Hooray! Winter Holiday!

First off, sorry to the 2 readers of this blog for the delay.  January has been pretty hectic overall.  Semester exams and report writing took up a larger amount of our work life.  On top of this, Simon got sick (which is always fun)

When you are sick you get the big bed!

It has now been five months since our move to Saudi Arabia.  I feel like we have finally been able to settle down into a routine!  What better way to celebrate than to completely disrupt that routine with a trip!  After looking at quite a few options, we decided on taking a trip to Oman.

When planning this trip, we had a few important criteria:

1. Go to a place that neither of us had been before.
2. A direct flight or as a direct flight as possible.
3. A short flight/easy to get to.

Why Oman?

We had heard wonderful things about Oman.  The scenery is beautiful, the country is well organized, and there was quite a lot to do there.  Another bonus was that it was a two-hour direct flight on KLM.  We decided to order a guidebook and that encouraged us even more.  We particularly like the Bradt Guides.  These are much better than Lonely Planet!

Hacking our trip

We have two purposes to this blog.  One is to keep our friends and family updated with all of our goings on (well when I can find time to write).  A second purpose is that we hope that people get some kind of utility from reading this.  Maybe it is a tip to make their lives easier, maybe it is a way to spend less money.

Over the past year or so, we have delved deeper into the world of financial independence.  Our goal is to retire when we are 55 (sooner if possible) without living like hermits in the process.  Moving to Saudi Arabia (where our money goes further) was one step to achieving this goal.

In order to continue to live our lives as normal as possible, we have looked into travel hacking.

Travel hacking involves gaining travel rewards (often times through credit card signup bonuses) in order to gain free things.

We are in our infancy with regards to travel hacking, but one of the best Travel Reward programs is Chase Ultimate Rewards Points.  With these points you can book travel (flights, hotels, car rentals) straight from the Chase portal; however the best use of Chase UR points is to transfer the points to a partner program.

About a year ago we got the Chase Sapphire Reserve (CSR) Card.  Get yours here.

What’s so special about CSR?

First of all, most people may be put off by the $450 annual fee.  When I first started looking at the card, I did too!  When you look at the benefits, maybe you will see how great it is.  The first is $300 in travel credits. This is basically a refund on any travel-related expenses which makes the annual fee really $150.  Also you receive a $100 credit every year for Global Entry or TSA Pre-check.  You also get free Priority Pass membership to use at first-class lounges throughout the world! Another big perk is Auto Rental CDW.

So how do you hack?

The best website to use is Award Hacker.  This lets you see who flies where and how many points it might cost.

When we plug the airports in this is what we get:

In case you can’t read that, that is 15,000 Korean Skypass miles per ticket.  We ended up paying 25000 per ticket for direct flights during the Winter holiday time.  This cost us 75000 Chase UR points and about $80 for fees and taxes.

$80 is not too bad for three tickets to Muscat!

Hotel

We stayed at the Coral Muscat Hotel in a fairly convenient location in Muscat.  We decided to stay here because when we travel, we prefer to stay in apartment-style places rather than a hotel.  That is so when Simon goes to bed, we can still be up and watch TV or read.  He won’t go to sleep in the same room if we are up.

It is difficult to hack 7 nights in a hotel that has no loyalty program so we used hotels.com.  The reason for this is that the rewards program is that is you book 10 nights you get one night free.  Not too bad of a return (if you travel quite a bit)

Traveling with a toddler

I would like to say that traveling with a two-year old is easy.  I could say that but it would be a lie! I think that we were both spoiled with Simon being such a good baby because he is a difficult toddler.  We also decided on a 7 night trip.  I think that we were overly ambitious and the trip was about two days too long.

The Flight

The flight itself was fine, what was not was the hour and a half delay at 10:00 at night.  Luckily we had a bit of entertainment to see us through

Every airport should have this

Not sure why these are not in every Airport in the world!  Also, I have never seen these in US Airports.  The rest of the world certainly has something on the States with regards to traveling with children.

We decided to check the car seat (we would be renting a car and prefer our own) and got the Cares Safety Restraint System.  This is FAA approved and has a lot of potential.  The seats on the KLM flight weren’t flush and so it fit a bit awkwardly but can definitely see the potential of this system to replace a car seat.

The other purchase that really has helped us our is our stroller – The Baby Jogger City Tour.  We find it best for traveling because it is lightweight and folds up into a backpack that can be stored in an overhead compartment.  That meant that we didn’t have to check it (or gate check it), and could put Simon right in after we got off the plane. No waiting for a stroller with a wiggly toddler!  Also for some reason the green one (technically Juniper) is $20 cheaper than other colors.

Things to do in Oman

While the title of this section is Oman, we really mean Muscat.  Besides a short day-trip, we never really made it out of the capital city.  That was partially by design and partially out of necessity.  Traveling with a toddler is hard.  Also, we wanted to relax a bit rather than come back from a vacation more tired than when we left.

I think we may have suffered from unrealistic expectations when it comes to traveling with a toddler.  We will definitely bite off less next time!

Luckily, Muscat is a wonderful city with quite a bit to do; however we kept saying to ourselves, “this would be great once Simon is 8 or 9!” (Parents of 8 or 9 year old might be cringing)

We also had very poor luck in that it seemed that everything was closed for renovation.  This trip really should be called “Closed for Renovation”

This may be the only borders still in existence!

One thing that we enjoyed was the numerous parks in the city.  Coming from Saudi, it was wonderful to see so much green space.  Our hotel was right next to the largest park in the city, Al-Qurm Park.  This park was huge, and we enjoyed walking around it and playing on some of the equipment.  One other interest fact about the parks is that the playground equipment is a child’s dream.  We are talking 2 story slides!

We also had time to do Simon’s favorite activity – Driving the car!

Another park we went to was in the far East of the city, called Riyam Park.  You know you are there because of the large incense burner on the hill.  This park had toddler-friendly playground equipment that wasn’t two stories tall and set near both the ocean and the mountains.

Large incense burner!

View from Riyam Park

The ocean near Riyam Park

Near Riyam Park is the Mutrah Souq, the largest souq in Oman.  This felt a bit more authentic than the one in Bahrain.  Lindsey got some more comfortable sleepwear and we also bought some souvenirs.  It was wonderful to smell the Frankincense and see the haggling.

Inside the souq

Inside the souq

Entrance to the Souq

Our one day trip was to the Nakhal fort.  This fort predates Islam in Oman and is irregularly built up on top of a large boulder.  We loved climbing up all the stairs and looking inside all of the rooms.  Simon liked it too! The views were spectacular!

Simon loves climbing stairs!

So that is about it.  I wish we could be more adventurous with our holiday but we enjoyed the time away.  Oman is definitely a place we want to go back to.  If you are ever in the Middle East, we highly recommend going there (just maybe not with a two-year old)