Maximize Travel Rewards: JetBlue’s 25 for 25 Promotion with James He
How do you turn one wild promo into 25 years of Mosaic status and 350,000 TrueBlue points?
In this episode of the Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast, Justin Vacula chats with James He to unpack JetBlue’s 25 for 25 promo from planning to execution.
You’ll learn the exact strategies James used, what he’d do differently, and how to stack credit card rewards, hotel status, and airline loyalty for maximum value.
We chat:
How the JetBlue 25 for 25 Challenge works and who should try it
Real Mosaic benefits that matter in practice
Smart routing, rebooking, and other tips that save time and points
Stacking with Amex, Hyatt, and other programs to stretch travel budgets
Cost breakdowns, pitfalls to avoid, and James’s pro advice
Great for travel hackers, frequent flyers, JetBlue fans, and anyone chasing elite status.
Timestamps:
00:00 Intro
01:36 Meet James He
01:57 James’s travel background
06:01 JetBlue 25 for 25 overview
12:10 Mosaic status benefits
21:12 Planning and executing the challenge
22:57 Events and meetups
25:45 Amex and Hyatt benefits that pair well
27:04 Hotel stays and smart rebookings
28:38 Maximizing points and statement credits
31:37 Airport shuttle stories and lessons
34:17 Memorable stops along the way
38:27 Cost breakdown and practical advice
42:38 Future trips and elite status plans
43:49 Final thoughts and how to connect
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Rough Transcript:
Theme Song: [00:00:00] Travel at low cost with points and miles. Credit card rewards bring the smiles. Many adventures tales to be told, make and save money, the world will unfold.
Fight the war on happiness. Pick up the gold. Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast breaks the mold.
Justin Vacula: You’re listening to the Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast, I’m your host, Justin Vacula, here to help you make money, save money, and travel the world next to no cost with credit card points, miles, benefits, and loyalty programs. James He joins me today to talk about the JetBlue 25 for 25 challenge he recently completed.
Visit meetup.com/philly miles and points to RSVP for monthly Greater Philadelphia travel credit, miles and points meetups I [00:01:00] host in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania. The next meetups are November 23rd and December 22nd, 2025. Find a link in the show notes. For more content between episodes, follow Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast on Facebook and x.
Follow Justin Vacula on Instagram. Subscribe to Hurdy Gurdy Travel podcast on YouTube for daily content, including travel videos, podcast clips and posts. Find more information including episode transcripts at HurdyGurdyTravel.com. On with today’s episode recorded October 21st, 2025. Welcome to the show, James. Hi Justin.
Thanks for coming on today. I had Hunter Threadgill as a past guest. He recommended you as a guest to talk about this JetBlue. Challenge that a lot of listeners probably considering I’m considering, so I think it’ll be an interesting topic for today. But before we get into that, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
James He: I am a Texas native. Grew up there, [00:02:00] graduated from the University of Texas, Austin Hook ’em horns. I’ve been in the Points of Miles game since 2009. And back then there wasn’t really much bloggers. There wasn’t Twitter, there wasn’t like tiktoks or Instagram. So main, mainly the information. You can find about points in travel, basically what people describe as a hobby.
It was mostly online forums. Since then, 2009, I’ve been flying anywhere between 150 to 200,000 miles a year for leisure. Currently work and reside in New Hampshire. And also I am a freelance writer for Business Traveler USA magazine. And I have a lot of great general knowledge about travel. Currently have lifetime status with American Airlines.
I’m a 2 million miler currently on my way to 3 million miler and also a lifetime bonvoy titanium member from the SPG merger. So previously I have attended several mega dues in the past and also flyer talk dues and meetups. [00:03:00] Another interesting fact about me would be the, that I have been to all six inhabited cabinets and have been to 52 countries and territories so far.
Most recently, I was in Ireland in June of 2025. So currently have statuses across various hotel programs including Hyatt Globalists, Merrit Lifetime, titanium Hilton Diamond, A Core Gold, and IHG Platinum. And then for various airline programs, I have Lifetime Platinum with American Airlines, British Showy, gold Finnair, platinum Delta.
Diamond Medallion. SAS, gold, Lufthansa, Senator, and other their other statuses as well. I also serve as a moderator for the Hyatt Globalist and World of Hyatt Facebook groups, and I am a big fan of Hyatt Properties have been to two to 35 unique Hyatt properties and counting.
Justin Vacula: Nice. A big travel resume of sorts.
Lots of travel and I’m sure most of it, low cost or even no cost [00:04:00] in some circumstances because of points and miles.
James He: Yes. So a lot of times, points and miles are a form of currency. It’s a tool to help us afford travels and vacations that one might not be able to otherwise afford. One of the greatest redemptions I remember was using a hundred thousand Alaska miles to fly fresh class on Emirates, starting in Singapore, on their Boeing 7, 7, 7 aircraft, which is the old first class.
Configuration. It’s a 2, 2, 2 very outdated product. So flew that to Dubai and then had a 36 hour layover stop over, which was, which is one of the selling points of the Alaska Atmos program using their miles. And then I continued on from Dubai to Dallas on the A three 80 in their first class suites, and that includes the infamous shower and their A three 80 product where you get five minutes.
