Good morning and welcome back to The Daily Drop.
I want to start off by giving condolences for those involved in the fatal crash of Yeti Airlines flight 691 on Sunday. As a lover of both travel and aviation, it's always heartbreaking to see events like this happen, especially on a well-established, popular commercial route.
While accidents like this are always possible, I want to highlight exactly how rare they are. In case you weren't aware:
- Your odds of being in a plane crash are 1 in 1.2 million
- Your odds of dying in a plane crash are 1 in 11 million
- Even if a plane crashes, your survival odds are around 95%
- When something like this happens, those odds get even smaller as pilots, airlines, and manufacturers learn from the tragedy.
These odds differ depending on many other facts. For example, those odds are significantly smaller if you fly in the U.S. or Europe.
The crash this weekend occurred in Nepal. While I do not doubt that the pilots were just as well trained as most other major airlines out there, Nepal just has inherent risks due to the challenging geography and weather.
I know that knowing these stats doesn't always make people feel better when they're sitting in their seat, but here's an activity to try:
Go on Google's random number generator and set the parameters between 1 and 11 million. Think of a number and see how many guesses it takes Google to guess it.
You'll probably die of old age before the numbers match...
Anyway, I hope this makes you feel a little better if you are a nervous flyer. I know that it helps me when I get nervous about flying (which does happen sometimes).
On a more upbeat note, here's what we'll cover in today's newsletter:
- 🙌 Travel Trivia Tuesday
- 🛳️ Cruise news: Princess cruises steps up their game
- 🏔️ This Canadian city is offering a $250 discount on hotels
- 🤔 18-year-old + crypto = new airline...?
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We all love trivia, right? Except when you're at trivia night at the bar, and that one friend keeps chiming in with all the wrong answers.
Thankfully you can do some trivia from the comfort of your computer or phone.
Here's today's trivia question:
To which place does this flag belong?
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I'll tell you the answer later in the newsletter. |
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🛳️ Cruise news: Princess cruises steps up their game
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I know we just had some cruise news a couple of newsletters ago, but hey - it's wave season, so cruise deals are going to be in the spotlight this month.
Princess cruises has thrown its hat into the wave season ring with an excellent promotion, which they're calling their "Best Sale Ever."
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Here are the deets:
- Get up to 35% off cruise fares
- Get up to $150 in onboard credit
- Add-on packages are also significantly discounted
- Offer expires on March 1st, 2023
- Currently only available to residents of North America
The add-on packages include things like premium wifi, drinks, activities, and more - so this could be a great time to get in on a discounted, all-inclusive cruise.
I wanted to give you some specific examples of cruises, cruise packages, and pricing, but the website doesn't seem to be working right now...
I guess either they noticed a visit from an Iraqi network and don't think I'm interested in buying a cruise, OR this deal is so good that everyone is flocking to the website and overloading it.
I'd like to think it's the latter.
Whatever the cause, the sale is good for another six weeks, so I doubt this will prevent anyone from getting in on the fun.
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🏔️ This Canadian city is offering $250 discounts on hotels
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Canadians rave all the time about how great of a city Toronto is. As much as I love Toronto, in my mind, it will always hold second place to the city of Vancouver.
The spacious streets, the beautiful scenery just a stone's throw away, and the dankest macarons in North America - it's just a wonderful place.
Now that I've sold you on how great of a city it is, do you want to go?
What if I told you that you could get hundreds of dollars of free cash if you book a trip to Vancouver? Now do I have your attention?
I thought so...
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This promotion happens a few times every year and offers various incentives (usually in the form of prepaid gift cards) for booking hotels in Vancouver during certain timeframes.
This time, the gift cards range from $100 to $250 for a stay lasting at least 2 nights (though you can book as many stays as you'd like) for stays taking place between January 5th and April 30th, a pretty sweet timeframe.
Sorry, I know I just used the word "stay" way too many times.
I visit Vancouver at least a few time a year and always get excited when this promotion comes back.
If you maximize this promo, you could get $250 for a 2-night stay. But you don't need to book top-notch hotels to get great value.
