Thirty Years, Four Countries: An Anniversary Trip Around the World on Points
Toronto · Abu Dhabi · Maldives · Seoul · June 15–25, 2026
Programs Used: Delta SkyMiles · World of Hyatt · Etihad Guest · JetBlue TrueBlue · Alaska Mileage Plan · Bilt Rewards · Accor Live Limitless
How We Turned a Retired Round-the-World Program Into Our Own Version for 605,600 Points and Under $650 Cash
Total Points Used: ~605,600 pts Cash Out of Pocket: ~$648 Destination: Toronto, Abu Dhabi, Maldives, Seoul
The Setup: Building Our Own Round-the-World Trip
This trip was for our 30th wedding anniversary, and I had wanted to do a proper round-the-world trip with ANA for years. ANA discontinued that program last year, so instead of one clean redemption, I had to build the routing myself, flight by flight. What came together was Toronto, then Abu Dhabi, then the Maldives, then Seoul, then home to Salt Lake City.
The foundation was two separate Bilt Rent Day promotions, each offering a 200 percent transfer bonus. I moved 50,000 Bilt points to Etihad Guest for the first leg and another 50,000 Bilt points to Accor Live Limitless for the Maldives stay, and each transfer turned into 200,000 miles or points once the bonus hit. A seats.aero alert found us a business class option we could not find at the airline level directly, and a Thrifty Traveler alert turned up a rare nonstop routing home from Seoul that tied the whole trip together.
The routing: Salt Lake City to Toronto, Toronto to Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi to the Maldives, the Maldives to Seoul by way of Colombo and Hong Kong, then Seoul directly back to Salt Lake City.
Leg 1: Toronto, and the Flight I Almost Forgot to Book
I wanted the whole trip to be a surprise for my wife, so I deliberately avoided booking her Salt Lake City to Toronto flight through Delta while she still had app notifications turned on. The plan worked a little too well. I got so focused on keeping it a secret that I forgot to actually book it. We got lucky. The flight was not sold out, and I was able to grab her a seat with enough notice that it did not become a real problem.
Our Delta flight to Toronto ran into a six hour delay from a mechanical issue, so instead of landing at 4 p.m. we did not check into the Park Hyatt Toronto until midnight. We missed most of the extra amenities the property offers because of the timing, but the breakfast the next morning made up for some of it. My wife had the avocado toast and I had the Nova Scotia lobster benedict, and both were excellent. The stay cost 29,000 World of Hyatt points, and I applied a suite upgrade certificate on top, which got us a corner suite.
Pro Tip: If you are trying to keep a trip secret from someone who shares your loyalty program logins, set a reminder to actually book their ticket. A surprise only works if everyone has a seat.
Leg 2: Abu Dhabi in Etihad First Class
The flight from Toronto to Abu Dhabi was the second time we had ever flown first class, the first was Singapore, but the first time it felt elite. It completely changed my assumptions about what separates first from business. I always figured the difference was mostly better drinks and marginally more space. The Etihad Apartment is a different category entirely: a huge individual seat, a separate bench that converts into a twin size bed, and a basket of premium snacks plus extras that kept showing up throughout the flight. The 14 hour flight felt short. This first class ticket was booked using 196,000 Etihad Guest miles, funded through the Bilt Rent Day transfer bonus, and it also came with a private chauffeur transfer from the airport to the hotel. It was a nice touch, though the chauffeur turned out to just be a private car transfer to the hotel in an Etihad branded van. Still nice.
We stayed two nights at the Grand Hyatt Abu Dhabi Hotel and Residences Emirates Pearl. Category 1-4 free night certificates cannot have a suite upgrade certificate applied to them, so I booked the first night on points and used a suite upgrade certificate on that night, then used a free night certificate for the second night. The idea was that if the upgrade landed on night one, the hotel would have no reason to move us out of the suite for night two. It worked, and we kept the same corner suite with a huge balcony for both nights without ever being asked to switch rooms. The club lounge was under renovation during our stay, so instead of the usual lounge access, the hotel gave us a dining credit to use at the restaurant on the lobby level. I actually preferred that to a standard club lounge experience.
