Thanks Leslie, but like Cruise Critic and LCT, collecting miles & points is a just a hobby with wonderful $$value vs the psychic value I get from posting on CC and here.

Our miles accumulation principal funding mechanism is the many different credit cards we churn for bonuses (like BA Visa 3x (between Ida and me) for 100K BA miles per churn, AMX-Plat (100K mR for Ida last year, only 25K for me this year) and many others. However, a close second is the tip I got from Gary Leff to use Bank Direct..we get 20K AA miles per month with our checking account.

Also, learned as we began this pursuit (with the pre cruises we take) we needed to also accumulate hotel points (e.g. there is a good Carlson promo now for one nite stay at Radisson will net you 50K points (good for a one nite stay at the very nice Rad Blu properties worldwide) Am doing what we call a mattress run next Tuesday at a nearby Atlanta Country Inn and Suites..for $63 one night stay will earn 44K carlson points. Also, we have churned multiple Hilton (AMX, Chase) credit cards where Ida and I now have close to 230K Hilton points..am now working on two credit cards (Bank of America Hawaiin, and Bank of Hawaii) that will soon net us another 140K hilton points. For our next churn (we do this every ninety days) we will get these cards for Ida and have over half a million hilton points. Min cost (annual credit card fee) just need to have excellent credit.

Finally, if you do not have the Hyatt Visa Signature card, for just the annual credit card fee, you earn two nights at any Hyatt resort in the world. For example, we stayed at the Grand Hyatt in Bangkok and Hongkong last year on my Hyatt visa award nites. And two months ago we stayed two nites at the Grand Hyatt Dubai (got upgraded to club suite) for the cost of Ida's Hyatt Visa ($75)...Strongly recommend folks sign up for this super hotel bennie.