The whole idea of a summer vacation is somewhat intoxicating and every time the season approaches closer the lyrics of Will Smith’s song plays in my head.

“Summer summer summertime,
Time to sit back and unwind.”

It will be peak season just about everywhere in the world, and most people are already in the midst of planning their summer travels. Hotels in popular destinations will be priced higher and places crowded, but this is also the time to soak in the beautiful landscapes, enjoy a stroll in the parks and festivals that only take place this time of the year.

If you are already packing your sunscreen and buying a new pair of shades to go with that sun hat, we’d like to remind you about how to be a smart Indian globetrotter and get another vacation out of your summer vacation.

Over the last few weeks, we’ve been sharing tips about how you can earn JPMiles for your hotel stays. In fact, last week I shared a list of 10 offbeat European cities you should put on your list for the summer holidays, along with hotel recommendations from India’s only mileage-earning hotel booking website from JetPrivilege at hotels.jetprivilege.com.

Summer Vacation = Free Vacation. Here is how…

You can choose from over a million plus hotels, villas, farmhouses, retreats, and BnBs. For instance, if you are looking for a family break in India, a farm stay in Ooty could be your getaway. Live in a resort where they have a stable full of horses, a dairy full of cows, a hutch with rabbits and guinea pigs, geese, sheep and a couple of watchful dogs. Your kids could indulge in an organic farming lesson while you take a stroll on the farm.

And not just that, you roughly earn about 3,200 JPMiles for the stay (1,700 JPMiles for the dates we searched, plus 1,000 JPMiles for booking through hotels.jetprivilege.com). Add another 500 JPMiles towards the first stay bonus on your booking with our exclusive promotion (registration required by May 31, 2018)

But that is not all. Let’s say you pay with a JetPrivilege / Jet Airways co-branded credit card, such as the Jet Airways American Express Platinum Credit Card. You would earn 8 JPMiles/INR 150 spent. In this case, that brings you another 1118 JPMiles. And if you apply for the card now, you could be getting an excellent bonus of 20,000 JPMiles (10,000 Sign up Bonus & 10,000 Special Bonus) as a special offer for applying via cards.jetprivilege.com.

That earns you a total of 24,300 JPMiles, which is good to get two round-trip redemption tickets between sectors such as Mumbai/Bengaluru/Hyderabad – Goa, Delhi – Dehradun/Srinagar, Kathmandu – Delhi and many more. There, you have award tickets for your next vacation already.

Vacation around the world

JetPrivilege Hotels are not limited to India. You get tonnes of stay options across the world, thanks to the tie-ups with Booking.com, Agoda and Homestays.com.

For instance, if you are heading to Paris and want to take the kids to Disneyland Paris, there are tons of options to stay overnight since Disneyland Paris is on the outskirts of Paris and a day trip can be very tiring. JetPrivilege Hotels also have cosy apartments close to Disneyland Paris.

Find your ideal vacation spot

One good feature of this site is that you can put your preferences in the filter option and get results to suit your needs.

For example, if you don’t want to leave your four-legged companion behind and are looking to take along your pet pooch on a summer break, then all you have to do is put on the pets filter, and there you have a bunch of pet-friendly hotels listed.

Or if you are looking to head to the beaches of Bali with family and friends, you could rent this 5-bedroom villa that comes with a childcare facility. So while your children ride cycles in the nearby rice paddy fields, you can cool off in the pool overlooking the paddy fields instead of running behind them.

And if it is not you who are going on a vacation but someone else, you can still get JPMiles by helping them book their hotel or homestay on hotels.jetprivilege.com. They are the only people we know who would allow you to earn miles for booking stays for other people.

Everybody’s Contribution to the next Vacation

With JetPrivilege’s MyFamily+ launched in 2014, you can make sure no JPMiles earned go waste.  It works very well when individual members of your family don’t fly often to earn all the miles for free flight tickets themselves. Not just that, your kids aged between 2-11, who could not earn miles earlier, can now open a JetPrivilege account which can also earn JPMiles from their flights. 

The benefit of pooling the entire family’s miles is that anyone in your family can use a redemption ticket, even if they don’t fly much. For example, in my family, my mom, dad, and brother have linked their JetPrivilege accounts, and the last time my mom and dad had to travel to Mumbai on a day’s notice, we redeemed flights for them on miles from the family account and got them award tickets.

Exclusive Offer: Earn Bonus 4,000 JPMiles when you book hotels

To help you get more value for your money, we have tied up with JetPrivilege to bring an exclusive promotion to our readers. JetPrivilege is offering a 1,000 bonus JPMiles for everyone who books and stays before May 31, 2018. However, LiveFromALounge readers do have an opportunity to go even further and earn another 3,000 bonus JPMiles. That’s a total of 4,000 JPMiles! Almost on your way to Goa from Mumbai or other cities, but if you add the JPMiles you will earn from these stays, you are already there!

When you register for this promotion here and make your bookings with the JetPrivilege Hotels portal for yourself or others, you earn JPMiles as per the following schedule:

• 1,500 bonus JPMiles on your 1st completed stay between April 26 and May 31, 2018. (1,000 Bonus JPMiles from the JetPrivilege promotion above, and 500 JPMiles exclusive to LiveFromALounge readers)
• 500 bonus JPMiles on your 1st completed stay between June 1 and July 31, 2018. (500 JPMiles exclusive to LiveFromALounge readers)
• 1,000 bonus JPMiles on your 2nd completed stay before 31st July 2018 (1,000 bonus JPMiles, exclusive to LiveFromALounge readers)
• 1,500 bonus JPMiles on your 3rd completed stay before 31st July 2018 (1,500 JPMiles, exclusive to LiveFromALounge readers.)

You need to add the JetPrivilege membership account number every time you are making a hotel booking for yourself or someone else, to make sure you get the JPMiles credited into your account after the stay is completed. Making use of promotion alone will earn you about 5,000 JPMiles which can get you free flight tickets on multiple domestic sectors.

So, where are you heading to this summers? Have you tried JetPrivilege hotels website?