AD | Best City Breaks, Long-Haul Flight Hacks & How To Make The Most Of Your Avios | SheerLuxe Podcast

0:00Charlotte Collins:Welcome to the Sheerlux podcast. Today's podcast is in partnership with British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card. There's a little holiday in the things you buy. Representative 136.4 % APR variable. Your rate may vary depending on your circumstances and your fee applies. Terms apply 18 plus subject to approval. I'm very excited that I'm joined by two of the most in the know travel people I know, the lovely Billie Bhatia, and travel and points expert, Nicky Calvin. Hi both. I'm excited to be here, to be put to the test by you. Is that what's happening? We're grilling you. You're going to be under the travel spotlight today.

0:45Charlotte Collins:We're here to talk all things BA Amex, but let's kind of start from the beginning. Let's start from your travel routes, both of you. The first trip you can remember that really ignited your passion for travel. Nicky? I did a huge trip to Africa just after having survived a whole Crohn's disaster. I was very, very sick. I decided to do this big trip, climb Kilimanjaro. And it gave me this realisation that I can do anything. I can go anywhere. And I kind of used that as a springboard to then be doing more exciting travel. And I really grabbed the ball by the horns after that trip. Because you work in the travel space now, but you were a corporate lawyer.

1:21I was a corporate lawyer. Then I was a music lawyer. I've done all sorts of jobs, actually. but I was a lawyer for a bulk of my career. And so this was, the travel thing was always my passion, particularly aeroplanes. I'm like a proper little avgeek, if you know, do you want an avgeek? Yeah, aviation. Aviation. Yeah, no one knows that. I say avgeek, people are like, eh?

1:37Charlotte Collins:I can work it out in the context. So yeah, that's, I really felt lucky that I managed to make that shift from corporate lawyer world into doing what I really love. Love. Billy, what about you? Sorry, I'm still shook that Mickey was a lawyer before this. People are like, you? Brains and beauty. It was always like people for me when I traveled, like when I was younger and we would always go to like Spain or something as a family holiday. I would always be so excited as to like the kids that I would meet and get to hang out with and play with, mainly because my brother and sister were always so bored of me.

2:10But I did a road trip when I was 20 across America, like on an absolute shoestring budget. And it was just so exciting. Everything was just so big. And I was like, whoa, this is the world. Like there's huge mountains and there's huge lakes and huge everything and I was just yeah I think I caught the bug then and I was like I just want to see as much as I could possibly see where did you go we started in Texas and drove through Arizona and then across to California and then up the coast we weren't very young and we couldn't um legally hire a car so we had to buy a car but we but our budget was$250 each so you can imagine the whole trip for the whole well for the car for the car right the car that we drove it didn't really serve us in huge stead but it went to the adventure did you sell it at the end no we gave it to goodwill that's nice i don't know if they could use it but complete right yeah i've got a

3:00Charlotte Collins:question here that says do you travel to switch on or off i suspect you're going to have quite different answers because you travel so much what i mean can you just give us a rundown of it's wednesday today what you've done in the last two days last two days my little routing from monday morning was london to gibraltar to tarifa to tangier to casablanca to paris to london that was the last 48 hours i do love it i love that pace but when people are saying to me how do you do it you even said that to me this morning and i'm like i don't i'm dead yeah feel awful but it does energize me as well as and i think i do travel generally to turn on because it energizes me i can sit by a pool i can do that and enjoy that but i like to experience learn be invigorated by seeing and doing new things so getting on a plane i know you're getting on a plane for pleasure tomorrow that doesn't feel like work no not at all yeah yeah no tomorrow is like chill and um i'm really looking forward to that okay nice flight no filming anything billy a bit of both i do like a drop and flop type holiday sometimes where you just do nothing but now like we're so overstimulated by everything i think you're just still on most of the time anyway but i'm going on a big trip on monday yeah you are tell us because do you i suppose this doesn't really count as like travel holidays so much as like semi moving yeah yeah yeah so i'm going to bali for nine weeks so that feels like a switch off are you gonna work while you're there i'm gonna do a bit of work i mainly just want to play paddle every day that's that's pretty much that's yeah you've just come back from the most insane trip as well it was it was so spectacular i have got the safari bug so hard was that was that for safari no i went in january to south africa and i completely fell in love i feel i feel like africa literally imprinted on my heart and i was like that's it i'm done that's this is all i want to do and my mum was born in kenya and she hadn't been back for like over 40 years.