Onboard to take a shower in one of their two shower [00:05:00] suites.
Justin Vacula: A short shower may be famous, as well as you’re not able to shower in the sky many times, but a cool thing to do, although sometimes maybe more than five minutes, but still a nice opportunity in the sky, something that you’re not going to get on other flights.
And a lot of these trips, I imagine you would not have paid full price or cash money. Cash value. For all of these, especially the more luxurious trip.
James He: Yes, for sure. I’ve been fortunate to fly a lot of wonderful first class products using miles and points ranging from Japan Airlines, first class a NA first class, Lufthansa first class, especially on their A three 80 Thai first class Catholic Pacific.
First class British Airways, Qantas first class. Haven’t flown Air France first class yet. That is on the bucket list.
Justin Vacula: And recently it’s been a lot of JetBlue flights for sure, as there was a lot of talk about this JetBlue 25 for 25 challenge in [00:06:00] 2025. So for those that might not know, can you please explain what this JetBlue challenge is?
James He: Yeah, so the JetBlue 25 for 25 challenge. So basically, JetBlue was a startup airline 25 years ago in New York City. And this year is the 25th anniversary. So in order to celebrate this moment, ation and the 25 years of continuing service, JetBlue announced a interesting program this year. Basically, everyone that is a TrueBlue member, which is their loyalty program, is automatically enrolled into the promotion.
And the promotion started on June 25, fifth of this year. It continues all the way until December 31st of this year, so there’s still time left. We have a little bit over two months to complete the challenge for anyone interested. So it’s definitely doable. 25 airports. It’s not too hard if you plan it correctly, especially if you’re based on the East coast where JetBlue has most of their flights, especially if you can [00:07:00] get to or reside in Boston, the New York metro area and the East Coast.
In Florida, especially around Fort Lauderdale
Justin Vacula: and a lot of cheap flights, cash fairs are using JetBlue points. I have a Barclays JetBlue credit card, and I know there are many transfer partners that can yield JetBlue points to save on this quest of going to all these different airports. Another perk of this challenge is that you get Mosaic status, one of their high statuses for 25 years.
Can you explain that as well?
James He: Yeah. So the rewards for this promotion is Mosaic one status. So you can actually start earning bonuses from this promotion at 15 JetBlues destinations. And what they define as a destination is arriving or connecting through an airport. So for example, if someone was flying from.
Tampa to JFK to Boston. They would get two airports, one for transiting through [00:08:00] JFK, and then one for arriving to Boston. But if they flew the reverse routing, they wouldn’t get credit for the JFK sincerity or transited through JFK, but they would get credit for the Tampa. So with this promotion, if you fly through or into 15 destinations, you earn 150,000 bonus BU points.
Then if you just do five more destinations, you earn an additional 200,000 true blue points. So that’s 350,000 true blue points, which is unheard of for a US airline promotion. And then if you do five more destinations, so the 25, you earn 25 years of mosaic one status, plus the above 350,000 cumulative true blue points, and that’s not including the points you earn from the spend.
For taking the flights and any credit card bonuses you may have. For example, you have the Barclays JetBlue credit card,
Justin Vacula: and it seems that if you plan this really well, if you stay within certain regions and hop around so you’re not flying as far, that [00:09:00] the bonuses can offset the miles or the points that you would actually use for the flights themselves.
So if you’re getting 200,000 bonus points with a 20 destination milestone. You might be able to do the whole thing in less than 200,000 miles or points. So it seems like they’re paying you to fly or giving you a rebate in a way.
James He: Yeah. So what I’ve discovered online is that, so with the promotion, they’re not actually awarding the points until the end of the year.
So I know some people were count the fact that they were gonna earn the a hundred thousand points at the 15 destinations and they actually haven’t been awarded yet. So you can’t really count on that to. Earn points in order to redeem for more flights to count towards the 20 and 25th airport destination milestones.
So with this promotion, one key, one key thing you have to remember is that it cannot be a blue basic fare, which is their version of a basic economy fair, but any revenue or points booking either through JetBlue or one of [00:10:00] the partner airlines will count towards the promotion. So this was heavily discussed in online forums and also verified.
By the social media team at JetBlue, for example, JetBlue has partnerships with Etha Airways, Qatar Airways, and Japan Airlines. So if you have Mileages through those programs, you can actually use those currencies to book the JetBlue flights. And as long as you get the JetBlue True Blue number into the booking, so either through calling the reservations desk or using the social meeting team on X, you can.
Book it through the partner airline and then put your JetBlue true number in the booking. It will account towards the challenge.
Justin Vacula: Nice. So lots of ways to get there. And maybe also using some travel credits from cards like the Chase Sapphire Reserve points from the Altitude Reserve, maybe. Maybe American Express Airline incidental credits for the cheaper flights.
So I think [00:11:00] lots of ways to take the cost of doing this down very significantly.
