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ter, as the cost could be different for each day left to do before we traveled was to figure out
of the week. I found our Saturday night stay which tech devices to take along, and what
would cost the most if purchased, so I made the needed to be set up at home to protect our stuff
points redemption reservation online for that and make it look like we never left.
night, and the paid nights (Sunday and Mon-
day) were made on a separate online reserva-
tion. Up to this point I’d made all of our travel
arrangements online, but now I had to break
down and call someone at the hotel to make
sure I had selected the same room type in the
two reservations (for points stay and paid stay)
to be able to get the same room and not have
to vacate between reservations. I didn’t trust
that this would work out if all I did was send
them an online message.

Before making the final hotel reservations, I did
look a bit at the hotel reviews online, to make Yvonne
sure there were no problems mentioned repeat-
edly, or a lot of unsatisfied guests. I also went
on Google Maps and used Street View to look Mitchell
at the area around the hotels to make sure they
looked to be in safe neighborhoods. I learned
this trick when booking hotels for the night of
my wife’s company Christmas party. She works
for a company based in Los Angeles but works
remotely on her own in San Diego. She is al-
ways invited to the company party, which is
held in a nice restaurant in the LA area. Since I Good turn out
don’t know the restaurants or the area very February 8, 2020
well, we have to be cautious when looking for a
hotel to stay at so we don’t have to drive back Membership Chairperson
that night. You can’t tell much from the Google J.J. Johnson
Maps satellite view, but street view will reveal if
the building next to the prospective hotel is cov- Members: 37/68%
ered in gang graffiti, or the hotel has fortress-
like barricades around it. Those are the ones I Meeting Attendees: 25
avoid. THANKS FOR JOINING
None

We researched and booked a few things to do THANKS FOR RENEWING
on our trip through the web, like a boat ride on
Lake Tahoe and bike rentals so we could ride Donna Kalinoski
the river trails in Sacramento. That completed Barton & Diane Berndtsen
all our travel arrangements. Now all that was
THANKS FOR VISITING

March 2020 7