4:47So we did a really special mother-daughter trip.

4:50Charlotte Collins:Yeah, I just want to live with the animals all year round. I mean, wow, we're making it happen in Bali more than in London. How has travel influenced your career? I mean, Nikki, this is kind of an obvious question for you, but Billy, for you, like how has, you know, maybe take us back to kind of your early days as an editor, because obviously travel is such a big part of that career path too. How has travel kind of shaped your professional life? I think travel's the biggest privilege. And when we were younger, like we went on one family holiday a year sometimes it was like a UK based thing or Spain it's like a family friends place it was never like a super extravagant trip and then I kind of worked in the magazine industry and I was like oh right so you just get flown business class to New York and we're going here we're going there and I was like I never want this to end but it is also it's quite mad because these aren't things I would naturally be able to afford to do so it kind of it's a weird like skews your perception of travel and traveling but it is also yeah I just think travel is the greatest privilege to be able to experience somebody else's world and I just want to do it all the time just like Nikki yeah I agree I'm just looking at you like oh really really enjoy that I was like I agree yes locked in we've got some more like travel nitty-gritty questions to get into but I I want a bit more like flavor from you both about what travel has look like over the past year nikki you said you've done like an insane amount of flights this year yes um it's been about 80 odd so far this year last year was 109 about half of those are long haul flights so it's a lot i get to see a lot of the world most of it's for work i'm obsessed with the flying so i love it okay yeah that's fair that's fair i want to know where somewhere from both of you that you've been to this year that you're obsessed with you actually took the most insane china trip this year as well i did a bit of china and then i came back via hong kong and i I loved Hong Kong.

6:35It just felt like mini Manhattan to me. Like lots of high rise. So many good places to eat. Great places to drink. Really fun people. Like everyone's up for a good time. Like it's the shopping was amazing. I really had like no expectation of what Hong Kong would be like. And I really didn't. I didn't know if I'd hugely enjoy it. But I was like right sign me off. I want to come back. Did you stay there? Yeah I stayed at the Rosewoods. Nice. Oh my god. Unbelievable. I feel like Asia does hotels like nowhere else. It's huge. It's like it's the biggest hotel I think I've ever stayed in. Actually, no, that's a lie.

7:08I think the Atlantis apartment is maybe the bigger. That's probably the biggest. They had an unreal Indian restaurant in there, like so delicious. The views are amazing. You get this really cute little boat like over to the other side. And I went to visit some friends there and it was her grandma's 90th birthday. So we had a very traditional Hong Kong style dinner. I got like a red packet with like five Hong Kong dollars in it. And yeah, it was amazing. Nikki what about you somewhere you've been this year so January I went to Cape Town and I think it's you know everybody says they love Cape Town but until you've been I don't think you can really feel how amazing it is and just the city is amazing the food options the vibes there the beaches the sea is cold but if you're brave you can get in the water and you don't have to drive very far to be in these unbelievable wild spots um actually went to like this incredible nude beach was not new did not get naked but the beach itself is the most stunning place anyway cape town is a package same time like same time zone is so minimal that like you don't have any kind of issues with that also really affordable insanely affordable i feel like that's what everyone says like you get yourself there and then when you're there it's so affordable the food is particularly is world-class and you're having these incredible meals and you're paying like nothing you know you're having a whole meal with cocktails and wine and three courses and it's like 18 quid each like you've got it's it's insane blue ba first class as well it was really nice i mean