Pro Tip: A suite upgrade certificate cannot be applied to a free night certificate stay. If you are combining both at the same hotel, book the points night with the upgrade certificate first. Once you're settled into the suite, most properties will not bother moving you for the certificate night that follows.
We used one of our two days in Abu Dhabi to visit Ferrari World, which is worth a visit if you are an extreme coaster aficionado. As rollercoaster weaklings, the Flying Aces ride was the final straw for our visit. We did have lunch there, average Italian food, pizza and pasta, that was not too pricey. The temperature topped out at 109 degrees that day, so after lunch we escaped back to the Hyatt. Once the sun went down and the temperature dropped, the city was still extremely hot but bearable in the shade.
Pro Tip: Bilt Rent Day promotions with a 200 percent transfer bonus can turn a modest points balance into a first class international ticket. Watch for the next one and have a redemption in mind before it lands.
Leg 3: A Late Pivot to Business Class for the Maldives
I was not able to find business class award space from Abu Dhabi to the Maldives when I originally booked this leg, so I booked economy instead, reasoning that it is only a four hour flight. A few days before departure, a seats.aero alert showed business class availability on the same Etihad flight bookable through JetBlue TrueBlue miles, a partnership I had not planned around. We rebooked into business class for 34,600 JetBlue points plus $73.60, and the seats were more spacious than the typical business class product.
We arrived at Malé and immediately hit a small snag: neither of us had filled out the Maldives arrival customs declaration ahead of time, and nothing had prompted us to do it in advance. It cost us about 15 minutes standing at the airport filling it out on our phones before we could get through customs. A representative from SO/ Maldives met us at baggage claim and walked us to the boat that took us on the 15 minute ride out to the resort.
The stay at SO/ Maldives in Emboodhoo Lagoon was covered by 200,000 Accor points, again funded by a Bilt Rent Day transfer with a 200 percent bonus, and it covered all four nights with half board breakfast and dinner included, plus a complimentary one hour massage. We were assigned a personal host named Aana who communicated with us over WhatsApp for the entire stay, and any question or reservation change was handled almost instantly. Everything outside the included package was expensive: entrees ran around $45, activities started around $250, and additional spa treatments started around $200. The overwater bungalow itself made the cost easy to accept. Since we were traveling for our anniversary, the resort surprised us with a cake waiting in the room after dinner one night and decorated the bed with flowers spelled out to read Happy Anniversary in local leaves. A staff member mentioned the resort was quieter than usual because the US and Iran conflict had reduced the number of flights coming in. The weather stayed in the high 90s with nightly rain and wind, but it never got in the way of the trip.
Pro Tip: Check partner award charts like JetBlue for last minute business class space on routes where the operating airline shows nothing directly. seats.aero makes this kind of search fast enough to do a few days before departure.
We were originally scheduled to fly business class on Ethiopian Airlines from Malé to Seoul, but a few days before our trip I received a flight alert that the flight had been cancelled and rescheduled for four days later. That obviously would not work, so I cancelled the flight we had originally booked with United, got my points back, and found a Cathay Pacific routing bookable with Alaska points with a layover in Hong Kong instead. I was grateful to have a stash of points where I could pivot that quickly.
Leg 4: Seoul, a Baseball Game, and the Long Way Home
Getting from the Maldives to Seoul took three flights: Malé to Colombo on SriLankan Airlines, then Colombo to Hong Kong and Hong Kong to Seoul on Cathay Pacific, booked together for 120,000 Alaska Mileage Plan miles plus $505 in business class the entire way. All but the first leg were true lie-flat seats. The 5 hour 15 minute layover in Hong Kong gave us time to experience The Pier, Cathay's flagship business class lounge, which lives up to its reputation as one of the best lounges in the world.