James He: There’s definitely different paths to completing this challenge. I can definitely use points transfer currencies to one of those airline partners, either to the JetBlue program or one of the airline partners. And also, one of the things I utilized was the Citibank merchant offers.
So this summer there was two rounds of offers on various credit cards I had, and I took advantage of both rounds and on across different credit cards in the Citibank portfolio. One of ’em, for example, was spend. Two $50 on a JetBlue flight and you get $25 credited back to account. And the good thing about JetBlue is that as long as you don’t book a basic economy Blue Basic Fare, you can cancel the flight up until before the flight departure and get it, get the money into a travel bank, which is good for a year.
So you won’t lose the money. If you don’t take the flight, you can rebook it. You can use the [00:12:00] funds for future travel. You can even apply it towards airport fees if you’re using your true blue points for redemptions as well.
Justin Vacula: It’s a lot of possibilities then. And the mosaic status, why should people care about the JetBlue Mosaic status?
So
James He: JetBlue has a elite recognition program for flying on them. So there’s. Different mosaic levels. There’s 1, 2, 3, and four. So the first one is earning what they call tiles. So you have to earn 50 tiles in order to get mosaic one and then a hundred tiles for mosaic two, and then all the way up to 200 tiles for mosaic four, which is their highest level.
So with the mosaic one level, you get benefits such as the mosaic boarding, so they differentiate between mosaic three and four boarding, and then mosaic one and two boarding, and then. Onto their general boarding, ranging from a all the way up to F currently, you also get your two free check bags free, and then you can [00:13:00] also get up to three complimentary alcoholic beverages per flight.
So beer, wine, liquor is all included per flight. And then you get to pick the preferred seats app booking, which also includes the two rows that they have for exit rows. So definitely more space. So this is. Given to even Mosaic one. So this definitely is a really great perk to have the extra leg room and just be able to spin the exit row at no charge and then at check-in 24 hours before the flight mosaic ones can get the even more space for free.
So those are like the first fur rows of the flights. They include like an extra snack, which can be the Tates cookies or chocolate chip cookies. You get priority boarding before everyone else, so this is complimentary. Usually they can charge very, depending on the flight length, the a hundred dollars, $150 just for those seats.
And those seats also give, they also get a complimentary alcoholic beverages. One of the biggest perk [00:14:00] that I used was the same day flight change. So JetBlue has a really generous same day flight change. You can do it on the app and sometimes the app does glitch out, and then you can call the mosaic desk and they’re more than happy to switch your flights.
JetBlue has what they call cold terminals. So for example, when the New York airport, they have the Long Island MacArthur, JFK, LaGuardia, Newark, white Plains, New York, they’re all considered code terminals. So you could switch flights. Between any of those airports to a destination. So they all fly to Fort Lauderdale, they fly to places in South Florida, so Caribbean.
So you could theoretically book a flight that’s a little bit less expensive and then at like in an undesirable time of day, either really early morning or late at night and switch to a flight that you would prefer that’s a little bit more suitable, like a 10:00 AM departure. So you can save a lot of money that way and.
In regards to that, [00:15:00] I was able to save some money to book a flight that was in an undesirable time and book it to the one that I wanted. One thing about JetBlue is that they don’t oversell their flights. So as long as there’s just a seat for sale on the flight, then you can do the same day flight change to it.
So that’s what I found during this challenge is like the biggest perk was the free same day flight change. Other cold terminals are like Fort Lardo, Miami West Palm Beach. That’s considered cold terminal. Tampa, Sarasota, Florida is also code terminal, and then in the northeast Boston, Lista, Providence and Manchester New Hampshire are also considered terminals.
Other Mosaic one benefits include priority security, priority check-in the de dedicated phone support and priority chat, which I have actually utilized a few times, and agents are very professional. There’s also component upgrades on Heathrow Express because JetBlue actually flies across Atlantic. They did an Atlantic extension a few years ago.
So they fly to Paris, Amsterdam, [00:16:00] Fain, Ireland. And then there’s also a Avis Elite Match as well.
Justin Vacula: Lots of perks and a bit of an America Loves math moment. You also can choose perks with the tiles. 10, 20, 30, 40 tiles of bonus points. So you get 5,000 points. I believe four times or maybe even five times, depending on how many tiles you get and how much spend you do.
So that 25 years of mosaic status throughout the challenge gives you a very big points in fusion. What is it? Something like half a million points over 25 years.
James He: I’m not sure. That’s much math for me. With JetBlue, even on your way to the mosaic one status at 50 tiles, they actually have milestone rewards.
So basically it’s to incentivize you to fly JetBlue more, and you basically get to pick your perks along the way. So with the Tiles program, so every a hundred dollars you spend in JetBlue flights or their JetBlue package, vacations before taxes, you earn one [00:17:00] tile. You can also earn a tile for spending $1,000 on their co-branded JetBlue Barclays credit card.
So when you hit the thresholds of 10, 20, 30, and 40 tiles, you can pick one of what they call their signature benefits. So one of them includes early boarding, which is boarding with group B. You can also pick priority security. Alcoholic beverages enjoy up to three complimentary beverages. On each flight, we get like a one time JetBlue vacation bonus, so you earn double points on the Jet blue vacations.