8:34Charlotte Collins:no two better people to talk about collecting points i mean nikki i was going to start with you because like let's kind of go back to the beginning about kind of what this even means because i feel like i'm still so surprised at how many friends i have who are not sort of using their credit cards to amass points to enable travel so kind of can you give us just like a bit of context for like what it actually means and like what you could be doing use it for your everyday spending and more your non-everyday spending too and rack up points and those points can be used in various ways but in my opinion the best way to use your points is on flights it's where you're going to get the best value and there are other ways to earn points but credit cards really are the backbone of that earning strategy because you are so often buying things and spending money and it's so simple it's just happening all the time in the background if you're using anything but a rewards earning credit card you're not getting anything back for it you can use for something tangible something fun and if you're using them in the right way if you learn how to then use your points well you can get real outsized value either to save money or to have experiences that you might not otherwise be able to afford there are different tiers of b8 amex cards available we're talking specifically today about the premium plus card i mean you know off the top of your head like an encyclopedia what that card offers you so what is it what do you get if you have that card okay so you get a higher level of earning per pound so you get 1.5 alveos per pound but also three avios per pound if you're spending with british airways and so that part yeah so that elevated earning is very helpful if you spend 15 000 pounds per card membership year you earn a companion voucher which is incredibly helpful just pay the taxes you have to pay the taxes on both but it reduces the avios price you can also now use that voucher to cut the price of avios in half as an individual traveler because it used to be very much for couples and now it works really well for individual travelers as well that's cool so you can sorry that's your companion voucher you can use to cut your price in half if you're doing it just for you let's say your return business classified is 100 ,000 avios plus the taxes you're going to just pay 50 ,000 plus the taxes that's so clever I did not know that and the really good thing about that voucher it has 24 months validity and also you're able to use it in all cabins premium cabins including business and first fine so you could book one first class ticket and then you could use that your companion voucher that's right you just pay the taxes on both really you're an avid avios collector what is the best trip that you've booked using your avios so I use my avios on my recent trip to kenny with my mum we flew from london to nairobi yeah our flights were super super super affordable using that and we got an option to upgrade in the ba app for a very reasonable price to business class too so it worked out an absolute treat billy brashia billy brashia morning noon and night what's amazing is that you can either clock up those avios by your everyday spending or if you do need to buy one big thing you can also get yourself pretty far into it right i mean my advice would be when you're buying anything so you're gonna you're gonna definitely make a big dent in it buying a sofa or paying for a holiday but you're also going to make a significant dent from your coffee every single day for the whole year and you know add up all those things together you're going to really be uh you're going to be earning and then you can bolster it with other ways of earning avios to end up with lots and lots and lots all the miles what about somewhere short haul you've been this year that you loved anywhere in europe do you know what i went yesterday to a place I've really had in my mind and wanted to go for ages, Tarifa.

11:51Charlotte Collins:Yeah, I hadn't heard of that when you said that. I flew down to Gibraltar and it's about an hour's drive from there. It's a wind surfing, kite surfing town on the beach. So, so cute. Little village, cobbly, windy streets. In Spain? In Spain, yeah. They have vintage shopping. They have amazing beach bars, little chiringitos. Oh, cool. It's fabulous. and if you want an extra adventure you can take the ferry just over to Morocco it only takes an hour that's so cool yeah this is a really dumb comment but it does blow my mind how close I know Africa and Spain are on Monday I sat on the beach and had lunch there and you can just see Africa in front of you that's nuts it's crazy yeah how cool yeah Billy anywhere in Europe my favourite flight to catch is London City BA to Ibiza interesting because I will give London City BA to Mallorca a run for its money tell me why you like the Ibiza one so much oh it's just there's no middle seats it's so quick it's so easy and then you just arrive in ibiza the most fun place in the whole world what about rituals we're talking a lot about flight i mean nikki this has got to be a question for you like can you have rituals if you fly to the extent you do you know do you have like the things that you have to have in your carry on like what what's your flying vibe a few items that always come with me and one is very practical and boring but it is an absolute essential and that is a multi adapter power port that can make any plug takes any plug has usbcs usbas yeah all in one little box that is used constantly all the time my kind of more i don't know if this is this disgusting to talk about i don't know my like lifesaver is the sinus saline sinus rinse bottles you know you shoot it up your nose the salt water comes up the other side clears out anything keeps you moisturized i do it morning and night every day if i'm on a plane i do it on the plane as well it kind of makes my eyes water thinking about it but i really want to try oh it's like it's so satisfying especially when you blow your nose and nothing comes out and then you do this and you're like where did that come from fun and it's uh it's really it's like quite exciting i'm very strict with um timing sleeping i always try and get on the time zone to the place that i'm going um as soon as i possibly can i think that's probably those are like some of my always rituals we've actually had a disagreement before on what is the best ba flight home from New York is that it because I'm from maybe to and from because yeah oh it's the to New York I think because I feel like we really differ what is your preferred way to time to get to New York so I prefer an early afternoon flight that gets you into New York late afternoon because then you can get to your hotel it's enough time to like have an early dinner go to bed too late and you're falling asleep on the plane too early in the day in New York is too long okay yeah because I don't agree I prefer taking a late night flight you can nap for a couple of hours on the plane and then you land and it's like midnight so you get there and you go straight to bed and then there's literally no jet lag philly flying rituals in flight skincare done and dusted don't touch that it's not like we don't cross-pollinate regular day skincare with the in-flight skincare why so what goes in the in-flight one well it's just like hydration spray serum but i'm saying i don't use any of my regular skincare routine in that that's already a lot later done what other rituals are I'm you know I'm so chaotic before a trip like sorry it's embarrassing but I just get so I get too excited wherever I'm going that I don't really sleep that much the night before so I pack so last minute and I normally give myself maybe like three to four hours sleep before the flight and then I know that I'm going to be out for pretty much all the flight and I'd wake up fine yeah sheer panic listening to this so yeah yeah my entire life would be complete chaos type a and type b very Very much quite be.

