Our Favorite Place To Vacation In Florida

Our favorite place to vacation in Florida is known as 30A, a scenic 24-mile stretch of county road between Destin and Panama City, located in the Florida panhandle. 30A is home to several picturesque, upscale beach towns with powdery white sand and captivating emerald green-blue waters. The communities along 30A are masterfully planned and they each have their own distinct personality. You’ll find beautiful beach bungalows and adorable coastal cottages to rent. What you won’t find are commercial high-rise condos and touristy restaurant chains, which is what makes 30A so charming and special. However, because there are no commercial hotel brands in the area, redeeming points for our 30A trips is a bit more challenging.

Here’s how we travel on points and miles to 30A…

Flights To 30A

There are 3 airports near 30A: Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport (ECP), Destin-Fort Walton Beach Airport (VPS), and Pensacola International Airport (PNS). ECP is about a 30-minute drive from 30A, VPS is about an hour away, and PNS is about 2 hours. 

The easiest way to find nonstop flights to ECP, VPS, and PNS is to look up the Wikipedia page for each airport, click on “Airlines and Destinations” on the left-hand side of the screen, and take note of which airlines fly nonstop passenger flight routes. Then, enter that info into my Award Flight Search spreadsheet to start searching for and comparing your options.

Southwest Airlines operates several nonstop flights between BNA (our home airport) and all 3 of these Florida airports, but we chose to fly into VPS because the points prices were lowest and the flight times were the most convenient of the 3 options. I redeemed our Rapid Rewards points for Adam and me, used 2 Companion Passes for our kiddos, and paid just $22.40 for the taxes and fees for our 4 flights to Destin. It’s a quick, nonstop 1.5-hour flight from BNA to VPS. Easy peasy.

Lodging In 30A

Most of the lodging in 30A are rental homes. You can book directly with homeowners and property management teams or use rental home sites such as Airbnb and VRBO. We usually book cute beach bungalows via Airbnb and have been very happy with our accommodations. Some rentals even come with golf carts and bicycles to ride from town to town!

While we can’t redeem points and miles for lodging, we are able to lower the cash cost by using the travel credits available to us. Adam and I each have this credit card, which comes with an annual $300 travel credit (so, $600 total). This credit card benefit is one of the easiest to take advantage of because the $300 credit covers all sorts of travel expenses such as hotels, rental cars, train tickets, taxis, ride-shares, airline charges, toll bridges, cruise lines, and more. Additionally, after you use up the travel credit, you’ll earn 3 points per dollar spent on any other travel purchases.

Last year and this year we vacationed at 30A with another family, so we usually rent a home large enough for all of us to share. The rates vary with each rental home, but just as an example, the 4-bedroom, 3.5 bath home we rented this year was $254 per night plus various Airbnb service and cleaning fees, which came to a total of $1,309 for a 3-night stay. We split the payment up between our two credit cards and were able to utilize the $300 credit (x2) which brought the total down to $709.

30A Budget Breakdown

• (2) Flights from BNA to VPS on Southwest Airlines: 17,616 points + $11.20 taxes/fees.
• (2) Southwest Companion Passes: 0 points + $11.20 taxes/fees.
• (3) Nights at an Airbnb Rental: $1,309 – $600 travel credit = $709.
• (2) Flights from VPS to BNA on Southwest Airlines: 20,860 points + $11.20 taxes/fees.
• (2) Southwest Companion Passes: 0 points + $11.20 taxes/fees.

Total Cash Cost: $753.80.

While this cash total is substantially more than our previous vacations, we were able to save quite a bit of money thanks to airline miles and credit card benefits. I priced out the cost had we paid cash for the entire trip and it would have been almost $4,000!