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Review: Intercontinental Austin Deluxe King Room
This is where we spent the 2nd night on our surprise trip to Austin. The Intercontinental Austin is located smack in the middle of everything at Congress and 7th. If you aren’t familiar with Austin, this is a great location, near the nightlife, but also walking distance to the Capitol building and the River. The Intercontinental Austin is named after Stephen F. Austin, who is known as the “father of Texas” and also who the city of Austin is named after. The first night we actually stayed at two hotels, the Driskill, and the JW Marriott. If you’re interested in our “experience” check out the Driskill review of room 525.
I ended up using my free night from my IHG Chase card, which if you don’t have IT.IS.A.MUST. $49 annual fee and I got this night free, which would have cost over $300 ( including taxes). The official site is here if you’d like to read more
The Deets:
- When – September 2016
- How much – FREEEE courtesy of the Chase IHG card
- Typical cost: 50,000
- Room Type – King
- Loyalty: IHG
- Status: Platinum
- Other benefits – upgraded to Deluxe King
Check in
Swift and pleasant. Intercontinental has their own loyalty program named Ambassador. It’s a fee based program, costing $200 the first year and $150 every subsequent years. I’ve definitely flirted with the idea of joining, but haven’t made the plunge. I know quite a few people that believe the program is well worth the investment, but I’ve aligned my stays more with Hyatt and Marriott and haven’t found it a value to me. There was a guest checking in after me, and they were pitching Ambassador to him, saying they would give him Club Level free, and also put him in a suite. Pretty good swag – WHY DIDN’T THEY ASK MEEEEE. I prolly would have bitten. Anyways…I did receive a 1 category room for being an IHG Platinum which was unexpected.
Our upgraded room: King Deluxe
We were really pleased with the room. There are quite a few suites in the hotel, but the King Deluxe basically serves as a Junior Suite. So unless you specifically want/need a suite with a separate seating area this room is plenty big. We were also offered club access for $45 which we took.
Club Level
The club room is located right next to check-in. It offers afternoon drinks, champagne, tea, and breakfast in the morning. We ultimately didn’t make it to breakfast so I can’t report back on how good it is, but from the menu it looks pretty solid. If you think you’d have any drinks and/or breakfast, the $40 charge for club level is a good deal.
The afternoon presentation:
The Bar and Outdoor balcony
I think the outdoor balcony is the coolest part of the hotel. We spent a few hours there just enjoying the weather and sipping a drink. It’s a unique aspect of the hotel, and makes me think back to when the hotel was first built over 60 year ago. It’s really cool sitting up above Congress and just enjoying the day or night.
The Gym and Pool:
The gym has just about everything you could possibly want from a hotel gym. The only downside is that it’s in the basement which gives it a sliiiiiiightly depressing feel, butttt the gym does look straight into the pool which made Miles happy. Had we been there a bit longer I would have definitely made use of the facilities, but we were too busy having FUN! 
Overall:
I really enjoyed the Intercontinental Austin. It’s a solid 4 star hotel with an outstanding location and cool history. If you’re looking for a more modern feel I would highly recommend the JW Marriott, but this hotel was superb. I mean…it was free – aside from the $40 club level upgrade. I suppose if you think about it I did pay $49 for the annual fee, but I’ve also accumulated over 130k bonus points from the sign up ( 70) and priceless surprises promotion ( I netted roughly 60k) in roughly a year’s time. Not bad.
This experience illustrates one of the reasons I most love this obsessive hobby. It creates opportunities to have incredible experiences at a cost that most people can swallow.
Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.
Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card went through a major refresh in 2026 adding new bonus categories, travel protections, statement credits, and remains one of the best travel starter cards in the market. It earns Premium Ultimate Rewards that can be transferred into over a dozen partners many of which are US based including Hyatt, Southwest, United, IHG, and Marriott. Note that Hyatt is now a 4:3 transfer partner
Welcome Offer
Earn 100,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening
Annual Fee
$95
Points Earned
Transferrable Chase Ultimate Rewards
Earn
- 5x on all travel purchased through Chase Travel℠
- NEW ACCELERATED EARN CATEGORY: 3x points on gas and EV charging
- NEW ACCELERATED EARN CATEGORY: 3x points on vacation homes at top brands
- Cardmembers will earn 3x points on vacation homes at these top brands: Airbnb, Vrbo, Plu Guide, HomeAway, Homestay.com and Vacasa.
- 3x on dining, including eligible delivery services for takeout & dining out
- 3x on select streaming services
- 3x on online grocery purchases
- (excluding Target, Walmart and wholesale clubs)
- 2x on all other travel
- 1x on everyday purchases
- 5x points on Lyft rides Earn 5x total points on eligible Lyft rides including ride share, bike and scooter rides and subscription and membership products through September 30, 2027.
- 5x total points on Peloton equipment Earn 5x total points on eligible Peloton equipment and accessory purchases over $150 through December 31, 2027.
Benefits and Credits
- $100 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit via Chase Travel℠
- NEW: $120 Global Entry, TSA PreCheck or NEXUS fee credit Cardmembers will receive one statement credit of up to $120 every four years as reimbursement for the application fee charged to the card.
- NEW: Complimentary Apple TV subscription for one year
- Points are transferrable to 14 Ultimate Rewards partners
- No foreign transaction fees
- Suite of Travel and Purchase Coverage
- Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver is my favorite
- Complimentary DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees & lower service fees for a min. of one year when you activate by 12/31/27. Plus, a $10 promo each month on non-restaurant orders
We keep an up to date spreadsheet that lists the best ever offers: You can find that spreadsheet here.
Historically 80k is a very, very good offer and hit in both 2022 and 2023. In 2021, we saw the offer hit an all time high of 100k. Who knows if that will ever come back.
Main Cast:
Cards that earn flexible points and should be used on the bulk of your purchases.
Supporting Cast:
Cards that earn fixed points in the currency of the airline/hotel and can not be transferred at attractive rates. These cards yield benefits that make it worth keeping, but not necessarily worth putting a lot of your everyday spend on.
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is great starter card and offers transferrable Ultimate Rewards, and pairs well with other Chase cards.
If you carry this card alongside Chase’s cashback cards like the Chase Freedom Flex® and Chase Freedom Unlimited® or the business versions: Chase Ink Business Cash® , Chase Ink Business Unlimited® you can combine the points into the Sapphire Preferred account and transfer into hotel and airline partners
Annual fee remains quite low at $95 a year and if you use the $100 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit via Chase Travel℠ you’ll wipe out that annual fee every year. It has great bonus categories and other useful statement credits to enhance your travel.
One thing that is a bummer is Chase lowered the transfer ratio to World of Hyatt from 1:1 to 4:3.
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