Bora Bora!
You heard of it!
You might have seen your favorite blogger showcasing it!
If I’m your favorite blogger, ahhhh…..thank you!

Well, I’ll be showcasing Bora Bora today. I want to show you how I got 6 free nights at the Conrad Bora Bora!

Bora Bora is located in the French Polynesia. An hour flight from Tahiti, which is a 7 hour flight from Los Angles. It’s far enough away to be surrounded by secluded luxury, but close enough to be an 8 hour flight.

I’m not going to show how I got free flights, that is another post. I will show you how I saved over $10,000, by utilizing certain credit cards. Why I Love Credit Cards!

Conrad Bora Bora is a Hilton resort. Hilton Hotels has 31 different brands in their portfolio. All different price points. From the low end Hampton Inn and Double Tree, to the high end Waldorf Astoria. Conrad falls on the higher end of Hiltons portfolio.

Bora Bora is expensive by itself. So, to stay at a high end resort in Bora Bora, has to be VERY expensive right? Well, yes it is, IF, you pay cash rates and don’t know how to take advantage of promotions.

The first step that you need to take, if you ever stay at any hotel chain, is to sign up for their loyalty club. Every big hotel chain will have one.


  • Marriott-Bonvoy
  • Hyatt-World of Hyatt
  • Wydham-Wydham Rewards
  • Choice-Choice privileges
  • Hilton-HHonors

Signing up for any hotel program is always free. The benefits of the programs vary from program to program, and even hotel to hotel within that program, but one thing stays the same; You will get much better rewards for being a member in their program, than not.

In the HHonors case, we are going to get a 5th night free, by being a member in their program, when we use points for the first 4 nights.

So, how to accrue points in HHonors?

The easiest, quickest, and cheapest way, is to sign up for a Hilton branded credit card, issued by American Express.

American Express has 3 different Hilton cards, 4 If you count the Hilton business card, which I am not for this example.

  • Hilton Honors American Express Card
  • Hilton Honors American Express Ascend card
  • Hilton Honors American Express Aspire card

 

Just like all of Hilton resorts, these credit cards have 3 different price points/annual fees.

  • Hilton Honors American Express card-No annual fee
  • Hilton Honors American Express Ascend card- $95 annual fee
  • Hilton Honors American Express Aspire card- $450 annual fee

If you are looking to go to Bora Bora, or any other Hilton resort, I strongly recommend the American Express Aspire card. Yes, it has a $450 annual fee, however, after getting $250 calendar year flight credits, and a $250 member year Hilton resort credit, you are already making $50 for having this card.

Throw in the free night weekend certificate, which I will get to later, the sign up bonus, and Diamond status, which is HHonors highest member tier, you are coming out so far ahead of the annual fee.

*On a side note, I do not believe the benefits of this card will last long. This card is an extremely great value, IF, IF, IF, you stay at a Hilton resort.

For Conrad Bora Bora, this changes with every hotel, even within the Conrad brand, we need 80,000 points/night for a free night. Remember from earlier, if we book 4 nights, using points, we get the 5th night free. At 80,000 points a night, we would need 320,000 points for 5 free nights(80,000*4=320,000+5thnight free)

The sign up bonus using my provided link, is 150,000 points, after $4,0000 spend, within 3 months.

With the Aspire card, you get 7x HHonors points at restaurants, airfare and rental cars agencies. You get 3X HHonors points at everything else!

After meeting the $4,000 spend within 3 months, you would have a minimum of 162,000 HHonors points. More than halfway to our goal of 320,000 points.

How do we get the needed balance of 158,000 HHonors points to get to the total of 320,000 points?

Well, transfer partners.

 

American Express has their set of point currency, called Membership Rewards. These points are transferable to certain hotel and airfare partners. One of those partners is……Hilton!

At a rate of 1:2, meaning every American Express point is equal to 2 HHonors points, you would need to transfer 79,000 Amex points to equal 158,000 HHonors points. American Express and Hilton have frequent promotions that increase this transfer rate. The highest I have ever seen was a 1:3 ratio, meaning 1 Membership Rewards point would equal 3 HHonors points, an increase of 50% over their standard rate of 1:2.

How to acquire Amex points? Well, yup, you guessed it, sign up bonus via credit cards. I love the American Express personal platinum as I get a ton of value out of it. More than the annual fee.

That is another article.

After getting the sign up bonus from the Amex Aspire, and transferring points from American Express personal platinum, you will now have enough for 5 nights FREE at Conrad Bora Bora. How do you get the 6th night free?

One of the MANY benefits of the American Express Aspire card, is a FREE weekend night certificate at a Hilton resort! You get this certificate 6-8 weeks after opening your card, and every anniversary after. A weekend, under Hilton terms, consist of Friday, Saturday or Sunday check in. There is a small list of exclusions, where the certificate can not be used. Conrad Bora Bora is not on that list. Neither is the Conrad Maldives, but I’ll save “Conrad Maldivesd! How I got 6 free nights!” for another day.

List of excluded resorts to use the weekend night certificate are here;

https://hiltonhonors3.hilton.com/en/promotions/weekend-reward.html

By using the HHonors program, and getting an American Express Hilton card, you can get yourself much closer, for free, to that luxurious Bora Bora trip you always wanted, and don’t think you can afford.

 I’ll see ya there!