15:26Charlotte Collins:What about, I think I know the answer based on that for both of you, but what about packing? Are we hand luggage people? Are we taking the kitchen sink? I suspect we are. Well, this is why I'm a chronic overpacker, because when you have a silver status on BA, you are allowed two 32kg suitcases, which means I just forfeit doing an edit and take 20 pairs of shoes on a four-day trip. I've never in my life got on a plane with two suitcases. Oh, regularly? You've checked in two suitcases? Yeah, yeah, yeah. yeah for like a five day trip I have BA gold and if I'm flying I think I can sometimes end up with three 32 kilo bags or if I'm in first I think when I flew first to Cape Town I had four 32 but is that like gear to film stuff oh no I didn't as in I had the option I never I never I used to I used to really like checking in bags actually I thought that being a bit free-handed but now I'll if the trip is short enough I'll do everything I can to get it in get it as carry on because it's just like I want to have my stuff with me the delay of like hanging around waiting for your bag you can arrive at the airport later and you can leave the airport the other end quicker and when you're flying like 100 whatever times a year that's like cumulative like days of your life I do see the benefit to it but my chaos is it's it's unmanageable I've also never heard the word edit for like is that like a girl you haven't spent enough time at shit because that's what I'm going to start using that word and i need to be better yeah this is your this is your travel edit i love that what about prepping for a long-haul flight i also do you know what for somebody who gets quite icky about other people's travel things i am quite specific so like everything has to have 100 battery like i flew i flew home with lou the other day our fashion director about 10 minutes into flight she's like oh have you got a charge on my ipad's dead no why didn't you charge your ipad like i just don't understand that that blows my mind i'm like everything's downloaded i've like downloaded more than i could ever possibly watch everything's charged everything's accessible so like that's my like pre-flight necessities right you guys I do need to be more like you yeah well I just get very stressed I'm not no that's not you I'm on 100 % everything but I then forget about the downloads until about 20 minutes before and I'm like quick quick quick download Charlotte I'm just like you everything is deeply prepared to the point that like my bags are set up in a way that like the important accessible things for example if I know I'm gonna have to take liquids out my bag it's already separated it's in the plastic bag and it's at the top of my bag or the front pocket so that can just be thrown you know this is the kind of level i'm operating i have zero tolerance are you what you're not no i'm a nikki on this okay good you're not busy separating your liquids no no no no no because i already have my bags there you do public service announcements people just be more thoughtful at the security machines like there's no there's no reason to be doing what what 95 of you are doing they suddenly realize although i have to say it's getting a lot better now that nearly most airports now you don't have to take things out which is making life a lot better it is a lot easier what about snacks do you take snacks on the plane um i've got into fruit on planes oh so this is this is so exciting there's so much variety oranges apples i'm pretty i try and stay because again eating i'm very i'm a foodie and so when i'm in environments where i don't need to be like eating rubbish if i supply myself with things like fruit protein bars yeah i'll stop eating rubbish on planes where they have you have like a snack basket the chocolate balls that they have in the in the they used to call it raid the larder do they still call it that i actually can't remember but i took i actually took a cake for my crew um on my last ba flight which they were beyond obsessed with they cut it all up and it was great but they have they also on the same flight being bought a box of the chocolates that they have on board anyway so they were like they have one chocolate on board like just buy them anything else um do you know the crew personally when you get on planes like you must sometimes Crew know me a lot because I do this Cabin Crew Hacks series and lots of crew watch it.