And then there’s also the 5,000 point bonus. So these five perks, you can actually only pick one every time you cross a 10 mile, sorry, 10 point. Lemme start over. So with these signature perks, you can actually pick one every time you cross a tenile threshold. So at 10, 20, 30, 40 mile, you can pick one, but once you pick one, that option is no longer available.
So unfortunately. Can’t pick the 5,000 bonus each time.
Justin Vacula: Ah, so a little bit of war on happiness there. For those [00:18:00] that just wanted the points. So maybe not that great, but you’re still getting the big infusion of points from completing the 25 for 25 challenge. And potentially this has happened before it may happen again because competition is great.
You can match that mosaic status to other programs with other airlines and get temporary status with them.
James He: Yeah, for sure. We’ve seen different types of opportunities pop up American or match Mosaic one. American and JetBlue used to be partners in the Northeast Alliance, but that was struck down by the DOJA few years ago, so they had to.
In that Southwest also matches to Mosaic Frontier Spirit. They also match to Mosaic One, and then recently we saw the Rogerian match. They also matched to JetBlue as well. So there’s definitely opportunities to leverage that Mosaic One status for 25 years to match another program, either domestic or [00:19:00] foreign.
Justin Vacula: Nice. So that could be an extra benefit if those come up again. And every year we seem to see lots of them. So maybe not guaranteed, but probably going in the future. And speaking of probably some people might have seen this press release, the chatter on the different blogs, websites, social media, about the challenge, and people were thinking, oh, maybe I should do this.
This sounds interesting. What brought you from, maybe I should do the challenge to absolutely. I’m gonna commit and do this. So
James He: JetBlue recently announced that they are doing a, what they call Blue Skies partnership with United Airlines. So the JetBlue Mosaic statuses will get honored by United once they figure out their integration and have reciprocal benefit.
So the main selling point for the program is the 350,000 cumulative true boot points, and then also the 25 years of status plus bagging rights to this. So with JetBlue, [00:20:00] their program is not a traditional program where it’s mileage based either by region or by distance. So with Jet JetBlue, they have what they call a fixed value redemption.
So basically one point is worth 1.50 cents in towards airfare. And the good thing about the true blue points is that they don’t expire. So basically it’s infinity with an asterisk. And then also, if you use your points to book a flight, there’s free cancellation as long as it’s not Blue Basic. And then if you, for example, book a flight from JFK to Orlando and you decide that you don’t want to take, you can cancel it.
The $5 50 cents TSA fee will go back to your travel wallet. So you can use that towards another redemption, or you can use it towards an actually revenue flight for JetBlue.
Justin Vacula: Lots of benefits. For going for the challenge, and I think that people can knock this out during the week if they were to go to maybe two [00:21:00] airports a day for consecutive days, maybe three, although that might be pushing it with tight layovers.
But as you said, we’re recording October 21st, 2025, and there’s still time to do this. You started a little bit earlier though, so what did the planning look like for you?
James He: Yeah, so once I decided I was gonna go on in for this challenge this summer. JetBlue had a special promotion where they unveiled a special Dunkin JetBlue collaboration plane.
So this plane actually has donuts on the side of it. And then so this summer they had pick me up Mondays. So on the Tuesday before the Monday where this special plane flu, they published the routing. So for me. I wanna take this plane because they had a special promotion where you got temporary mosaic one status for three months, and then anyone that already had mosaic status earned 20 tiles towards the next level.
So for me, [00:22:00] I was in Orlando for July 4th, and then the week before I saw that they had the plane. The plane was flying from LaGuardia to Orlando to DCA Reagan National, and then I believe it was going to West Palm Beach. So for me, since I was already in Orlando and I need to make my way back north to the northeast, it made sense for me to fly on the Orlando to DCA leg, and that flight didn’t leave.
Too many, didn’t leave too early in the day, so that was great. And then in regards to the challenge, I range anywhere from one to four airports a day. So they range from doing like a day turn, just basically flying to the airport and flying back to anywhere to a three day trip.
Justin Vacula: All right. We’ll take a break and get back to more of the particulars of the challenge and some challenges that you faced during the challenge.
Join me at ZorkFest 2025 in [00:23:00] Las Vegas, December 5th through the seventh. At M Resort, casino Hotel, Zork Fest, combines miles points and gambling content all in one weekend. I’ll be there speaking and connecting with podcast listeners. Buy your ticket@zorkfest.travel zork.com. I’ll also be speaking at Chicago Seminars Hyatt Regency O’Hare event, November 7th through the ninth, 2025.
Use promo code HurdyGurdy when buying a ticket to support me. Also join me October 24th through the 26th, 2025. For Chicago Seminars Holiday Inn Chicago Oakbrook. Use promo code I must have a promo code 20 for $20 off tickets. This episode is also supported by card pointers. If you have multiple credit cards like me, card pointers helps you automatically activate bank offers and knows which card to use.
