Rob could not find time to go away during Spring Break, 2010. $%&%$#@#$%&. (Read as cursing). However, I did not want to stay home for an entire week alone with my kids who were then ages, 6,6 and 8. Shoot Me! To convince Rob to “let” us go away without him, I knew I had to make it a pretty good deal. And that I did! With my sister-in-law, Jackie, in tow as the other parent, we headed out to Arizona and stayed 5 nights in Scottsdale, at the Phoenician.
The Phoenician is part of the Starwood Preferred Guest Luxury Collection and is an SPG Category 5 hotel. Back then, I booked the room for 12,000 Starpoints per night and we got the 5th night for free. So we used 48,000 Starpoints for our 5 night stay. Conservatively, rooms ran about $350 per night. I saved $1,400 using Starpoints. How could Rob have said no to that?

I should note, that I think the Phoenician needs a little TLC. Also, as with our stay at the St. Regis in Miami, even though you are staying for free, it is very expensive to eat at the hotel and take advantage of some of the hotel amenities. Luckily, we only spent about 1 day hanging at the hotel. For the most part we explored Scottsdale.
We did a great desert jeep tour, experienced the Old West at Rawhide, shopped and explored downtown and Old Town Scottsdale, and hiked 2 mountains. The first was Camelback Mountain, which is the mountain that you see behind the hotel and the 2nd one (with a hiking guide) was Piestewa Peak. It was a great 5 days even without Rob. 🙂