Want to experience the thrills of an amusement park without the horrors of high ticket prices? Meet your favorite characters without sacrificing a limb to gain access to the parks? Where there is a will, there is a way, and the way is paved with credit card points. 

Once upon a time, my parents took me to a land far away called Disney World. It was an amazing trip and even though I was eight and had a good understanding of things, I still enjoyed meeting characters and getting lost in the magic. When I was in high school, my friends in band got to go on a “field trip” and march in a magic kingdom parade. I was green with envy and I’ve been dying to get back to Orlando ever since. 

Now, having said all that about Disney, it might surprise you to know that I instead planned a trip to Universal Studios. Despite my love of Disney and Cartoons, I thought my current tastes and interest would be better catered to at Universal. I mean have you seen the Hogwarts replicas! Squeal!! 

 When I learned that you can travel hack theme park tickets, I immediately started planning a trip to Orlando. I’ve wanted to visit Universal Studios since I was a young tyke but the overall cost of a trip prevented me from ever going. It really sucks when you have time, but not enough money for a big trip like this. Between park tickets, flights, hotels, food, and extras, costs add up quickly. Paying cash never felt realistic, I’m still a young adult with only one very modest income. Even if I could have driven to keep costs lower, here in Southern Mississippi, there’s still 12 hours of road between me and Universal and I’m not willing to drive that considering I only get two weeks of vacation at my big-kid-job. So credit card points came to my rescue. I started learning about this intricate little world to try and maximize my budget and make the most of my everyday spending. 

For this trip I wanted to pay as little out-of-pocket as possible. I brought my boyfriend along, but made him buy his own park tickets; so I was responsible for two round-trip flights, four nights at a hotel and three days worth of park tickets for one person. I bet the suspense is killing you, right? How did she do it? Well, let me explain. 

First the flights. I had recently gotten an 80,000 sign up bonus (SUB) from my first blue bank card, and those points are super flexible because this bank has great transfer partners. Originally I booked my Southwest flights for president’s day weekend. As the time drew nearer for the trip, G and I agreed to push the dates back because neither of us were ready after splurging on Christmas festivities. Luckily, by choosing a different non-holiday weekend,we got back about half of the points we used (and can reuse at a later date) and the parks were less crowded. 

I chose Southwest because they have good award availability, free changes/refunds, and I really appreciate free checked bags. Not to mention, as a large bodied person, I love their person of size policy. Having that extra seat makes a world of difference when it comes to comfort. My stomach spills over the armrest usually and not invading someone else’s space is a relief. I can share more details of this policy later. Round-trip it ended up being around 11,000 points per person +12 in taxes and we were refunded 24,000 points difference from the original flights. We flew into Orlando on a Thursday night (we both worked a half day), and flew out Sunday afternoon. 

Traveling in February, we definitely missed the peak season for Orlando parks and so hotel prices were a little lower. I’ve learned since starting this points hobby, that one of the best bang for your buck points redemption is for Hyatt hotels. Hyatt is also a blue bank transfer partner so I didn’t have to open a Hyatt specific card to get the points. I booked the Hyatt Place across from the park for 8,000 points a night for three nights. Hyatt is one of the few hotel brands that still use a standard award chart for their different categories. Meaning this hotel will be 8,000/night every night in the off season. I probably could have gotten a cheaper hotel for a cash price, but like I mentioned at the beginning, I wanted to spend as little cash as possible for this trip.

It was a nice hotel and while the website says it’s right across from the park, be warned that it is still a sizable walk to the park gates. We used uber to get to and from the park every day and it was about $12 a ride plus a tip. The hotel does have a shuttle, but it’s still like $6 a person each way so it was more convenient to ride share for a similar price. Since we were saving so much on flights and hotels, I didn’t mind spending a little on rides, especially after my feet got wrecked the first day in the park. Even wearing comfortable tennis shoes, just walking for six plus miles put a strain on my little piggies. 

Now, for the moment you’ve all been waiting for. How did she buy her park tickets with points? Well technically, I didn’t. Use a points program that is. No, instead I purchased my tickets on my Capital One Venture card through a website that codes the purchase as travel, and then I “erased” the purchase with rewards points. 

The official Universal or Disney website won’t work for this particular hack. Purchases from these vendors will typically code as an entertainment purchase. I used the site “Undercover Tourist” to buy my tickets and then I used my Venture rewards I earned from the Capital One Venture sign-up bonus to erase the purchase and get a statement credit. The credit posted to my account within a day of redeeming the rewards. Other cards would work for this strategy as well, such as the blue bank ultimate rewards program and I believe Citi travel rewards as well. The tickets MUST be purchased on the card with the erasable rewards and MUST code as travel for its points category.

Now that you know it’s possible, would you credit hack your way into an amusement park? I certainly don’t regret it. By simply putting my everyday purchases on a credit instead of a debit card, I got an almost free trip to Orlando.* After putting off visiting for so long because of the costs of park tickets, plane tickets, and hotels for so long it felt great to finally walk past that giant globe into the park for the first time!

*Not including the price of food/drinks, extra activities, taxis, or rideshares.