For maximum rewards card pointer saves me time and money. Use my link card pointers.com/erie gerdy travel for a discount on annual and lifetime plans. I [00:24:00] also host monthly travel and points meetups in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania. Next meetups are November 23rd and December 21st, 2025. If you’re local or want to make a trip, it’s a fun casual way to talk point strategies.
Meet like-minded travelers and share ideas. RSVP at meetup.com/philly Miles and points. I’ll also be speaking at Frequent Traveler University in Irvine, Texas. Just aside, Dallas May 1st through the third 2026 at the Nylo Las Colinas Hotel by Hilton. Join me community members for social events and educational sessions.
Ticket sales are live, $200 for FTU members and $249 for non-members. You can also grab an FTU annual membership for online courses, seminars, member perks, event discounts, and more. Signup link and membership is in the show notes. And James, you should be speaking at FTU Dallas as well, right?
James He: Yes. I am slated to be speaking about Hyatt Hotels at the [00:25:00] event in Irving, Texas.
Justin Vacula: Ah, perfect. And speaking of hotels, let’s get back into it. My guest, James, he talking about the JetBlue 25 for 25 challenge when you were accumulating all these different airports. Which hotels did you stay
James He: for? One of ’em. I did a three day trip, so I had to overnight in Raleigh Durham and I stayed at the Double Tree by the airport, and that one I believe was like a hundred dollars revenue rate.
And I have the American Express Hilton Surpass credit card, which gives me a $50 hotel credit that I can use every quarter. So that was, I was able to bring some of the costs down for that. Stay using the. Payment credit.
Justin Vacula: That’s a good one. A lot of people have just been using it on food, so if you could use it on a really cheap hotel night, that’s really cool.
And
James He: also one of the new benefits that was started last year in December was the Platinum Business credit card, [00:26:00] which also gives a $50 Amex credit for the Hilton hotels as well.
Justin Vacula: Yes, the Amex Business Platinum. The quarterly credit. Yeah. And you stayed in Jersey as well? Yes. So I
James He: was actually needed to stay in New York and Manhattan, and I actually ended up using a free night certificate at the Hyatt House in Jersey City.
Basically, that just came from staying for 30 nights at Hyatt. So you get a free category, one through four hotel stay certificate, and with the rising cost of hotel points, there’s actually no more Hyatt one through four category in Manhattan. So Hyatt House, Jersey City, Hyatt Regency, Jersey City, Hyatt Place, long Island City, and the JFK Hyatt Regency Resorts World and the LaGuardia Hyatt Place are the only categories, one through four and left in the vicinity.
Justin Vacula: Lots of options as usual. The answer to everything is more credit cards to get these [00:27:00] benefits, to get these free night certificates and much more. And where these hotels more impromptu stays. Or when you booked the flights, you also had the hotels booked with the flights beforehand.
James He: So the Double Tree by Raleigh Durham Airport was preplanned, didn’t have any flight issues, no delays or re bookings with that.
And then the Hyatt House in Jersey City, that was preplanned. I had an event to go to in Manhattan, so that was booked. The DoubleTree, JFK that I end up staying for one night was due to a rebooking. So there was a weather delay in. In Dominican Republic, I missed my connecting flight from San Juan Puerto Rico into White Plains New York.
See, originally I was booked at the Hyatt House, white Plains, New York, using a category one through four certificate. But due to rerouting, I was rebooked to JFK because that was the last flight arriving into the New York metro area. Arriving [00:28:00] around 2:00 AM. And then everything was sold out. I would’ve preferred to have stayed at the higher Regency Resorts world by JFK, but they were sold out.
Unfortunately, I was able to call the Hyatt, globalist Flying, told ’em the situation, and told ’em that I wasn’t flying to White Plains, New York, and I needed to cancel that state the day of. They were very understanding. They contacted the hotel, my behalf, canceled it, and then refunded the free night certificate.
And then the only viable option I saw that night was to stay at the DoubleTree by JFK airport using 60,000 points for that stay because the rates, revenue rates were over $500 that night.
Justin Vacula: Sounds good. It’d be interesting to pair this with the ascension to globalist status if you were to need the 60 nights.
Having some of these nights during the challenge seems appealing. I qualified for globalist earlier in the year, but I imagine that some people that would be around 45 to 50 nights. Would really like those Hyatt Nights.
James He: Yeah, of course. And then right now, Hyatt personal [00:29:00] credit card has an interesting promotion.
So if you apply between now and the year, they’re giving you double elite night credits for just having the hotel. So every night you’re staying at the hotel. From now until the year, and then also through the end of January of 2026, you earn two elite night credits instead of just the one. So that’s an interesting proposition for those people that are on the fence in regards to getting the Hyatt personal credit card from Chase,
Justin Vacula: I and probably other listeners have lots of points with Wyndham, as many of us got the Wyndham Business Earner card years ago to get the Wyndham status matched to Caesars and took advantage of the eight x points earning.
On the Wyndham cards, so perhaps lots of Wyndham hotels near these airports that you would be flying for JetBlue to get some of these points out.
James He: I am not a seeker of Wyndham Hotels. I do have some points, and the points I had, we’ll say Orphan in my account, I actually transfer them to [00:30:00] United for this month.