We spent two nights at the Park Hyatt Seoul for 25,000 World of Hyatt points per night, 50,000 points total. Of the three countries on this trip, Seoul turned out to be my favorite city by a wide margin. The night before our flight home, we caught a South Korean baseball game, and it was unlike any baseball experience I have had in the United States. When a player walks up to bat, American crowds tend to go quiet. In South Korea the entire crowd does the opposite: they chant the player's personalized choreographed dance timed to his walk-up song. It felt closer to a K-pop concert than a ballgame. The concession stands were their own kind of memorable, including one that filled an upside down baseball cap with dumplings or fried chicken on top of a drink. I went home and watched videos about how the cheerleading and chant culture developed, and I am already looking at Taiwan baseball as the next thing to build a trip around.
The final flight, a nonstop Delta One service from Seoul directly to Salt Lake City, came from a Thrifty Traveler alert and cost 272,000 SkyMiles plus $69.06 total for both of us. A direct flight home after a trip like this, instead of another connection, made the last day of travel far easier than it could have been.
The morning of our departure, we got another flight alert: the flight would no longer be nonstop. A mechanical issue meant the plane needed a fuel stop, adding a short one hour stopover in Seattle and about two extra hours of travel time overall. The flight attendants kept everyone updated throughout and apologized more than once.
Pro Tip: Sign up for alert services like Thrifty Traveler if you want a shot at rare direct routings on points. A nonstop from a secondary hub like Seoul to Salt Lake City is exactly the kind of fare that disappears fast, and it's worth having a backup plan if the routing changes on you at the last minute.
The Full Breakdown
Here is what this trip actually cost:
SLC → YYZ (Delta): cash fare, booked last minute
Park Hyatt Toronto, 1 night: 29,000 pts
YYZ → AUH (Etihad First Class Apartment): 50,000 Bilt points transferred at a 200 percent bonus to 200,000 Etihad Guest miles, 196,000 miles used for the ticket
Grand Hyatt Abu Dhabi, 2 nights: 1 night on points with a suite upgrade certificate applied, 1 night on a Category 1-4 free night certificate
AUH → MLE (Etihad Business Class via JetBlue): 34,600 pts + $73.60
SO/ Maldives, 4 nights, half board: 50,000 Bilt points transferred at a 200 percent bonus to 200,000 Accor points
MLE → CMB → HKG → ICN (SriLankan, Cathay Pacific): 120,000 Alaska miles + $505
Park Hyatt Seoul, 2 nights: 50,000 pts
ICN → SLC (Delta One, nonstop): 272,000 SkyMiles + $69.06 total for two
Total: approximately 605,600 points, meaning 100,000 of those started as Bilt points before Rent Day transfer bonuses turned them into 400,000 Etihad and Accor miles and points, plus 1 free night certificate and 2 suite upgrade certificates, and about $648 in cash, not counting the last minute cash fare for the Toronto departure.
Why This Trip Is Worth Planning
Losing a round-the-world award program is not the end of a trip like this, it just means building the routing yourself instead of booking it in one pass. This trip leaned on four things: a pair of Bilt Rent Day transfer bonuses that turned modest balances into six figure hauls at Etihad and Accor, a willingness to rebook a leg when better award space showed up later, alert services that surface both partner availability and rare direct routings, and knowing the fine print on certificates well enough to sequence them so a suite upgrade sticks for the whole stay.
The mistakes were part of the trip too. A forgotten flight booking, a six hour delay, an afternoon in the desert heat that ran too long, a customs form filled out at the last minute. None of it derailed anything, and most of it turned into the parts of the story worth telling. Thirty years in, a trip that stacks a first class flight, a free night certificate stretched across a whole stay, a bucket list overwater bungalow, and a baseball game in Seoul is exactly the kind of anniversary that points and miles were built to make possible.
If you are sitting on a points balance and waiting for the perfect single redemption to use it on, take the lesson from this trip instead. Watch for transfer bonuses, keep an alert running for the routes you actually want, and be ready to piece together your own version of the trip a discontinued program used to hand you in one booking.
Every trip like this teaches me a little more about what I actually like and dislike, and something new about the cultures and people I get to spend time with along the way. That is why I love travel as much as I do, and getting to do it on points and miles is just icing on the cake.
