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I’ve been on a few safaris in my life and one of them was at the Richard Branson Ulusaba safari lodge in South Africa and it was absolutely incredible. Branson doesn’t do anything unless it’s 5 star and top notch. It’s rare to be able to book safaris with points ( You have the JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton in Kenya available on points, and another Marriott in the pipeline), but the prices are very high ( think 200k per night range ).
Finch Hattons, which is a part of Virgin Limited Edition ( same as Ulusaba ), charges $2800 a night for two people, but through the end of June you can book for just 125k points for stays through September. This includes all of your food, game drives, but not transport to the lodge. This is a phenomenal deal especially since Chase has a 25% transfer bonus to Virgin Atlantic meaning you could stay for just 100k Chase points per night and tick a major bucket list experience off your list.
Additionally, Virgin has their points on sale with up to a 70% bonus pricing points at between 1.21 and 1.4 cents per point so you could easily buy the points for this stay and save money compared to the cash rate. They’ve upped the base amount to 200k, meaning you could buy 340k total points ( you’d need 375k for 3 nights ). If you wanted 3 or more nights, you could always have two accounts buy points and book nights from each account.
This is all bookable via Virgin Red
If you have a Virgin Atlantic account you simply link it and your miles will populate in the Virgin Red account and you can then redeem on experiences, flights, hotels, etc.
You can find details on this deal here
- Book by 6/30/25
- Stay by 9/30/25
One thing I would note… Finch Hattons is in Tsavo National Park not Masai Mara. It looks like it should have a great view of Mount Kilamanjaro; however, you would have a completely different terrain than I experienced at JW Marriott Masai Mara.
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
Welcome Offer
Earn 60,000 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
- 5x on all travel purchased through Chase Travel℠
- 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)
- $50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit via Chase Travel℠
- The begins immediately for new cardmembers and after your account anniversary for existing cardmembers
- 2x on all other travel
- 10% Anniversary Points Boost
- each account anniversary you’ll earn bonus points equal to 10% of your total purchases made the previous year
- Chase Sapphire Preferred continues to redeem at 1.25c in the Chase Travel℠ and the slew of other benefits remain in tact including Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver ( primary ), purchase protections, etc.
- Points are transferrable to 14 Ultimate Rewards partners
- Redeem in Chase Travel℠ for 1.25 cents per point
- 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
- $95 Annual Fee
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® is exceptional 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: Ink Business Cash® , Ink Business Unlimited® you can combine the points into Preferred account and transfer into hotel and airline partners
Annual fee is quite low at $95 a year + you get a 10% anniversary bonus on points + $50 hotel credit in Chase travel.
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