They have a 25% hotel transfer bonus for transferring points from different hotel programs into. The United Mileage Plus Program, and then right now there’s a temporary bonus for double points, so I was able to transfer 16,000 wind points to have it become 6,400, the United Points and Miles, and there’s gonna be a 25% bonus that will be added in January.
Justin Vacula: America still loves math.
James He: But you gotta do the math when you’re doing all these calculations. Yes, the points redemption. I’m not super obsessed with it, but that’s one way to compare value. You want to sign a baseline value to the programs. Sometimes people redeem points for less than 2 cents per point, and.
That’s not a good redemption value because you can still get 2 cents cash back, for example. You can get at least a 2 cents per dollar spent on the Citi Bank, [00:31:00] double cash, or if you have the wallflower go.
Justin Vacula: Lots of options, although I think people with more points are more willing to spend the points to get them out.
As we have this first world problem of too many points and too many programs, perhaps expirations looming. In the future, so lots of options, but I might, I transferred Windom out to United as well as I had lots of Windom points. So if that eight X turns into something like a five x or a six X going over to United and perhaps I’d get more than 1 cent per point with United, I’ll be pretty happy about that.
So nice versatility using some of these points. And were a lot of your hotels near the airport, was it easy to get to these hotels or did you end up taking ride shares that had to take you a much longer distance?
James He: So the Hyatt Place by the White Plains Airport, they actually don’t have a shuttle on weekends.
They have a limited hours for their shuttles. So it was basically Monday through Friday from nine to 6:00 PM I believe. Don’t quote me on it in [00:32:00] regards to the DoubleTree by Rally Durham Airport. The shuttle was a little bit more frequent, so that was easy to just call ’em. They picked me up within 50 20 minutes, very easy to get to my flight to Fort Lauderdale.
The following morning was, I believe, 6:00 AM so the shuttle was available, and then the JFK DoubleTree Hotel, that property, I had to wait over an hour for the shuttle. Basically, I took the air train from terminal five where JetBlue flies into. To Federal Circle. I called the hotel at least three times to get a shuttle, and it was very late.
And then the next morning I was actually supposed to fly from JFK to Nantucket, and my plane apparently was delayed and then subsequently canceled due to we Air. And then I had to rebook myself from LaGuardia to Nantucket. And then I took an Uber to the me, the subway [00:33:00] station, and then a or Eli, I am not familiar with it.
And then subsequently the Q 70 bus to LaGuardia,
Justin Vacula: any MBTA writing in Boston. I had past podcast guest, purple Princess Perry. On who’s a fan of the MBTA and now hired by them? Any Boston Transit while you were there? So
James He: I actually didn’t get to take any Boston Transit for me. I reside in New Hampshire, so we have a hourly bus from New Hampshire on either Boston Express or Concord Coaches that gets to Boston Logan Airport.
The one I usually frequent is a 3:45 AM bus out of London. I call it the party bus because it starts at three 15 in Concord and then. It gets into Boston around 4:30 AM in order to make those 5:36 AM flights, the bus is pretty frequent. It’s every hour. And then the last bus I usually take is the 10:25 PM bus from Boston Logan [00:34:00] Airport.
It goes all the way up to New Hampshire. So for this, for the purposes of this challenge, actually didn’t take any MBTA,
Justin Vacula: ah, maybe some tea in your future. Yeah, but not this time. And how about some memorable stops throughout this? So it wasn’t just mileage running. It wasn’t just flying to fly and flying, sleeping, surely you got out of the airports, out of hotels and got to see some places during this challenge.
James He: So for me, it was mainly just trying to fit in the 25 destinations and airports as quickly as I can in between my days off, memorable stops. I was on actually the last flight from Boston into Miami on September 2nd. That route has been discontinued since they. Offered two flights a day. I was on the morning flight and it went off with a hitch based on reading on the online forums.
The later flight that day had mechanical, there was delayed and the flight actually got into Miami super late. I actually, so flew into Miami and then I took the tri rail into Fort [00:35:00] Lauderdale. That was like, I think $3. It leaves directly from the Miami airport. It takes you pretty close to the Fort Lauder airport.
And then there is a free shuttle from the tri rail station there into Fort Lauderdale. When I was in San Domingo, Dominican Republic, that was my only international destination for this trip. I saw that they would fly from Fort Lauderdale into San Domingo and then continue on to San Juan, Puerto Rico. My flight was, so I was in San Domingo.
I did a self connect and then I had less an hour to connect. Fortunately, my, my plane landed safely in the SDQ airport. I had to clear immigration. They don’t have a serial transit area, so you have to actually enter into the Dominican Republic, get stamped in. Luckily, I had filled a electronic arrivals card, but I didn’t fill a departures card, so that’s something to be cognizant of, to fill out
Justin Vacula: your cards.
Oh, that’s interesting. When I flew to Bahamas, they had me [00:36:00] fill out a paper on the flight and told me about it, but I’ve heard this from you and. Jean pb, who is probably a listening fan of the show, that he had some problems with paperwork as well. They asked do, did you fill out the paperwork? And he didn’t even know it was a thing.