19:15It gets sent around. It's a really fun series. It keeps me entertained when I'm on planes. It happens a lot. They come up to me. They're like, oh, got a hack. I've got a hack for you. Come see me later.

19:23Charlotte Collins:What's the best hack you've ever been given by Cabin Crew? Cucumber. Taking a cucumber on every flight, a full big fat cucumber, eating it on the flight because it's good for hydration and the skin. It's like water and a stick, basically. That's very, very good. Let's go back to destinations. I mean we talked about this year but just in general kind of across across your travel lives where is somewhere that you fall in love with that you didn't expect that you would I went to the Dominican Republic last summer and I really had no expectation I really did I didn't also didn't really know that much about the country and I absolutely loved it so we um we were staying up near Punta Cana um which was amazing because you kind of have this like rainforest on one side the atlantic on the other side and then we drove down to santo domingo and it's such a vibe it looks quite spanish and like madrid vibes but yeah everybody is just there for a good time they's just started dancing in the street and it's a really uplifting great fun energetic place and i i would love to go back it was so enjoyable where did you stay anywhere you recommend we stayed at an alman hotel almanera so i suspect you would recommend yeah i'm very to every hotel you mentioned i'm like i want to go there nikki can pack for me and then you're a dream team actually um nikki what about you this is a bit like a sweeping enormous area but when i was 20 i just packed a bag and went to india by myself i didn't know what to expect i think going is like i really as like a young person was throwing myself in at the deep end with that kind of travel I was beyond obsessed and over the years have gone back and back and back again and spent weeks there at a time all over the whole country uh particularly love uh the north there's a place called Varanasi that was like mind-blowing amazing what why what about it it's microcosm of India you see everything there and you see life right in front of you people go there to die and are born there and there's cows walking on the street and there's people um washing themselves in the Ganges next uh ashes of their bodies being thrown in next to them and it was it like was kind of a life-changing experience going there and has made me drawn me back to India again and again it's it's amazing there I mean you mentioned solo travel that's quite a bold solo travel first destination where where do you recommend people go if they're traveling somewhere by themselves honestly India like I really think like it's a it's a place where you can see and experience so much you don't need to be with people to to be feel part of what's going on even just being there and walking down the street is part of the experience so I think it's an amazing place you'll never there's always something to see and look at and feel something's a great one actually you're never just like alone in your silence you have to be alone with your thoughts which I think is key to traveling and Billy what about you I didn't solo travel to Bali but I do think that would be a great place if you wanted to solo travel because it's so friendly there's so many people there kind of doing a similar thing on a similar journey that's a very cliched thing to say but I do think it is a place that would naturally um create connections and so I think you could easily bounce from place to place around the island and have a great time and meet people and and also have a long time and do your yoga and whatever have a relax but also if you wanted to meet people and do things it would be very very very easy to do that there what about the place that you go back to the most often where where are you going more frequently than anywhere else oh probably ibiza just because i love it i just love it there i love ibiza but i love form and terror and we're very fortunate that friends have got like places that we can stay there and it's amazing but it's it's just so calming and so chill and i do really feel like i know that there's lots of woo woo things about ibiza and there's lots of like feminine energy and divine energy and you know s fedra is like this beacon of womanhood but i buy into it entirely i'm like moon attach me here you know sort this chakra out and i don't know i just feel like it's it's quite like recharging for me it's new york it's really work that takes me back there very regularly i'm probably going every six weeks at the moment and it is just such a great place and there's so much to it, so much to explore.

23:38I really love this feeling now of not needing to do anything because I know I'm going to go again and I'm going to go again. So I'm able to just float around. I try and stay in different areas in the city. And it is just, whether you've been 50 times or once, it's always a magical place.