For example, they have hotels for around $300 per night that will give you a $250 gift card. That means a 2-night stay would be discounted from $600 to $350, almost a 50% reduction.
Given the absurd hotel prices in cities like Vancouver in recent months, a $250 discount is nothing to scoff at.
Here are a couple of examples of hotels and their corresponding gift cards:
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Is this deal worth pursuing?
If you were already planning on going to Vancouver, then yes. If you are now planning on going to Vancouver after reading this, then also yes.
Having taken advantage of this promo myself in the past, I can guarantee that it's a great way to save money in an otherwise expensive city.
I treat prepaid gift cards like cash because... well... you can use them for anything.
But in some instances, the hotels will offer you the alternative of just reducing your room rate by the same amount instead of giving you the gift card, making it literally just cash.
If you're really stingy like me, you could even group a few stays together and maximize your savings (and get to experience staying in multiple neighborhoods around the city).
If this sounds as appealing to you as it does to me, then check out their website, book your trip, and enjoy all the glorious splendor Vancouver has to offer.
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🤔 18-year-old + crypto = new airline...?
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It's always great to see new airlines entering the travel space. After all, competition is what makes the best airline loyalty programs valuable for us travel hackers.
But sometimes, airlines are just... confusing. And this one definitely takes the cake on that front, and it's quite interesting to learn about.
The newly established Bavarian Airlines is a German airline startup aimed at offering a better product than competitors like Lufthansa, while also dabbling in web3.
What I mean is that instead of a normal loyalty program, they'll offer crypto tokens as rewards, which can then be redeemed for future flights. Here is how it is described on the website:
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That's right, folks. Instead of earning those pesky "worthless miles," you'll earn something far more valuable and predictable: crypto.
First of all, I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with that concept. In fact, I think it's only a matter of time before other airlines experiment with web3 in more substantial ways.
But there are other things that don't quite add up about this airline.
First, they plan on leasing 12 Embraer planes (which they don't have yet) and offering a premium business-class seating arrangement in a 1-1 configuration.
Unless they're planning on installing first-class pods like Emirates, there's no way this makes sense, spatially speaking.
Plus, most of their planned flights are within Germany. So why go from "non-existent" to "world-class lie-flat pods" for flights that, in most cases, will only last 30-60 minutes? Who would pay for that flight? Who would invest in a model like that?
Next, their website, while sleek, is also confusing.
Their home page features a place to search for flights, but every search results in this error page:
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The reason is because... well... they don't sell tickets. Because they don't have planes. Or approval to fly in or out of any airports. Or any staff. And their 6-sentence press release had a glaring typo... or rather an entire word missing...
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If it sounds like this airline isn't the most well thought out, it may be because the founder is an 18-year-old entrepreneur with no experience in the travel or airline industries.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think you need to be an old geezer to start a company.
In fact, I love the idea of entrepreneurs finding creative ways to innovate the travel space and compete against the big dogs to keep them on their toes.
But airlines are complicated. And it sounds a bit like a kid who loves crypto pitching half-baked ideas.
In the end, I think it's really interesting to see stories like this being covered by major news outlets despite the confusing messaging and lack of any hard product, which makes me think maybe there's more than just what I see on the surface.
If everything works out exactly as pitched, I'll be... surprised, to say the least. But I'll also be excited to see where this company goes.
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That's all for today, friends! Ready for the answer to the trivia question?
The flag belongs to the region of Kurdistan here in Iraq. The 21 rays of the sun represent March 21st, the most important day in Kurdish culture.
Not only is that the day of the Newroz festival, but it also coincides with the Spring equinox. It's basically a big celebration of Kurdish culture, history, Spring weather, and more.
If you search for photos of it online you'll see how awesome it looks.
What is your favorite flag (country, city, state, region)? Send me a picture! What are your thoughts about Bavarian Airlines? Would you pay a premium for a 30-minute flight in a first-class seat? Let me know by replying to this email or reaching out on social media.
Tschüss,
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