James He: So yeah, I actually went to put Canada during COVID in the summer of 2020, and back then they did the paper landing carts, but it looks like the Dominican Republic actually transited to electronic landing and departure cards. So that’s something to be cognizant of. So when I checked in Raleigh Durham, they asked me to fill it out.
I didn’t realize that I needed to fill it out when I left, so that’s something to be cognitive of. You can fill it right away after you fill it out to take a screenshot, you can just do the QR code and that’s something they scan. I believe it’s also linked to your passport number, so just have your screenshot saved in case there’s any issues
Justin Vacula: and any other memorable moments or stops throughout town.
Yeah,
James He: so flying into Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket, [00:37:00] airports, they’re really small. So they’re on basically remote islands near Massachusetts. So they are not made for sterile transits. So you actually have to exit the airport, go through like a metal gated fence, similar to what you like a ballpark, and then exit it, and then go to baggage claim and then get, basically go through security again.
And then the departures area for those airports, literally like an outside tent and they just have benches waiting out there. And then they have a little concession stands. Basically where they sell like sandwiches and chips and drinks and things like that. Very small airports. One of the challenges, I actually was flying from Bangkok all the way to JFK, and then I just booked a tag flight from JFK to Highness and then arrived at Highness Airport.
You can take a bus from Hyannis all the way up to Boston, south Station and Boston Local airport. Both Plymouth and Brockton do that also. Peter Pan does that. They charge about $28 one way, so you can [00:38:00] just book it online. Some of these flights, especially to like Nantucket and Arts Vineyard, were on the E one 90 and that plane has been retired, so the Emperor one 90 has been retired from.
The JetBlue fleet. So they’ve been mainly replaced by the 8, 2 20. Those planes were great. It was a two by two, but they were definitely warned. They had the old generation entertainment system as well.
Justin Vacula: Okay. So to summarize some more math, what ended up being the cost of the challenge? So after these bonus points, did you come out ahead about how much maybe cash out of pocket?
Did you end up spending as well?
James He: So me, I spent more than I actually wanted to admit. So it was in the four figures, but that’s mainly just to optimize route planning and also just basically I have limited days off between work, so I was just doing it on my off days. I did read online that some people were able to book the trip for around two [00:39:00] $2,500 in spend.
It can actually be lowered by using points, either transferable currency into JetBlue or one of their partner airlines or using, for example, American Express points to offset the cost of the travel
Justin Vacula: and any advice for others considering challenge.
James He: So definitely have backups for me. One of the fights I took was from Pittsburgh into Boston.
I actually was flying from Savannah to JFG to Pittsburgh on JetBlue. So that flight was delayed, and then JetBlue only has one gate currently in Pittsburgh. So when I was literally taxiing into Pittsburgh, the gate, and then I was on a separate JetBlue flight from Pittsburgh to Boston that was leaving around the same time, and then because my flight was so delayed, actually missed that flight.
So I was literally waiting on the tarmac outside the plane. The gate agent called me, asked me where I was, and I casually just told her I was on the tarmac. She goes, oh, are you on the plane, dude, Boston? I said, no, I’m [00:40:00] on the India plane from JFK. And she’s oh, you’re not gonna make it. Oh. So it turns out that our flight was so delayed that the flight going to Boston had to leave the gate area and then.
Go in the penalty box to fly into Boston, but Boston currently has runway construction, so later in the afternoons, all the arrivals and departures are delayed. So I literally saw the plane pull back from the gate and then go into the penalty box to wait for their A TC delay into Boston. And then I got back to, then we pulled into the gate off a plane casually, went to the gate agent and she says, are you doing the JetBlue 25 or 25?
I said, yes. She’s I figured. She was confused why I was on the tarmac and not on that airplane going to Boston, but she graciously rebooked me on the later flight on JetBlue to Boston, the last departure. But I also had a backup flight on Delta from Pittsburgh into Boston, and that flight was departing earlier and I got a bad fuel upgrade as a [00:41:00] diamond medallion on that flight.
Then that flight was delayed an hour, but then the JetBlue flight that they rebooked me was also delayed. So I ended up taking the Delta flight into Boston. And then after, as soon as we pushed back from the gate, I canceled my booking on JetBlue for the later flight into Boston. So that went to my travel bank.
And then other advice, a lot of these airports have priority plus. So for example, San Juan Airport has a new escape lounge there. Fort Lauderdale has escape lounge. Just have fun with it. Enjoy the destination, make it a trip. Make sure opportunity to visit all these destinations. Definitely leave the airport and explore the sites.
Make a
Justin Vacula: day trip out of it. And some chase lounges too. Maybe Centurion lounges, some other higher quality lounges you might have been able to visit.
James He: Yeah, when I flew into Miami Airport on that last flight, last day that Jeff was operating flight. I actually had a backup plan on American from [00:42:00] my to Boston.
