flight before my Companion Ticket arrives.
So, as I've already got the personal and business versions of the Southwest card from Chase, and the general guidance is that you can't get the exact same card from Chase again… can you get the Southwest cards again? I'm aware there's some kind of exception for the Chase United Explorer card, or there must be as I canceled it in January and got it again a few days ago (both VISA). Can't guarantee I'll see the bonus again but I took screenshots, they knew who I was when they offered it to me, and lots of other people, bloggers included, seem to be getting the bonus again. So… is this true of the Southwest card(s) as well?
@Glenn – So with most Chase Cards, you can't get the bonus again although there are exceptions to this rule. With Southwest, there are 2 Personal Cards, so you can always get that. Let me know if you got UA bonus again.
We are flying to Salt Lake City next week on the miles we got from opening Southwest Credit Cards. I love flying SW for the inflight wifi and the legroom!
Colorado Springs is an awesome place, if you love waking up to a view of the gorgeous mountains (almost like Boulder, only a little further away). Its not a very lively place, only pockets of the city have nightlife related places, but it has some of the best breweries you can find. Rocky Mountain Brewery!