23:55Charlotte Collins:I so agree. I so agree. Well, I changed my answer. I want to get back to New York. Yeah. I was going to say, I think mine is New York as well. And I'm just like, to be able to go with work, every like not to move there but to be able to go every you know like once a quarter plus is the ideal scenario where do you recommend somewhere you're loving at the moment in new york well i actually just stayed on the lower east side which i don't normally do and it's not it's not so close to the office but there was something this time about being there that was like just super fun it's it's one of like the most buzzy places there's always people on the street every next restaurant is unbelievable I mean New York is a bit like that anyway I just love being on the East side a bit grittier yeah all the reasons I don't like the Lower East side but sure if that works for you yeah it's just it wouldn't be my norm and I just it really I was really vibing it uh it's a couple of weeks ago really like we were there for fashion actually no you were there for the tennis and I was there for fashion yeah a couple of yeah it must have been about two years ago yeah I stayed on the Lower East side and when I say there was like a rave outside my bedroom every single night on the street it was like I like my sleep I need my silence so not for me but the rest of the city.

24:58Charlotte Collins:Oh, I love it. Can we talk a little bit about as well certain statuses and how you can use your points? Because correct me if I'm wrong, if you hit gold status on BA, you can use double Avios to unlock any seat. 30 days ahead. Did you know that? No. Yeah. So like, let's say now you're a gold status. Now, today you need a flight to New York in five weeks time. If there's no Avios availability, you can just unlock it with double Avios. And that's even better in Europe where the Avios cost is much lower. So when you're doubling it, it's not even much of an impact. And that's really where you can save huge amounts of money.

25:30That's one of the reasons I love my gold status.

25:32Charlotte Collins:What about the companion voucher? Have you ever taken somebody somewhere special? When I went to Cape Town in January, that was a trip that I used my companion voucher with my best friend Sam Salter and we flew first class return and it was mega. Sorry, something else that's just reminded you said that. You went somewhere on that trip that I have been, which is super random, which is Bengara Island in, which we were talking about yesterday in Mozambique. Yes. Which is like one of the most special places in the whole world. Yes. Insane. Have you been there? Kasawa. I haven't. Yes. Great place. You win.

26:02Charlotte Collins:You win. You win. I would say that is the best hotel I've ever been to in my life. So I stayed at the Ambion property. I think you stayed on the other one. Is that right? Yeah, Kasawa it's called. Yeah. It was absolutely beyond magical. It's insane. You've got to get yourself there. Adding it to my name. There you go. BA direct to? I'd like to Johannesburg. That's what I did. It's the only way. BA to Joburg. Yeah. And then to Mozambique and all. Yeah. Okay, finally, I want to know what's on the list. Where haven't you been that you really want to go? Do you know a really major country that I've never been, and people are surprised, is Brazil.

26:34I did actually go for one day once, but like Brazil is a place I'm like, it's really, that's really high up there for me. And I don't know, I'd literally go anywhere. I find joy and excitement in everywhere, really.

26:48Charlotte Collins:You talking about Brazil has just reminded me, make sure when you're looking for your Avios flights, top tip, to be looking at multiple destinations within a country because we flew into Sao Paulo and then continued our journey. Basically when you're looking into traveling to a country look at the different routes that are available within that country because there might be avios availability to different destinations. I'm going to double your hack if you want. Did you know when you use a companion voucher you can book what they call an open draw ticket so you can actually book your flight to one destination and out of another.

27:15So for example you could book your avios flight with a companion voucher and go to Cape Town and out of Johannesburg and then have your trip that be the bit in the middle.

27:24Charlotte Collins:I suspect my husband knew that because we did that, but like we came home from somewhere else, but I didn't. So thank you so much. And people at home, maybe you didn't either. Billie, where do you still want to go? Where's on the list? I haven't done any traveling around South America. So I am really, really, really keen to do a stint there. But I do feel like I've got some quite big travel plans for the next six months. So I probably should just chill out for a bit. But the end of next year. You need to come home, start spending, recoup your hours and then off you go again. I'm actually just going to steal Nikki for an hour after this and be like, please help me book my flight.

27:56Top tip. Yeah, you think you're escaping, you're not. We're going to pit your brains for quite a lot longer.

28:00Charlotte Collins:Thank you both so much. I've learned a lot. There's a little holiday in the things you buy. Search BA Amex to learn more about the British Airways American Express Premium Plus card. Representative 136.4 % APR variable. Your rate may vary depending on your circumstances. Annual fee applies. terms apply 18 plus subject to approval thank you so much for listening or watching and we'll see you next time bye