Our Australian Adventure: LAX-MEL-PER-LEA-SYD-LAX
- Erin Cokeh Halla
- Jul 6
- 5 min read
We just came back from a 3 week epic trip to Australia! Whenever I book these more complex itineraries, I get questions about how I decide where to go, what my points breakdown was, how I earned those points and how I find the best deals. So before I get into all the details of each individual city, I’ll share an overview of our entire trip, where we went, how we got there, and how I paid for each stay.
I have a goal to make it to all the continents with the kids. I was in Australia for 3 months after college, and have some friends and distant relatives there, so it’s definitely been on my list of places that I wanted to take my family given the right circumstances. I find that I can never be “set” on going to a certain place, I have a list and I go where I can get the best value for my points at that time! When Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian airlines first merged, and there was a pathway to transfer my American Express points to Hawaiian Airlines, and then to Alaska (before the acquisition was fully complete and they had the same type of points), I took the risk and transferred 300k of my American Express points in hopes of booking LAX to Perth flights, with a stopover somewhere else in Australia in order to get another city in for free. One way flights to and from Los Angeles to Australia run about 37.5k points each way. In the off chance my plan didn’t work out, 300k points in the Alaska Airlines program wasn’t the worst thing in the world, so I decided it was worth the speculative transfer before my dates opened up. Luckily, my plan all went as I hoped! In addition, I booked some other flights directly with the airline (and not their partner) and also used some American Airlines points to book a Qantas partner flight as well. This is what I ended up booking for a family of 4:
LAX-Perth (with stopover in Melbourne for 2 nights)- 37.5k Alaska Airlines points per person, flying with Qantas.
This meant we flew LAX- Melbourne, and then 2 nights later, flew Melbourne-Perth, all on the same itinerary. Basically 20 hours of flying time for 37.5k points. That’s pretty incredible.
Perth-Learmonth (Exmouth)- 10k points per person, booked through American Airlines, flying with Qantas.
Learmonth (Exmouth)-Sydney (with a 5 hour layover in Perth)- 23,300 points per person (booked with Qantas, with points transferred from American Express)
Sydney-LAX- 37.5k points per person (booked through Alaska Airlines, flying with American Airlines)
Total number of points used for 4 people, 4 cities in Australia, and 6 legs of economy flights= 433,200 points
Total cash price of flights= $11,132 (Australian Domestic flights are not cheap!)
Having a longer multi city trip also means that you need a place to stay each night too, which can get pricey. I’m really proud of myself for how I made the most of all of my credit card benefits in addition to booking some nights on points and free night certificates. I do pay a good amount in annual fees for credit cards, but at the end of the day, it does pay for itself and much more. The amount I paid in the annual fees for these cards was half of what the hotels alone would have cost me, and there are far more benefits that I take advantage of organically aside from just the hotel credits. American Express Platinum and Business Platinum cards give $300 of Fine Hotels and Resorts credit every 6 months, and I used every credit I had there. Citi Strata Elite and Capital 1 Venture X also have $300 yearly credits which are a little less restrictive (can be used in any hotel in their portal, and not just luxury hotels like American Express) so I was able to use those in Exmouth, where there are no luxury hotels.
2 nights- Intercontinental Melbourne- 2x $300 American Express FHR credits
4 nights- Holiday Inn Perth City Centre- 106k points (4th night free when paying with points)
6 nights- Potshot Hotel Exmouth- use of 3x $300 credits, 2 years worth with Citi Strata Elite, 1 year worth with Capital 1 Venture X (each room was about $150 per night)
1 night- People’s Park Coral Bay- $300- the only night I actually paid out of pocket but I used booking.com and took advantage of cash back with Rakuten.
6 nights- Intercontinental Sydney- 2 IHG free night certificates, 4 nights booked with American Express $300 FHR credits.
Some of these nights may have gone over the credit by $20-$30, but I don’t think I paid more than $100 total over these credits. In addition, the rooms that were booked with American Express Fine Hotels and Resorts came with breakfast, which was an amazing buffet and saved us a lot of money because we could eat a hearty meal at the beginning of the day and go lighter for lunch.
Cost out of pocket for hotels would have otherwise been $4,244 for 18 nights of hotels (with me paying the 19th night of hotel out of pocket). This doesn’t include the free breakfast at the Intercontinental hotels, which was easily over $100 USD daily for the family.
Totaling everything up, it would have cost $15,376 for the flights and hotels. Not only did booking on points and credits save a ton of money (and allowed us to go on an otherwise cost prohibitive trip for us), it allowed for extreme flexibility to move dates around, book one way flights, and not be tied to specific airlines, so we could mix and match the flight dates and points cost that worked best for us. Often if you book on points, it gives you main cabin fare at least, so you can move things around or cancel without penalty, and you also get check in luggage included (which is huge these days!) Saving on these travel expenses also allows me to design the trip to have meaningful experiences, have those extra funds to really see what that location has to offer, and do things that create lifelong memories.
Some cards that I think have especially good offers now (referral links below):
Chase Sapphire Preferred card- 100k sign up bonus (ends July 12 from what I've heard!)
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