I was able to leverage my one world AL status on fan air and access the flagship lounge with American Airlines and their lounges. There’s no three hour rule for arrival for departure like they do with Delta or some of the other. American Express or Chase lounges, so I definitely utilized that. Actually used the lounge to do some work and enjoy some of the food.
They have actually made it to what I call the M 10 30 where they were having the last remnants of breakfast and then they were cleaning up and then setting up for the all day dining. So I was able to enjoy breakfast and then subsequently launch as well.
Justin Vacula: Cool. So now that you have JetBlue Mosaic status, you will have it for 25 years.
Any JetBlue in 20 26, 20 27, the New York future.
James He: I actually am going to Houston this Friday, and I have a JetBlue flight booked currently, but there has been a snafu with the promotion for me. So my last flight was on October the [00:43:00] third from JFK to Rochester, and the flight didn’t actually post until the 16th, and as of now, JetBlue hasn’t awarded me the 25 years of Mosaic one status.
And the temporary mosa one status I have from the Duncan promo expired on October 7th. So currently I am status list on JetBlue. So I actually reached out to their social media team on X, and they told me that it can take up to 14 days after it’s posted. So hopefully it will get posted before the end of October.
But I also have a backup flight booked on United nonstop and actually have another backup flight booked through Delta, through Atlanta. I was at work today and I got upgraded from Atlanta to Boston so that, so right now the contender right now is the Delta flight via Atlanta.
Justin Vacula: All right. Nice. That was a lot of information.
Cool to hear about the challenge and how you did it. We’re coming up on time, so let’s go to, how can people find you online?
James He: Yeah, so my Instagram handle is [00:44:00] life.in the pursuit of travel. If find me on there, you can also email me at life in the pursuit of travel@gmail.com. I’m also a high globalist and world of high Facebook moderator.
You can also find me on the award 1 0 1 in frequent Mailers Insider Facebook group. And then I am also will be a speaker at the Frequent Traveler University seminars in Dallas next year that’s gonna be hosted at the Nyla Hotel in Irving, Texas in May of 2026.
Justin Vacula: Nice. You should both be there as I’m scheduled to be there as well.
And if you could spell your name for listeners. Yeah. First name is James,
James He: J-A-M-E-S. Last name is H. Excellent. Anything
Justin Vacula: else that you’d like to add? I just wanna
James He: say thank you for having me as a guest on this podcast. I was able to talk about some fun experiences I had with Jet Blue the last three months and completing this challenge.
And at the time of recording on October 21st, you still have two months left to complete this challenge. And we do know that points bookings will count [00:45:00] either through JetBlue’s own TrueBlue program or their partner airlines via Japan Airlines, mileage Bank, Qatar Airways, Avios, or Etti Hot Guest miles.
So as long as you don’t book a points or revenue booking as the basic economy, blue Basic Fair, and then as long as you have your true blue number in the booking, you will qualify for the promotion. Everyone is pre-registered field promotional. As long as you have a triple number A, you have until December 31st to complete the challenge.
Justin Vacula: Did any award come in? Maybe they’ll send out something and say, congratulations, here’s this button, this medal, this hat, anything like that. What do we think? Mike Confide? I think
James He: based on what I read online and some other people that have already completed challenged, they just get a congratulations email, and then I believe the status changes.
Then I actually, on the flight from JK Rochester, told the crew about it and the pilots, the captains were nice enough to let me take a picture in the cockpit, so I was [00:46:00] able to take a celebratory picture in their cockpit. So they were great sports about it. So a lot of the JetBlue employees actually are aware of the program.
They see a lot of people are doing this, and even some of the employees are doing it just for the points and the status for 25 years.
Justin Vacula: Alright, cool, and we’ll stay tuned for 2026 to see if they send you some merch or if there’s some special announcement. It’ll be interesting to see how that turns out.
James He: Yeah, I’m definitely plug to it if JetBlue wants to reach out and gimme merch. I’m always in the market. I always love to enjoy airline swag. I’m an app geek, aviation geek, love many other frequent flyers travelers and just discussing miles and points and traveling in general.
Justin Vacula: Yes, you could even do an unboxing video.
That’s another thing. Past podcast guest Purple Princess Perry on Instagram from the Netflix show. Love on the Spectrum. She’s been getting a lot of merch from companies and doing these unboxing videos. So here’s a JetBlue mug, a JetBlue hat, a JetBlue shirt, [00:47:00] maybe a hundred dollars Dunkin Donuts gift card, all these things.
James He: Hey, JetBlue wants to send me and you. Anything along the way, I’ll be happy to accept it and to unbox a video and post it on social media.
Justin Vacula: All right, JetBlue, if you’re listening, here’s your collaboration opportunity.
James He: Alright.
Justin Vacula: Okay. Thanks for coming on. Yeah, thanks Justin.
James He: It was great discussing JetBlue promotion with you.
Yeah. And then thank you everyone for listening.
Justin Vacula: Thanks everyone for listening and stay tuned for future episodes. For more content between podcast episodes, follow Hurdy Gurdy Travel podcast on Facebook and x follow Justin Vacula on Instagram. Subscribe to Hurdy Gurdy Travel podcast on YouTube for daily content
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